Autism, Dancing, & Kittens

In our household, a pet has been a pretty difficult thing for us to squeeze into our already hectic life. Logan's aggression issues would be a real problem if we got a dog. I am afraid a dog would bite him if provoked.

My oldest son, with high functioning autism, is an animal lover. He loves all animals big and small. So I bought him a fish. He wasn't completely disappointed with the fish. Let's be honest, a fish is hard to snuggle with, take on walks, pet, or play fetch with.

Everything changed the day before Hurricane Irene came. My husband in a hurry for work was walking down the steps and heard a small cry come from the bushes. He stopped and listened and sure enough..."meow"..."meow". He got down and looked in the bush and there sat the most adorable blonde tabby kitten. We live next to my in-laws that have three black labs that are not known for their love of cats so my husband scooped the kitten up and brought him in the house.

I said, "What are we going to do with it?" with a look of shock on my face.

Most moms would have been freaking about letting the kitten take it's chances with Hurricane Irene or the three ferocious black labs next door, but not me.

All I could think was..."Logan is going to squeeze the juice out of this kitten".

My husband was like, well we can't leave him out for the storm to sweep him away and you know if the storm doesn't get him then the labs will.

"This is true", I thought. So we named her (appropriately) Irene.

Now we are talking about an almost three year old child that has just recently gotten over his texture aversions to fleece and fur (stuffed animals and the like) and we are going to throw a fuzzy kitten into the mix. Someone shoot me now!

The boys had already left for school and when Logan woke up I showed him the kitten. The biggest grin came over him and he kept saying "Cat"..."Cat"..."Cat"...in echolalia style.

Day 1 did not go so great. It was Logan versus the Kitten and let's say...Logan won hands down.

Day 2, not much better.

Day 3, some improvement.

Day 4, the shiny started wearing off a little.

And the days came and went and after lots of scratches and lots of scolding, Logan began to realize that the cat is our friend. It took a few days but slowly but surely, Nick Jr. began to take it's number one spot back and the kitten was eased in the the second place spot.

Because we all know that dancing comes first with Logan, the cat actually got repreive when Logan's favorite shows came on. I think I actually saw the kitten smile in relief when the Fresh Beat Band comes on.

"Ahhhh...Thank God!", the cat must be saying.

I think things are going to work out just fine. Now to figure out how to keep Logan from drinking out of the water bowl.