My shelter cat heist: How “Adopt, Don’t Shop” almost became my villain origin story

“Come back in a couple of weeks, and we’ll talk then,” the woman at the animal rescue chirped. 

The short version of this story is my husband and I had been trying to adopt kittens from a local rescue. What should have been a straightforward process instead turned into a year-and-a-half-long binge of rejections, capped off by this woman refusing to even have a conversation with us.

Instead, we got placating bromides (“Sure, adoption saves lives, but no”), some teasing (“Well . . . I was going to say, maybe . . . but no”), and finally, the proverbial straw, cooed at my husband as if he were five years old: “I get it: You want a little friend.”

The sheer humiliation at being denied wasn’t what nearly drove me mad, though. It was the escalating disdain in her voice. Sixteen months of these thwarted attempts left us so thoroughly defeated that we had already done the unthinkable: We shopped.

We did not do it lightly. We wanted two kittens, and thought maybe we could adopt them together. First we signed up for Petfinder and Adopt-a-Pet alerts, only to click on emailed links taking us to pages that read, “Looks like this pet has already been adopted!” We visited shelters and adoption fairs and submitted many applications without receiving responses.

Eventually, I tossed away hope of adopting a pair of cats concurrently and placed a deposit on a Maine Coon kitten with a breeder, meant as a birthday gift for my spouse. In the meantime, we decided to give the feline rescue websites one more look. That is how we found Clyde. According to his online profile, this 4 1/2-month-old ink spot with harvest moon eyes lived for belly rubs. Perfect. We wanted two kittens, and we could still adopt one. Right?

What drew us to this rescue — other than Clyde’s adorable picture — was its stated emphasis on engaging in conversations with potential adopters. It also had a policy of only adopting out kittens under six months old in pairs or to homes with another kitten or young cat. Since we had another cat joining us in two and a half weeks, as well as decades of experience as feline caretakers, we thought they would be willing to discuss our situation.

We were wrong.

As soon as I told the woman at the front desk that our other kitten had not arrived yet, nothing else mattered. We never got to discuss our qualifications or present our list of references, including our veterinarian. She wasn’t interested to know that Clyde, appraising us from his teeny terrarium, was a near-doppelgänger for the 16 1/2-year-old companion I had lost a few months before.

Later, I vented about my saga to my friend Bonnie (not her real name), and she confirmed what I felt: “This is absurd,” she fumed. As it turns out, she knew the place well.

Then, after a pause, came her offer. “Look, do you want this cat?” Bonnie has a reputation for getting things done. She is that friend with a friend who knows a guy. “You know what?” I blurted. “Yes, I do.”

Thus, the slight that almost became my Joker origin story instead ignited a kitty heist.

A road to hell paved with cute intentions

Clyde at the vet (Melanie McFarland)Look, I did not expect any of this. The last time my husband and I adopted a pair of kittens, which was way back in 2007, the process was simple. We saw a photo of a little mogwai on a neighborhood rescue’s webpage, visited the next day and walked out with him and his brother. From that day onward, we loved Ike and RayRay intensely until they died, separately, of old age.

Now, I have a saved document of answers to adoption questionnaires that is so elaborate, one would think I was applying for graduate school. All of this trouble is over my efforts to obtain one of the internet’s most adorable mascots.

Has cat adoption changed so dramatically? Apparently so — and not just for me. Finding someone with a discouraging yarn tied to a poor adoption experience doesn’t take much effort. Getting them to open up about it, however, is tough. Few of those to whom I spoke wanted to go on the record. None who did want to be identified by their last names, which is remarkable given that this is a story about trying to adopt cats and kittens, not spilling state secrets.

This also reveals a level of nervousness that should not be attached to feline rescue, which is an admirable cause. To suggest otherwise — to be clear, we are not — is to risk the wrath of, well, you name it. Animal lovers, passionate pet owners, fault-finding friends, anyone may come for you bearing digital torches and pitchforks. In the age of internet harassment, everyone feels vulnerable.

But maybe not as much as someone might feel if they were declared an unsuitable adopter for reasons that don’t quite add up.

If my husband and I were fine spinning the wheel of chance, our search would have been much briefer. Craigslist or Facebook Marketplace could have supplied us, lickety-split. There are also many more rescues than there were two decades ago, thanks to the trend of animal welfare’s decentralizing, expanding beyond brick-and-mortar agencies to include networks of rescues and volunteers fostering adoptable animals in their homes.

According to Shelter Animals Count, which tracks animal sheltering data in the U.S., the nation’s rescues outnumber dedicated shelters, with 9,514 rescues to the 4,915 shelters in its database. Experts might call that a good thing, since most rescues work with fosters, and it’s healthier for adoptable felines to be cared for in private home settings than kenneled for long periods.

