Not even a week ago, I was joyously telling you about Sophie the Cat’s entry into our lives. Today, sadly, I will be sharing her exit.

Let me start by saying that I really, really wanted this to work. Even though I’m not a cat person I wanted to be able to give my children their hearts’ desire and really did feel that this was God’s leading. Things started out well. She was using the litter box, followed us around, and seemed like a very reasonable cat. Then Saturday came.

Saturday night after the girls went to bed, Sophie started going from window to window yowling wanting to go outside. This got progressively worse over the next two nights until Monday night-Tuesday morning when she decided to climb the screen of our bedroom window at 3:00 a.m. Being we have Andersen windows, the screens are on the insides of the windows, which is NOT conducive to owning a cat. My husband marched her to the basement and closed her in the bathroom with her litter box. Tuesday morning when he let her out, she promptly came upstairs, went in my closet, and peed on my jeans. Not scoring points here.

I spent Tuesday in a tizzy. I already had problems with the fact that cats, and Sophie is no exception, walk all over everything–the kitchen table, the kitchen counter, the bookshelves, my desk, my lap, the window sills. And, while I am not a neat freak by any stretch of the imagination, there is just something that grosses me out about four little feet that have been scratching around in a mini sandbox with urine and feces walking around on the surfaces I use to prepare and consume food. Add to that her little pee-on-the-jeans trick, and I was freaking out.

Last night, same thing. Attempting to get out of every window in the house and mewing/yowling constantly. My husband again shut her up in the bathroom in the basement. She literally bounced off the walls attempting to get to the small window at the top of the wall in there. This morning, when he let her out, she followed him upstairs to our bathroom, found a pile of dirty clothes, and peed on them.

The desperation to get outside and the peeing on the clothes might mean that she is in “heat”, which would mean it is temporary. But, there are the other matters I noted above that I would still have problems with, and they are present all the time with cats.

Granted, I knew all this about cats going into this. I had hoped that since it seemed rather like God had answered a prayer here that He would also have changed my heart, toward this particular cat if nothing else. He didn’t. I guess He did change it a bit in that I was willing to do something I had never considered before to give my children something they so desperately wanted. But, I would think if He truly wanted me to have a cat He would also make me at peace with it, and I’m just not. Even before the bad behavior started I was on edge with her around.

So, this morning we had a little cat meeting with the girls to break the news that Sophie will need to go back to the shelter so she can find a new home that is right for her. I expected the middle one to take it hard since she was the one who “found” Sophie. She took it okay. The oldest one, however, was devastated. She understands the reasons, but reasons don’t make things hurt any less. We want to think they will, but they don’t. And, we’ve always had the suspicion that the oldest was part cat anyway. Those of you that know her will understand. She, however, can be trained to not walk on the counters and to wash her hands after using the bathroom.

There. Tell me I’m a bad mother, even though this provides a good teachable moment for practical life skills on making responsible choices (by showing what happens when Mom didn’t make one), dealing with emotions, and knowing when you’ve gotten yourself in too deep. Call me lazy, a quitter, a fool, or any other bad name you want to give me. I can take it, I’ve already called myself all of them and maybe even a few you haven’t thought of. I have learned my lesson. We are a NO PET family. The business manager of the school I work at told me you get the perfect pet for you only once in your lifetime. And, we had ours in Helga.