HELP! Could she be pregnant?!?

Cat people. . . I have a question. We got a rescue cat aboit a year ago. She was estimated at about four years old but I always thought she was younger. Anyway due to some health issues she needed to be an indoor cat. I was told they didn't know if she had been spayed and I would need to see if she came into heat. We've had her nearly a year and ive never noticed her go into heat. When my other cats have gone into heat its been really obvious. So I guessed she'd been done before she came to be rescued. Recently we've had a local cat break into our house. It (not sure its gender) couldn't get out again so I came home to find it in my kitchen. This was a few weeks ago and now I'm noticing she's licking her belly / behind area a lot and she's got quite a gut on her. Could she be pregnant if ive never known her to go into heat? Or is she just fat and needs to cut out the dreamies? Any advice greatly appreciated. Ill take her to the vets if anything becomes obvious or she seems in distress but she is an extremely anxious cat and going to the vets will cause her weeks of depressed behaviour so id like to avoid stressing her if its not necessary. X

She may have silent heats. Or just be too timid to show any outward symptoms. A shame if she is pregnant, really, because if she's that timid/skittish I don't know what motherhood will do to her :/.

But anyway. . .how do her nipples look? Usually they start getting pinker about 3 weeks along, although not all cats follow the rules :tongue2:. I guess you'll know soon enough, no matter what. . .do you remember exactly when the other cat was in your house? Cats are pregnant for 9 weeks (about 63 days) so just count back from then.

If she's not too far along, you can do a spay/abort. If you and your vet are comfortable with that.

Thanks Willowy.
I can't see her nipples because shes too furry and despises her belly being touched. The general rule regarding her is if you leave her too it shes the happiest most affectionate cat ever. But mess about with her or change her environment and she'll be physically ill and withdrawn for weeks. I guess the next week or two might tell as I think it was about three weeks ago. I wish I knew if she'd ever been done but the vet said tge only way to know for sure would be to open her up. But because she had to be a house cat (had a split pallete when she was rescued and can choke easily amongst other things )