Bonnie had come by her two quite easily. A friend unexpectedly hosted a vagabond queen who birthed a litter in their place. One of those kittens became hers. The other hails from a Mexico-based rescue Bonnie follows on Instagram. All she did was respond to a tragic video expressing her concern, and the next thing she knew he was on a flight to the Pacific Northwest: “Heeere’s Johnny!”

And yet, for some of us, decentralization has made adoption more complicated. Since there are no set of agreed-upon policies or best practices related to the adoption process, we’re very much at the mercy of the individuals between us and the cats we want.

Three decades of caring for cats made us adamant about supporting our local animal welfare organizations. Community rescues are on the frontlines of curbing overpopulation and working to improve the health of pet communities. Each animal placed in a loving home frees up resources for others that still need them. Hence that popular plea to obtain pets from a rescue or shelter instead of a breeder or pet store: “Adopt, Don’t Shop.”

Despite the way I was treated by that cat rescue, I have tremendous empathy for anyone who works in animal welfare, especially after chatting with those who generously agreed to speak with me. That is why I don’t identify it or any other rescues in this story, aside from those whose representatives offered their insight.

But despite the push by many organizations and people to simplify animal adoption, there remain those so determined to protect cats and dogs that they unintentionally make their definition of perfection an enemy of the greater good.

What began as an exercise in curiosity and self-examination — Is it me? What are we doing wrong? — became a journey through the myriad barriers imposed by rescues despite the consensus among organizations such as the Humane Society of the United States and Human Animal Support Services (HASS) that these previously acceptable requirements are now considered outdated.

Some are expectations potential adopters have been conditioned to expect as standard, including and not limited to phone calls to their landlords; potential home visits to assess their living spaces; unnecessarily probing questions about their income, work and housing status; and applications loaded with “trick” questions.

Others, like the basic philosophy behind this rescue’s reason for denying us Clyde, are rooted in reasoning endorsed by animal behaviorists: Raising two kittens together is healthier for their development and makes life easier on their caretakers because they expend their surfeit of energy on each other instead of their humans’ ankles and hands.

But said rescue also referenced a clinical-sounding malady known as “single kitten syndrome,” a behavioral term that did not exist two decades ago.

I suspected it was a crock, so I began by turning to the feline fanatic’s go-to expert in times of bewilderment and crisis: cat behaviorist Jackson Galaxy. Best known for hosting Animal Planet’s “My Cat From Hell,” Galaxy has a robust library of instructional and advisory YouTube videos and a gift for putting stressed-out cats and people more at ease. He has also been a shelter and rescue advocate for more than 30 years.

Originally, I wanted to ask Galaxy to explain “single kitten syndrome,” having noticed that he did not drop the phrase in most of his videos. I could only find one instance, dating back to 2021, and I wanted to find out whether that was intentional. (In short, yes.)

But Galaxy hit pause on that conversation as soon as he heard how long my quest for kittens had dragged out. “You were trying to get a pair of kittens for a year and a half?” he asked, looking genuinely baffled. “Why? What happened? I gotta know this.”

Once I filled him in on the tale of being denied my “little friend,” Galaxy noted that my “single kitten syndrome” situation was simply another type of adoption barrier, such as the ones mentioned above.

“I can’t believe we’re still having to do this,” he said. “But, I guess, on the other hand, it shouldn’t surprise me.”

My experience, while not singular, was certainly unusual. In more than a dozen conversations and message exchanges with people who had memorably adverse adoption attempts within the last couple of years, I learned that the time between the start and end of most animal companion searches tends to be much shorter. If one rescue did not have what someone was looking for, they either found what they needed elsewhere or simply gave up.

The “War and Peace” of cat adoption applications

A CatCon attendee visits the adoption fair at CatCon LA 2023 at Pasadena Convention Center on Aug. 5, 2023 in Pasadena, Calif. (Sarah Morris/Getty Images)A prevalent tale of adoption difficulty begins with an overly complex application process and concludes with a demoralizing dismissal.

Sam, a 37-year-old D.C. resident, was cut off cold by a rescue when he shared that the cat he and his wife were seeking to adopt would have outdoor roaming privileges. This wasn’t the correct answer in the rescue’s view, and that was that. No counseling was offered as to why.

This came after filling out an application that asked Sam to describe his daily schedule, living arrangements and “any ‘major life changes’ that we’re expecting over the next 5-10 years (!),” he told me in an email, adding he was also told to expect a post-adoption home visit. They ended up not adopting a cat at all.

“I understand the motivation behind these practices, and I believe they have the animals’ best interests at heart,” Sam said. “But I do wonder if these agencies, through their overly burdensome processes, are making matters worse by turning off people from adopting who would probably be good, responsible pet owners.

