The fluffy life-saver. True story. |
A little more than nine years ago, 2 wonderful Maine Coon cats came to stay with me "for a weekend." Micah and Talllulah Belle are half-siblings, same father; different mothers. Both had been purchased as kittens by a woman I worked with at the time.
She began dating a guy who had a Labrador retriever who hated and would kill cats. They became engaged and were going out of town for a weekend to celebrate. Their dogs were boarded with the veternarian, and her cats came to stay for the weekend. They have been with me ever since! She just never came back and got them and soon they became "my" cats.
From the beginning, they slept on the bed with me. Tallulah is cold natured and likes to sleep under the cover with me year round. Micah sprawls across the opposite corner of my king sized bed...he does NOT like being covered up.
A few years ago, I was awakened by Micah about 4:30 a.m., as he was licking my hair really fast and taking his teeth and scraping my scalp. I woke up fighting him off and yelling at him, "Micah, what are you doing?" As soon as I woke up, he stopped this behavior and went back to his corner of the bed and plopped back down.
Later, as I was thinking about why he had demonstrated this behavior, I wondered if perhaps I had sleep apnea and had stopped breathing. I asked my doctor about this possibility when I next saw him and his response was to send me for a sleep study. Sure enough, I found I have sleep apnea and I now have a CPAP machine to use when I am sleeping.
Occasionally though, I may nap on the bed without using the CPAP machine, and several times I have felt Micah's whiskers under my nose when I'm kind of in that twilight time of just dozing off or just waking up. My hero Micah continues to look after me and there is a lot of comfort in knowing he is there. Anyone who says cats aren't as smart as dogs needs to look no further than my Micah and they will change their tunes. He certainly wasn't taught to rouse me up when I quit breathing, but he seemed to know instinctively what to do. I thank him for that and treat him like he's king of the house, needless to say.
Jean Edwards
Irmo, SC, USA
mzmystical@aol.com
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