ChubChub's weight loss journey and my own
ChubChub is doing great. She's really regaining her catly figure. She's lost over a pound, and she's becoming a completely new cat.
She's sleeping less and able to jump onto furniture, and even the backs of furniture more comfortably, and more often. She's playing alot more, for longer periods of time and a lot more actively.
When we first got her, she wasn't even very interested in her cat-nip toy she came home with (an elderly lady makes and donates hot-dog bun sized fleece catnip pillows to send home with each cat). ChubChub would occasionally nap with her catnip toy, clutching it between her front paws like a child with a teddy bar, but she never really played with it.
Now she plays alot more and a lot longer. She loves chasing crumbled up paper "mice," and not just chasing when we throw them, but if we're not wanting to play, she's toss it around herself for such a long time. The years are melting with the fat.
It's exciting and motivating to watch. It's made me remember some of my own weight loss transformations, the increased mobility and flexibility, the disappearance of my asthma and sleep apnea, the improvement of my allergy symptoms, my interest in "playing" and exercising....
ChubChub's transformation is a microcosm of my own. We're still both quite fat, but even the small changes have made big differences. I'm not sure why the cat's transformation has struck me so much more than my own, whether because it took place in such a short period of time, or maybe because I was watching it and not living it.
ChubChub is my little hero, my inspiration, even a role model. She doesn't really have any control over her diet, but she is choosing to be more active. Now, I know she isn't chasing paper mice because she wants to regain her girlish figure. She's doing it because now she can, and it feels good. And I don't think in that regard, a human is much different. It's harder to move when you're very fat, even when you want to. I don't think cat's contemplate the future much, and while humans can I think we often don't do it very well, either. I know, but often can't envision how the weight loss and exercise progress is going to transform my life. It just doesn't seem real until it happens (and if it happens slowly, sometimes it's hard to see and feel the transformation unless you ponder on it).
But watching this wonderful cat, is like watching the future me. I see the transformation in her progress, and it reminds me every day, that she is my future. I'll be chasing paper mice in no time.
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