“If there are animals who are staying longer in kill shelters as a result, then I think it’s indefensible,” he added.

In another part of the country, Erin’s rejection stamp came after she and her husband spent a couple of hours filling out an application for a rescue in Connecticut hoping, like me, to adopt a black cat, as they always do.

She was ready to be an open book. But this rescue, like the one Sam dealt with, expected applicants to provide an exhaustive account of their qualifications, something that can feel like trudging through “The Stand” as opposed to a breezy skip through Catster.

“In the past, I’ve had to talk about our experience with cats that goes back, maybe, five years,” Erin told me in a Zoom interview. “And this application wanted a full history, which, in our case, goes back to the 20th century.”

It included, among other queries, a college essay-style question asking for an explanation as to why she wanted the specific cat in which she was interested. Erin, a professional writer, fulfilled all those requests, only to receive this terse reply: “We noticed some inconsistencies between your application and the information we confirmed with your veterinarian. For this reason, we unfortunately cannot accept your application.”

“And that was it,” she said. As for the “inconsistencies,” Erin said she and her husband had found out from their veterinarian that the rescue had given them a failing grade for falling off their regular annual vet visit cadence during the pandemic.

“They had indicated to them that they preferred that applicants bring their cats in once a year for a checkup and, even more so, preferred that they bring them in twice a year,” Erin said. “I can tell you for sure because I would have remembered it: That wasn’t a question on the application. There was no place where I was compelled to address it in any way.”

The kicker? “This was an application not even for adoption,” Erin said. “It was an application for a visit.”

Kittens, kittens everywhere — and not a fluff for me

To hear others tell it, especially after they hear my story, there are places where kittens are falling from the sky.

Erin Keane, Salon’s chief content officer, was so gobsmacked by my tale that she offered to send me a box of kittens. In her home state of Kentucky, they pop up like dandelions.

“By the way,” my friend Mo texted me unprompted while I was writing this story, “we ended up catching FOUR cats in our yard.” She lives in Illinois.

One of social media’s many myths holds that the universe has a kitten distribution system that overtakes you when you least expect it, like true love or this year’s flu.

Video after video shows angelic fuzzballs bounding up to strangers in cafés and at bus stops, turning up inside wheel wells or underneath appliances and conquering the hearts of guys who swear they used to hate cats.

Contrary to what #CatsofTikTok or #CatTok would have us believe, the cat distribution system doesn’t supply every place or person equally.

Hannah Shaw, popularly known as The Kitten Lady, is a San Diego-based neonatal kitten specialist, rescuer and educator whose recent bestseller “Cats of the World” explores the differences in animal welfare philosophies in other countries and cultures around the globe. She also founded the grant-making nonprofit, Orphan Kitten Club, which partners with shelters and rescues and funds research related to pediatric feline health.

When I spoke with Shaw in August, there were “kittens coming out of our eyeballs” in Southern California. The same was probably true in Seattle, where I live. Western Washington sees a swell of newborn felines between April or May and late November.

Maybe not, though. One of Shaw’s biggest findings is that “animal welfare is so regional. It’s so impacted by climate, and resources available.”

“And for that reason, I will never say every organization should have the same adoption policies because that’s just not true,” Shaw said. “What a small organization in Seattle does and what a large organization in Montgomery, Ala., does, the strategies that would save lives in these two places couldn’t be more dissimilar.”

“There’s no national standard for any of it”

A cat available for adoption is seen at the adoption fair during CatCon LA 2023 at Pasadena Convention Center on Aug. 5, 2023 in Pasadena, Calif. (Sarah Morris/Getty Images)Overall, Shaw agrees with other experts I consulted, in that the broader push in animal welfare is to cultivate more equity in adoption processes. Instead of a system that favors homeowners over renters and wealthier people over lower-income families, the trend is to be more progressive, said Lindsay Hamrick, director of shelter outreach and engagement for the Humane Society of the United States.

“For us, it’s all about meeting people where they are being open and treating people with positivity that they’ve come for the right reasons,” Hamrick said, “and then having a conversation about the best match for their family.

“Our philosophy, which is shared by other national organizations, and a lot of local organizations, is that the idea that we should have really lengthy applications or lots of barriers to adoption is not just not serving the animals that we’re trying to move into loving homes,” Hamrick added, “but it’s also creating a lot of of judgmental experiences for a potential adopter who is doing the right thing.”

Then why do some rescues continue to demand that prospective adopters submit to exasperating and potentially demeaning hurdles? “There’s no national standard for any of it,” Hamrick explained.

This can lead to confusion around expectations, not to mention unnecessary distress, guilt and outright fear among those seeking to adopt.

Pandemic adoptions: A mostly happy tale . . . with a less-than-ideal sequel

A cute kitten looking for its forever home (Seattle Humane Society)My husband and I began looking for two kittens months after Ike died of kidney failure; he was almost 15 years old. This was in 2022, some time after the newsworthy surge of adoptions following the pandemic lockdowns that began in March 2020 had waned.

Stay-at-home orders across the country resulted in a soaring demand for companion animals. Rescue cats were a hot commodity back then, and meet and greets were facilitated over Zoom.

COVID-19 transformed the sheltering and rescue world in many ways, primarily by decentralizing it. The location from which we adopted Ike and RayRay, for example, no longer exists, joining a trend of organizations trading physical locations for virtually connected networks of foster volunteers.

The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) estimated in 2021 that nearly 23 million American households adopted a cat or dog during the pandemic. In 2020, the organization also reported a nearly 70% increase in animals going into foster care through its New York City and Los Angeles foster programs.

But Shelter Animals Count reports that data from the first half of this year indicates animals are spending more time in shelters. Between January and June, 3,118,000 cats and dogs entered shelters and rescues nationwide — a nearly 5% decrease from the same period in 2023. The same report also warns that 322,000 more pets entered the system during this timeframe than left it.

In Seattle, cats won the popularity contest in our local pandemic adoption sweepstakes. A 2021 Seattle Times story revealed that cat ownership among adults in the Seattle metropolitan area had risen by 18%, according to Nielsen data.

In 2023, from what my husband and I could tell, that wave had abated. We naively believed welcoming a new cat or two would not take as long as it had for other friends who had struggled to adopt in 2020 and 2021, when the competition for rescue cats was at its most intense.

Early in our search, after sending out many applications, we received three responses. One was from a rescue that was an hour away and observed bankers’ hours on weekdays, making it impossible for us to visit. Another came from a lovely sounding woman located on a nearby island, which required a time-consuming ferry ride. Sadly, that meet and greet was sidelined by unforeseen travel. Then came the rescue that approved our application and passed it along to the person who was fostering the cats we wanted. The fosterer never got back to us.

Nevertheless, we kept at it, sending application after application into a cluster of voids. Only after months of this did I find out that many rescues refuse to adopt younger cats to homes with elderly ones out of concern for the senior cat’s well-being. Nobody told me that, however. I had to research it myself.

The last holiday with the cat before Clyde

RayRay in the sun (Melanie McFarland)In hindsight, I was grateful for the pause. By then, RayRay was wracked by an assortment of infirmities linked to his advanced age. But he was happy to soak up my attention and follow the shifting patches of sunshine from our east-facing windows to our westward ones, dozing his days away either in my lap or on our bed.

We spent last Christmas Eve and the holiday holding him through seizures and incontinence. On Boxing Day, an hour before we put him to sleep, I took him outside to warm his face in the sun one more time.

All this is to underscore how vulnerable an experience adopting can be both for the adopter and the rescuer. Adopters like me may enter this process raw and hurting, seeking the comfort of, yes, a little friend. A steady companion when life and other humans fail us.

Another detail the woman who turned us away never heard is that Clyde’s birthday, listed on the name tag taped to his holding tank, is two days after RayRay’s death. I’m not a firm believer in reincarnation or any mystical business, but when you notice a detail like that while somebody is treating you poorly, it makes a dreadful situation feel that much worse.

“Everything needs to be a discussion,” Galaxy advised. He expressed appreciation for the new generation of people entering the rescue and sheltering world, acknowledging what difficult work it can be. “One of my big things when I go out and I teach to shelters, which I’m doing constantly, is if you’re inheriting a policy, the best thing that you could possibly do is due diligence. Don’t take anything at face value because where you might be receiving that information might be faulty.

“It might be from a person who wrote policy based on trauma that they experienced. It’s your job to make sure that you don’t just say something — that it’s accompanied by what you feel.

“Don’t assume anything,” Galaxy concluded, “and do your due diligence.”

Granted, some of the organizations that still require potential adopters to fill out extensive paperwork and agree to intimidating terms may believe they adhere to that advice.

The invasiveness of the “forever home” inspection

RayRay and Ike (Melanie McFarland)In the process of adopting her cats from a local rescue, a New Mexico resident, coincidentally also named Hannah, told me that the organization’s required landlord check led to her property management company changing her lease and substantially raising her pet fees in the place which she has rented for 14 years.

She pushed onward, though, eventually showing up at the local pet store hosting the rescue’s cats to pick up the ones she had selected.

According to Hannah, the rescue’s representative made her wait for two hours until she simply could not wait any longer. Then the person said she could drop the cats off at Hannah’s home.

“I said, ‘I can come get them as soon as they are in the carriers.’ (I live a mile away),” Hannah told me in a direct message on Reddit. “She refused.” Hannah added that while the rescue did not require a home inspection, “I realize now that this was a way to do a home inspection anyway.”

Once the rescue representative was inside Hannah’s home, she pushed on screens and opened doors, cabinets and closets. She also had Hannah sign a contract that threatened legal action if she violated the rescue’s policies. “She told me they would never get over their foster mother, that the foster should be coming over regularly,” she said, adding that the situation “made me paranoid for months that I would do something to get sued. I’ve had cats my entire life.”

Hamrick and others stress that such situations are not normal, and risk creating judgmental experiences “for a potential adopter who is doing the right thing.”

“This idea that the perfect pet owner lives in a three-bedroom suburban house with a fenced-in yard that they own is rooted in privilege,” Hamrick said. “There are millions of people who have successful relationships with their pets, who live in apartments, who rent, who maybe even have prohibitions in their lease for having a cat . . . and have been successful.”

It’s not the job of the animal shelter or rescue to be the one making these judgments, she added. “You can learn so much more about people by having a conversation about what they’re looking for.”

When two wrongs don’t make “the right cat for your situation”

Workers at Seattle Humane (Seattle Humane Society)Sometimes, there are uglier reasons why those dialogues never begin.

Ani, a culture critic and entertainment editor based in the D.C. area, recently accompanied her septuagenarian mother and 40-something sister to a Virginia shelter to adopt a pair of cats. The family had already sustained major losses and setbacks. After their father died, Ani’s sister, who works at a high-level job with the federal government, moved in with her mother to provide her companionship.

“This turned out to be the correct life choice, as when my mom had a stroke, my sister was right there and called 911 immediately, which allowed my mother to make an almost complete recovery,” Ani shared in an email. Although she rarely uses a cane when she is at home, Ani’s mother uses a rolling walker in public just to be safe.

Some time after their mother’s elderly cats died, the family was ready to adopt again. Her mother filled out the Virginia shelter’s online application for a supposedly bonded pair: a 1 1/2-year-old gray tabby and 2 1/2-year-old calico. According to Ani, a representative looked at the application and said, “OK, great. Come meet them and bring a carrier.”

That was before the manager laid eyes on Ani and her family. “I should have realized from the moment we arrived that the lady in charge took one look at my mother and the rollator coming across their gravel lot to the door and deemed her unfit,” Ani said.

Additionally, Ani’s sister has autism spectrum disorder with flat affect. “Suddenly, the cats we were there to see were ‘too shy for all this,'” Ani recalled. The manager and another staffer ushered her mother and sister into an anteroom that wasn’t large enough for the three of them and peppered Ani with questions about her mother’s mental stability.

The manager also declared that her sister “clearly ‘wasn’t interested,'” in spite of Ani’s insistence to the contrary. Eventually, she told Ani and her family the shelter did not have any cats that were right for their situation, and promised to call them if that changed.

“Once we got into the car, my mom asked, ‘They’re not going to call, are they?’ Me: ‘No, Ma, I don’t think they will,'” Ani recalled. “The whole way home, she was like, ‘Well, I’m going to die soon, anyway, so I guess we shouldn’t adopt.'”

When we communicated in late September, I asked Ani for links to the rescue’s adoption page to verify whether the cats her family wanted had been claimed. At the time of this story’s publication, both are still at the shelter waiting to be adopted . . . although the calico is currently advertised as bonded with a different gray tabby.

Melody Stone, the adoption program manager at Seattle Humane, is extremely sympathetic to these stories. “Every single thing that you experienced is a real phenomenon in sheltering. It happens all over the place,” she said in response to my story. “You end up having to look at every single process and put it through this lens of, ‘Are we getting animals out or are we actually preventing them from leaving?'”

Her organization’s model is called “Adopters Welcome,” and it starts every interaction from a place of yes.

This includes removing requirements that potential adopters have a fenced-in yard. “There’s no reason why we need to define these horrible philosophies of what an appropriate home is,” she said. “That’s a ridiculous, antiquated notion that is probably rooted in racism and culturalism and probably some sort of financial aspect we need to acknowledge.”

Ageism is another common barrier, Stone said. On the day we spoke, she had just finished adopting out a kitten to an elderly woman who had been rejected by multiple rescues that told her she wasn’t eligible due to her age.

When potential adopters are thwarted for such disheartening and unnecessary reasons, this can multiply the work for the people in animal welfare. Being turned away by one organization may require the next to repair that individual’s view of rescues: to reassure them they’re indeed able, sufficiently housed, not too old or counter whatever reason they were denied. That is, provided that person doesn’t simply resort to a surer thing. Like shopping.

