CN - I rescued a stray cat after trying to help her for several hours. She's cute and sweet, but I'm not sure if I should keep her.Here's the back story:
I'm an RN case manager and see patients in their home. Today I went to see a patient in an apartment complex. When I got there, there was a white-ish/tan cat that looked really underweight and had cuts by it's ears. I think it was a feral cat, because it was very unsure of me and unfriendly. I went into my patient's apartment and asked if she knew if it was someone's pet. Her son was there and said they have a lot of cats in the area, but said, "If you're talking about the black and white one, I think that's someone's pet, because it ran in the hall earlier when I opened the main door".
So after my visit, I get ready to go back to my car and sure enough, there's the black and white cat. I go over to see if it's friendly and she's super dirty and disheveled looking. I pet it for a while and gave it some water (it wouldn't eat my granola bar). Anyway, after several minutes, a girl comes by and I ask her if she knows whose pet it is. She said, "That was someone's cat here and someone in the family was allergic to it. They didn't know what to do with it, so they just let it go outside, because they didn't want it anymore. It keeps running back in the apartment when someone opens the door, because it's trying to go back to it's home".
So at this point, I'm furious. Who the hell kicks an animal outside, because they claim they didn't know what to do with it? Ummm, how about you take it to a shelter you lazy fuucck?? It's supposed to be around 100 degrees and all sun the next several days. There was no way I was leaving that cat behind.
The mailman comes and gives me this crate to confine it since the animal control center won't come get an animal unless it's confined. So I cover the cat with the crate and place a 5 pound dumbbell on top to keep it there so I have time to call animal control. That plan failed. It managed to get the weight off and was so frightened that it climbed into the bottom of a car where the engine is. I spent the next 2 hours trying to coax it out with a granola bar until I decided she'd probably stay there til I ran to Target to get a animal carrier and cat food.
That worked. I got her out and took her with me to the vet. They think she's about a year old. No fleas or ear mites, but they gave me a topical medicine just in case. Other than being dirty, scared, unspayed, and a bit underweight, she seems healthy. She had no microchip, which doesn't surprise me. She's soo friendly and cute.
I already have two cats and I'm not sure if I should keep her. I live in a 1200 sq ft apartment and I'm not sure if this is enough room for three cats. I'm doing what the vet said and keeping her in a separate, closed room for a week to slowly introduce her to Dexter and Murphy. If the cats don't adjust and appear stressed after a while (I know it can take time), I will obviously rehome her.
Basically, I'm not sure what to do. Do you guys think my other cats would be jealous of a new cat getting some of our attention? Dex and Murph are big AWs. Do you think the apartment size is big enough for 3? What would you do?
(I'm not taking her to a shelter. I'm either keeping her for good or keeping her til I can find her a nice home).
Thanks for reading all this! Here's a pic: