This is Figaro. And the reason he looks like fox now is because he needed an eye surgery. It was expensive and stressful, and I wanted to use him to make a point. Often I have people, mostly kids but also many older kids and adults, telling me how lucky I am to do cat rescue. Now, I agree heavily with that statement. But do not be fooled, it is a JOB. It is WORK. It is PAYING to work. It’s heartbreaking, hard, and often times, expensive. There are sacrifices. For your time, money, and honesty personal belongings. Sometimes even emotional state. While, yes, there is a side of cat rescue that is genuinely fun, rewarding, easy, and heartwarming. With cute kittens and happy endings. The other side is death, heartbreak, mistakes, guilt, money, and people problems.. to say the least. It’s hard work. It’s not all fun and games. While cat rescue does help my emotional state a lot of the time, it also breaks it. My purpose for joining scratch, in the beginning, was to try and get more cat rescuers from the next generation in the community and teach them the right ways of doing things and breaking common misconceptions and stereotypes. While that is still my goal, and I make the hardships of cat rescue very clear, many people are still telling me how wonderful cat rescue sounds and how it’s amazing I can easily do such an wonderful thing. It Is wonderful.. but it is hard. We have sacrificed so much for these cats. That’s it. If you want to do cat rescue, you need to be prepared for this. If you’re prepared for the death, the facial mistakes you WILL make, the hard work, the money, the heartbreak of giving up a cat you love, of dealing with jerks using you, and seeing animals in pain. Then yes, you get the reward of having little kittens to play with and that reward of a sense of accomplishment when something goes right. But do not be fooled, that prize. Those smiles. The cute stories. They’re rewards for the hard work you’ll need to put in.