Sympathy for well-intentioned shelter workers and rescuers

Jackson Galaxy from Animal Planet’s “My Cat From Hell” poses with Bonni, a four-month-old domestic shorthair orange tabby cat during a ceremony in which the city of Las Vegas proclaimed Thursday “Cat Appreciation Day” on Nov. 7, 2019. (David Becker/Getty Images)Forgive me, Cat Daddy, for I did shop, not adopt.

“One of the things that upsets me is if an organization is going to make you jump through those kinds of hoops, your reaction is understandable,” Jackson said when I confessed, Catholic guilt style, that after a year of being denied and ghosted, I had gone to a breeder for one of my guys.

“Unless you’ve got it baked-in that ‘This is all I will do,’ then of course you’re going to make that choice or do what the vast majority of people do,” he added, “which is they get them from friends or family, or they find them on the street or whatever it is.”

According to ASPCA data, 31% of pet cats are obtained from a shelter or rescue, while 28% of cat owners get their companion from a friend or family, with 27% adopting strays.

This means that one-third of cat seekers turn to rescues first, where — and this needs to be stressed — most people have a wonderful experience.

Animal welfare staffers and volunteers deserve plenty of grace from the public. They sign up for jobs with a high burnout rate, many of them unpaid, all for the possibility of connecting vulnerable cats, dogs and other animals needing homes to people who want to spoil them. As Galaxy and others told me, it’s impossible to work in animal welfare for long periods without being a party to upsetting situations that leave lasting scars.

In the further defense of those noble souls, my absurdly lengthy search process is partly due to how little I knew and my specific desires. For one, we wanted a pair that included a black cat. We were very determined to adopt from a rescue in our area, when I could have had my pick of any number of litters in, say, Southern California or Texas. We insisted on meeting any potential pet in person, nixing that option.

Also, if I had known that each of my applications might have joined a stack of anywhere from a few to tens of others, I would have tempered my expectations.

Cat Adoption Strategies (Napkin)

Emilie Fairbanks, who has fostered neonatal kittens in the D.C., Maryland and Virginia area since 2020, and works mainly with two shelters that practice an open adoption policy, spoke with me on a video call.

Once photos of her kittens post online, she said, “I almost always get multiple requests about them in hours, and there’s only two [to] four kittens in a batch. So, I don’t have the number of kittens equal to as many people applying. Most of it is just supply and demand.”

Fairbanks offered insights into the latter, as well. Fluffy orange cats, white cats with points or cats that look Siamese will get lots of suitors within an hour or two of her posting a photo — anywhere between five and 50 inquiries.

“The look of the kitten matters a lot, which frustrates me, because I’m like, ‘It’s a black cat, it’s fine,'” she said. “But you definitely get fewer applications for black cats and, like, this guy —” Fairbanks held up the cutest gray kitten “— you know, just a, quote, ‘plain tabby.'”

The concept of kitten season is foreign to most people, too. Cats tend to mate and breed when the weather is warmer, a period that, owing to climate change, varies depending on the region. Kitten season can be all year round in some parts of the country, particularly in the South, but it’s limited to a set number of months further north. Since some organizations work with animal transfer and transport programs, there’s usually a selection of pint-sized felines available somewhere near you year-round.

“I try to use my Instagram to explain to people that in D.C., you’re not going to have kittens in winter,” Fairbanks said, “because people will come to us at Christmas and ask, ‘Where are the kittens?’ And I’m like, ‘There are no kittens. I can’t make kittens appear out of nowhere.’ And they just don’t understand that.”

Rescues and shelters: Pawing through the terms

Map of the U.S. showing shelter and rescue numbers across regions. (Courtesy of Shelter Animals Count)Knowing the difference between a rescue and a shelter is also helpful. Not all are alike, but the average person conflates the terms.

A shelter, for example, might be any physical location where animals can be housed and cared for while waiting for adoption. Some are run by city or county agencies and funded by tax dollars. Some are purely donor-funded.

Defining a rescue is where the situation gets trickier. It could be an individual coordinating with a group of foster volunteers. It could be a team. A private rescue might have a facility that is open to the public and a paid staff, or it might be one person caring for cats in their home.

Generally speaking, municipal shelters have the fewest pet adoption requirements. These are places that receive a significant influx of animals, either by owner surrender or retrieval, and would rather have people claim them than be forced to euthanize them. 

Privately run shelters and rescue organizations may be more selective, but not necessarily, as Seattle Humane demonstrates. That said, some insist on references or ask you to fill out applications with “trick” sections that ask, for example, if you plan to declaw the cat (which is cruel) or whether you plan keep your cat indoors or let them outside.

