cream's stairway to sharon

It's been a few years years since Sharon's cat, Cream, went blind. And he generally gets around pretty well. Actually, we're often amazed because he adapts very well to the frequently-shifting furniture.

Cream contemplates his staircase

He's not perfect, mind you. As he pads around, slowly making his way through a memorized house, he sometimes gets things wrong and bumps into walls. When that happens he adjusts and tries again until he finds his way. Sometimes he seems to get completely disoriented. When that happens, he sits and meows until someone gets him and brings him to one of a few familiar spots. We call that resetting him. And he doesn't seem to feel bad about it. As the vet explained, he doesn't know that he should have his sight, so he doesn't mope about it.

Cream exits from the bottom

But the big problem is Sharon's new bed. It's a loft bed, five feet off the floor. He can't climb up. And Sharon can't bring him to bed for the night for fear that he'll try to climb off (as he does Blair's and my bed) and have a nasty fall. This, Sharon's inability to have her cat with her at night, has been the one big drawback of the new bed.

Enter a clever work-a-way couple from Australia.

They started with an old Ikea Ivar shelving section. They cut a whole in each shelf, and arranged them in an alternating fashion -- one shelf with the hole at one end, the next shelf with the hole at the other. A sighted cat (or, we hope, a properly trained blind cat) can climb up or down by going back and forth, and through the holes. They added some carpet for better grip, some vertical pieces at the ends and plastic mesh all around (to prevent nasty falls). Voila! Cream has a staircase.

Sharon has been working with him to teach him that he can go up to her bed, or down to the floor. Cat treats are helpful in that regard. The hope is that we can get Cream to the point where we are confident that, if he's on the bed and wants to get down, he will know to do so via the staircase.

Fingers crossed!