Adopted A Blind Kitten & Looking For Resources

I have two cats (brother and sister litter mates who just turned 13 months) that I adopted at 12 weeks last November after my best friend rescued a pregnant cat and insisted they needed to live with me :-)  

I am now mommy to a  blind kitten (Angel) that I adopted from a rescue shelter three weeks ago and am looking for some resources. Her foster mom said that she had a respiratory infection when they found her and they were able to save her eyes, but not her vision so I don't think she ever really had the ability to see, which I think is probably a good thing since she doesn't know she is missing a sense. She learned how to get around my bedroom and bathroom in just two days and knows exactly where everything in the house is now. I'm a proud mommy. :-)

I kept them separated for the first week while Angel was getting used to my bedroom and when I slowly introduced them the next week, they would hiss (which I expected) and swiped at her if she accidentally got too close. After two weeks, Nala and Shai have finally stopped hissing at Angel, but now they just mainly ignore her and I can see she knows they are there when she walks up to them and they either get up and leave or swat at her with her paw. She doesn't understand why they don't want to play with her.  

Any suggestions on how to socialize her better with her new siblings?  I've been giving Nala and Shai alone time with mommy so they know they haven't been replaced in my affections by this new intruder, but I also think a lot has to do with the fact that they were always wrapped around each other even when they were with their other siblings before I adopted them. They are so close with each other that I am at a loss on how to get them to accept a newcomer.

I am also looking for suggestions on teaching Angel how to jump. She's almost 20 weeks and she is an amazing climber. I have a platform bed and she will scale up the side of it and when she wants down, she will leverage herself off the side and then drop down. Which is funny because she is timid about getting down from the sofa and it's a lot lower to the ground than the bed is.

She can't see her brother and sister jumping to learn how so I'm hoping there are some resources available out there that can give guidance on how I can teach her.

Thanks very much in advance! Any resource suggestions or advice would be greatly appreciated.

These are my furbabies.  Nala is the black male and Shai is his tuxedo-ed sister. They just turned a year old last month.


And this is Angel. She is almost 20 weeks old now.

Hello and welcome to TCS. Thank you so much for adopting little Angel.

I don't know how you can teach her to jump, but I can tell you that, with time, your older kitties will come around to accepting her. Sounds like you have done everything right in their introductions, and making the older 2 still feel loved, so just give them time. You could perhaps invest in a few Feliway diffusers to help.

Since she is still young and has already adjusted so well to your house, maybe with time also will come the confidence to jump. Jumping without seeing where your landing has to be a bit scary.  It will be important to not move objects/furniture, ect from where she is used to them being. Good Luck.  

I am guessing but would think you do not want her to jump from anything she is not very familiar with and knows how high it is. Also that you keep the space very organized so if you did get her confident to jump she wouldn't land on anything unsuspected and hurt herself.  

There may be an experienced person or expert out there but I suspect that there may be issues with the righting reflexes and mechanisms cat use to balance and control their fall so they land on their feat as sight will contribute to that.  Hopefully you will get plenty advice from people who have already been through this. I know I have recently posted on another thread with someone who has a blind kitten and you are definitely not alone as you help your extra special kitten grow and learn and play.  

In many ways I think it's best to keep her on fairly level surfaces for now, but start to introduce her to small drops from regular furniture you have like a low foot stool, being with her and encouraging her with touch and voice, giving sounds to show her where the ground level is e.g. her on the edge of a low stool and scratching the carpet or moving a toy on the floor below so she starts to learn about and judge distances from her hearing with you reassuring her it is safe.  Gradually increase any drop as you observe how she copes. 

Give her lots of opportunities to experience different surfaces, hard, soft, lumpy, slippery, and so forth.  Also rooms that are clear spaces and a bit echoey and ones that are more cosy.  Many blind people now use a highly developed acute sense of hearing to navigate around even unfamiliar places by recognizing how sound deflects of different surfaces around them.

Your little cat will learn to use her hearing, smell, and her touch senses (esp whiskers) to explore, she will need you to start showing her some of the riskier places where she could fall from though.  Use words to alert her if she is getting close to something that isn't safe too, that way you can start to allow her to roam a little further afield without being right next to her all the time.