In the view of most American rescues, indoor only is the right answer. Indoor cats tend to live longer and are less likely to be injured by other animals, humans or their environment. However, Galaxy counts himself among those who believe that decision should be a parenting choice. “Once given most of the facts that surround that topic right now, my hope would be that you would keep your cats indoors,” he said, “but I’m not going to make you do that.”

There are 14,429 animal sheltering organizations operating in the U.S. in 2024, according to Shelter Animals Count, and about twice as many rescues as there are shelters. West Coast states, including Alaska, Washington, Oregon and California, have more than three times the number of rescues (1,746) than shelters (520).

And each could have entirely disparate adoption policies. At one place, you might be able to walk in and out the door with a pet, no muss, no fuss. At another, you might tick all the right boxes and be rejected for any reason, including that the person between you and the cat or dog you want simply doesn’t like you.

“It’s awful. It’s traumatizing people, honestly,” Fairbanks said when I shared with her a few of the anecdotes included here, along with my “single kitten syndrome” encounter. 

As an ardent supporter of open adoption, she continued, “I will not work with any shelter that does that. The one control we have as fosters is who we work with . . . You have to be willing to say, ‘OK, this policy that you have is the reason I’m not willing to foster with you now.’ It’s the only way we have any influence.”

Understanding why two-cat policies exist, for better or worse

Hannah Shaw, an animal advocate known as “Kitten Lady,” attends an event in Rayburn Building on bipartisan legislation to end the Department of Agriculture’s scientific testing on kittens on June 7, 2018. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call/Getty Images)Dr. Mikel Maria Delgado, Ph.D., is a psychologist who specializes in animal behavior and cognition and is the co-founder of Feline Minds, a cat consulting service. She also spent years working in the Cat Behavior Department of the San Francisco SPCA, which is to say she has well-founded insight into feline and human behavior in shelter environments.

“Like anything else, whether you’re buying a cat from a breeder or getting a cat from a rescue, you should probably do your research and make sure it’s a good fit for you before you get committed to a particular animal,” she advised, “because it’s a very emotional process. People make a lot of choices based strictly on what the cat looks like or a picture of the cat, but it’s not like selling shoes.”

Delgado observed that some shelter workers may have a bias toward the bad stuff that happens. “You definitely don’t forget when you approve an adoption you didn’t feel good about, and that animal comes back and needs to be euthanized because they were not cared for properly,” she said. “You just don’t forget those animals.”

Taking all that into account, the overwhelming trend throughout the U.S., and especially in the wake of the pandemic, is toward rescues and shelters simplifying the process, reducing barriers to adoption and granting the people who come to rescues more compassion, as well as information and support.

That includes having discussions about why raising two kittens together tends to be better than adopting one without assigning an anxiety-provoking, clinical-sounding term to that reason.

Not every rescuer or rescue organization requires that kittens only go home in pairs. But even among those who do, including Shaw, there’s agreement that conversation-based evaluation should lead the way.

Shaw’s policy of only adopting out kittens in pairs requires that her fosters go home in duos or into homes that “have another young and playful cat,” adding that there’s plenty of room for interpretation within that designation.

She is also a famous influencer and knows she occupies a privileged position. “If I were running a high-volume municipal animal shelter, I would have very different policies,” she said. But since she averages around 16 applications for every kitten she gets, “I have the luxury of choosing between 10 good homes.”

That said, if a potential client is set on only adopting a single kitten, she will counsel them as to why raising kittens in pairs is better for feline and humans alike and direct them to shelters or rescues that don’t have a two-kitten policy.

“This is a big movement. There’s room for everyone. There’s room for lots of different strategies,” Shaw said. “The issue is when that impacts an adopter to the point where, from the adopter experience, if somebody believes, ‘Wow, it’s so difficult to adopt, I’m just going to go, buy a cat or something,’ I think that disadvantages shelter cats, truly shelters on the whole, in places in America where they are begging people to take cats.”

Speaking of which, let’s claw into “single kitten syndrome.”

Clinical cat-aclysm, or an overblown TikTok tag?

While Delgado and other experts confirmed that the major behaviors described by the term are real, “it’s an easy moniker, and probably easier than trying to explain in great detail,” Delgado said. “And — of course, at this point — it’s like a telephone game where people barely even know what they’re referring to.”

On the other end of that line is a thriving subset of social media where the term is bandied about as a warning to adopt more than one kitten at a time.

