Back in late June, Ivy was the cat who picked me while I visited the local cat rescue’s open house event. While I made the rounds, she followed me from one end of the room to the other and promptly jumped on my lap the moment I sat down. I couldn’t help but be charmed by her endless purring and loving personality. I submitted an adoption application thinking that surely, my sweet, relaxed resident cats would quickly adapt to a charming newcomer.

Following standard “slow introduction” procedures, the first week went well. They progressed rapidly from sniffing at a closed door, to eating on either side of the door, to observing each other through a baby gate, and eventually watching one another with the door open. Past that, things got awkward. 

As soon as Ivy had leeway to explore the house, Anya and Cordy retreated under the bed. Ok, back up to the prior stage of introduction and try again in a few days. This was when we entered the wash, rinse, and repeat phase of attempted introductions – with Ivy desperate to meet her new housemates and them hissing and spitting any time she got close. Rather than improving with exposure, Anya particularly became increasingly resistant and, in some cases, violent no matter how hard Ivy worked to project “friendly” body language. 

For the better part of two weeks, I ran the household in two shifts – With Anya and Cordy tucked in my bedroom from 5 AM to 5 PM and Ivy returned to her “safe room” from 5 PM – 5 AM. It was my misguided hope that as their scents and smells combined in the house, paraphs they’d desensitize to one another. 

Cat Reddit is filled with internet experts that will say six weeks was not nearly enough time to settle things – that it can take months or years for integrate adult cats. If anything, I feel like there’s a lot of talk in the rescue community decrying that adult cats are so often left in shelters and rescues month after month while kittens and youngsters fly out the doors. I always assumed that was a simple function of the “cuteness factor,” but I now have a sneaking suspicion that adult cats are so often overlooked, in part, because introducing adult cats and convincing them to live together can be a nightmare – or at least a significant unplanned hardship that the average person isn’t equipped to deal with. 

Having had many dogs and cats over the years, I consider myself reasonably animal savvy, but I was absolutely unprepared to continue on for month after month with Cordelia and Anya angry and chased out of their home while Ivy was increasingly confused by why she was being cast back into isolation every night. By the end, I suspect it had become a not particularly happy way of life for any of us. Capped off with three scuffles across Friday evening and Saturday morning when trying to re-initiate brief introductions again. 

To their credit, the rescue was incredibly understanding when I reached out to say I needed to bring Ivy back to them. I’d been keeping them up to date with the struggles, so maybe it wasn’t much of a surprise. I suspect the whole experience may have been more traumatizing to me than to Ivy. I opened her carrier at the rescue and she walked out without a moment’s hesitation, head butted the nearest cat, and made herself at home immediately. She was more comfortable and welcome in that room with 10 or 12 other cats in 30 seconds than Anya and Cordy had made her feel in six weeks.

I’ll never think of this period as one of my best moments. I’ll always wonder if there was something more that I could have tried or if hanging on for another week could have made any difference. I’ll probably never get away from thinking that sheer willpower is enough to drag things over the line, but in this case, seeing how Ivy reacted back in the rescue on Saturday and then how relaxed Anya and Cordy were on Sunday is probably the real sign that this particular hard decision was the right one. 

I wish doing the right thing didn’t so often involve being absolutely heartbroken. I really do miss that sweet calico girl.