For me, one of the bonuses about being pregnant was getting to wrangle out of a household chore that I really despise: cleaning the catbox.
As everyone knows, pregnant women aren’t supposed to clean the litterbox. And since I always followed the pregnancy letter of the law to a “T”, I made this tidbit known to my husband pretty much the moment we found out we were expecting. “It’s just not safe for the baby,” I explained, while munching on a cold cut sandwich.
So he obliged. And, to my delight, he continued cleaning it weekly, even after the babies were born.
I admit, I also didn’t offer to take it back. I figure I cleaned up enough human poop to make up for it. But that meant that for the past six years, I’ve been lucky enough to stay far, far away from the litter box.
Until this morning.
Today is Booyah’s routine pet exam. And apparently, since she’s getting up there in cat years, we get to take something extra to her annual exams.
A fecal sample. More specifically, a fresh fecal sample.
Now, if you’re a dog owner, this might not seem like a big deal to you. If you’re like all-but-one-of-my-neighbors, you’re probably used to scooping up the little gems in tidy little plastic bags and depositing the warm little presents in the garbage.
But for a cat owner, and more specifically, for a cat owner who has grown accustomed to not handling animal turds, it is a big deal.
So here I am, typing away at the computer. Waiting for Booyah to drop a deuce so that I can go hunting through the litter box for nuggets. It’s like waiting for the grass to grow. Only stinkier.
After which I get to wrestle my angry, scratching pet into a cat carrier that she loathes more than anything. And then I’ll drive said cat, moaning and hissing to the vet and back.
It almost makes me wish I were pregnant again, so I could delegate that task to my wonderful husband.
But on the plus side, I figure my day can only go up from here.
Oh hey, I got out of cleaning the litter box too! Unfortunately, as soon as the baby was born, the job was handed back to me, bah.
Collecting poop from the litter box? SO NASTY. I’m so sorry you have to this this. The cat-wrestling-into-carrier thing too – my cat once peed on me when he escaped from the carrier after 5 minutes of us wrestling (me to get him in, him to get the hell out).
I feel for you, I really.
p/s* My 2 cats have since been re-homed.
Ha! We didn’t have a cat so I totally made my hubby clean the bathrooms while I was preggo. I made up some story about not being able to.
I am hoping your day got better, if it didn’t I am sure I will be reading about it. 🙂
Oh gosh, I can see you, I used to have three of them, three girls, but I never had to do collect their output. But it was my task to clean the box, until I started with the betting. The loser had to clean it for a month. Worked pretty good for me, he he. But that was many many years before I was even thinking about a child. But going to the pet (2x per year for vaccinations) I was planning ahead. I locked each of the cats in one room and just collected them, ‘stuffed’ two cats in one carrier, and the wild one in a carrier of her own. Wearing gloves and being quick with the ‘stuffing’ helped a lot. 🙂
Quick! Fake a pregnancy! You can totally color in those blue lines as needed.
That’s actually how I told my husband I was pregnant. I said,”Honey, I have some bad news. I can’t clean out the cat box anymore!”
It’s time to get pregnant again…or fake a back injury in which it prevents you from bending like me. See I play the “Oh honey, my back remember?” card all the time.
Or you can go and get your nails did and play it off that you can’t get cat ka ka on them.
Bad enough to collect it once, but can you imagine being the person whose job it to attend to cat poop. God bless. I don’t have a strong enough stomach for any of it.
Hope everything comes out okay! lol
oh man, i don’t know who I feel worse for – you or Booyah. the task of cleaning the litterbox falls to me in our house too. and like you, I very much enjoyed my hiatus from that activity while i was pregnant.
I wish you “smooth” sailing. haha
Eeeeewwww! Just eeeewwwww!
My fingers are crossed for you that someone {anyone!} took this job over?!
XO
Oh, those were the days! We had two cats at one point in our lives…and I was SO happy to hand over poop-scoop duties (ha! doodies) to hubs when I was pregnant.
Hope your day gets better from here on out. I know the cat’s day won’t.
Is it weird this post made me want a pet?
Yes?
I’m okay with that.
Ugh! I made a strict “I will never pick up dog/cat poop ever” rule as a part of our marriage vows. He said this was fine. Our dog now lives with his mother. Apparently, she loves cleaning up the…well…poop. haha