Learn about cat senses, what they experience and feel and what they don't. Sight is not one of their most acute senses so I am sure she will cope well esp. given that she is learning as a kitten. I had two cats who went blind in their pensioner years and even then adapted well to negotiating their space  - one of them was still bouncing up and down off furniture and terrorizing her sister like a young cat and I didn't know she was blind until she walked in to a lit candle one day. (No one hurt, just red wax all down my sitting room wall).  One important difference is their not feeling heat on their body. This presents particular risks for her, especially if you have a fire, candles, or cooker hob that she needs to learn about. I think it is only their paw pads and mouth that they can feel hot with so take particular care around anything like this.

Good luck, I hope she starts to explore and learn all about her world with you and your other cats start to welcome her in to their space so she has some cat companionship too.  Thank you for looking after this special kitty.    

In some ways she is fearless, but in others unsure of herself. I taught her how to use the stairs to get into bed with me, but if she is on the other side of the bed, she will scale it where the bedspread hangs down lower to climb into bed. She doesn't seem to remember where the stairs are located even if she climbs up them. I guess it's that the bed is a rectangle and it's hard to distinguish the different corners from one another. If I'm not awake to tap on the stairs to help her hear where the way down is, I've woken to find her easing her body over the side and climbing down the spread and then dropping to the floor.

She claws her way up onto the sofa and reading chair, but she isn't comfortable with getting down even though they are closer to the ground than my bed is. I mainly want to help her learn to jump up and down onto the sofa and so she doesn't feel trapped on the sofa if I'm not there to help her down.

Nala and Shai are doing much better. I think they realize that Angel isn't going anywhere and mommy still loves them, although they will still give her a swat if she walks too close to them on her way to where she is going. We're working on that. :-)

Here's a photo of Angel the first time she navigated the stairs down by herself.


She is definitely helping me to be neater. I can't kick my shoes off when I come in or drop packages on the floor. She need to be able to know that they way is always clear for her, but I'm naturally a bit of a slob when it comes to housekeeping. She's teaching me new habits. :-)

Those stairs are a great idea. We have a number of threads about blind kittens that might be of help: http://www.thecatsite.com/newsearch?search=blind+kitten

There's a book about a blind kitten that you might find interesting: Homer's Odyssey, by Gwen Cooper.

Everybody warned that Homer would always be an “underachiever.” But the kitten nobody believed in quickly grew into a three-pound dynamo with a giant heart who eagerly made friends with every human who crossed his path. Homer scaled seven-foot bookcases with ease, survived being trapped alone for days after 9/11 in an apartment near the World Trade Center, and even saved Gwen’s life when he chased off an intruder who broke into their home in the middle of the night. But it was Homer’s unswerving loyalty, his infinite capacity for love, and his joy in the face of all obstacles that transformed Gwen’s life.

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Thanks for the link!  I will check it out.

Gwen's book is the reason I have Angel. I fell in love with Homer so when I saw the listing for Angel with her photo, well she also stole my heart, and after reading how well Homer flourished I knew I could give her a good home. :-)

Oskar the blind cat might be an inspiration to you as well.  Here's his page:  http://www.blindoskar.com/   His owners also have set up a You Tube channel where you can see Oskar & his buddy Klaus in action.  They are so cute!  http://www.youtube.com/user/Mick12321kciM?feature=mhee   Lastly, Oskar also has a facebook page, so if you're on Facebook, look him up!  https://www.facebook.com/BlindOskar  

Champ here!  A blind siamese cat.  I was blinded in an accident and adopted into a home with 2 new brothers and 1 sister.  

I didn't need much socialization.  My mom kept me separate from them for 2 days but separated only by a door.  We could smell and hear each other.  After that, we were buds.

As for jumping, I don't jump much.  Too much uncertainty.  But if I'm on the couch or on the bed and aware how far it is down, it didn't take me long to figure out the jumping thing.  We cats just figure out blindness and carry on.

Here's my story (like me on facebook!):  https://www.facebook.com/ChampTheBlindSiameseCat