@aceengel Replying to @Alaena Welcome to Cat School! Lets talk about Single Kitten Syndome! What is it, how does it develop, and what to do if you think your cat has single kitten syndrome! #singlekittensyndrome #kitten #catrescue #catfacts #kittenfacts #facts #cats #catsoftiktok #petangel #adoptdontshop #greenscreen ♬ original sound – Abby

Galaxy explained that “single kitten syndrome” is an umbrella descriptor used to explain what can happen to kittens who are not properly socialized during the crucial developmental period of two and nine (or 12? or 14?) weeks old.

“It’s like a seven-week period, and there’s a lot that’s packed into that period,” he said. During this time, littermates test their boundaries during play, and if they swat or bite too hard, their mothers can put them in check. Through these physical corrections, kittens learn restraint with their teeth and claws. Without them, some cats may never grow out of biting and scratching their humans.

There’s just one hitch. No peer-reviewed, published scientific research legitimizes this “syndrome,” as one #CatTok user spelled out.

@twistedwhiskertupelo what is single kitten syndrome and do you need to adopt two kittens at once? p.s. ashy is only temporary don’t fall in love with her #cats #singlekittensyndrome #kitten #cattok #catscience #medialiteracy ♬ original sound – The Twisted Whisker

Jordana Moerbe, the medical care director at Austin Pets Alive! who works with HASS, said there’s a general dearth of behavioral research on cats as opposed to the wealth that has been done on dogs. Moerbe explained that cats are “kind of the forgotten companion pet in terms of data and research.”

But she counsels against entirely writing off what the term describes, and understands why some organizations take a hard stance by requiring kittens be adopted in twos. It’s based on a set of demonstrated behaviors she has experienced firsthand in her 20 years of fostering cats and dogs. “It’s not going to happen in every cat. Some kittens are going to grow up just fine,” she said. 

Nevertheless, she said, “If we look at the actual definition of a syndrome, it’s just the term that’s been developed over the years. And I don’t know that anybody’s ever been like, ‘Is this actually a syndrome by definition?’ So I don’t know that there has been intentionality behind that.”

Galaxy echoed this sentiment. “I think the problem is not, does single kitten syndrome exist or does it not exist,” he said. “I think on both sides of the ball, there’s a lack of flexibility around whatever ideas we have.”

That doesn’t necessarily mean the term’s mainstreaming is harmless. Galaxy’s concern is that the label could make some kittens and cats less adoptable. “There are plenty of singletons out there that . . . sometimes they just wind up singles,” he said. “Does that make them victims of a syndrome? No.”

Ergo, by no means was it a given that Clyde, who was 18 weeks old when we tried to claim him, would devolve into an incorrigible face-eating menace during the two and a half weeks he would be without a feline companion.

In response to that being the reason I was denied the possibility of adopting him, Galaxy just shook his head.

“Anything that’s just so black and white like that — unless, of course, it’s true — you’re stigmatizing the animal. You’re stigmatizing the potential adopter. You’re shaming the potential adopter,” he told me. “You are losing someone who might be adopting for the second time, who might be a donor, who might then be a volunteer. You’re losing someone who might be a foster parent in the future. We’ve got to be thinking about these things.”

At last, a Bonnie and Clyde story that doesn’t end in tears

The Monster and Clyde, together at last (Melanie McFarland)After we walked away from the rescue whose warden decided Clyde would not become our “little friend,” we sat in our car, dazed and freshly enraged, trying to make sense of this illogical ouroboros. Her organization doesn’t believe kittens should be raised solo. Neither do we. But this person was fine with a different kitten being alone until we found another suitable match. Based on our track record, how long that would take was anyone’s guess.

Then it hit us. Our mistake at pretty much every juncture in this extended expedition was telling the truth. 

We turned that over and over during the drive that followed until I burst out laughing — the crazed kind that might result from being sprayed in the face by the Joker’s trick boutonniere.

This was all happening because we were trying to do the right thing: to adopt, not shop. Plus, we wanted to rescue a black cat — you know, the type that at least one study found to have poorer adoption outcomes.

Why . . .?

This is where Bonnie came into the picture, and in the way of all great childless cat ladies, cooked up a scheme.

The next day, she called the rescue and told them exactly what they wanted to hear. Nothing she said was a lie. Bonnie really did have a young, playful cat at home slightly older than Clyde. It also helped that she was a longtime donor to this rescue. Bonnie drove to its location, where she was whisked to an interview station after indicating she wanted Clyde. Membership has its privileges, as they say.

A short time later, we met up for the handoff . . . er, rehoming.

Strictly speaking, no policies were violated. The rescue got its fee. I got the cat I had been seeking for 16 months.

Although we created a separate acclimation area for Clyde, he chose to quietly explore our small, kitten-proofed house for an hour before making himself at home on the couch, sleepily kneading the cushions before flopping between my lap and my husband’s. He spent his first night in bed with us.

As for the whole “single kitten syndrome” of it all, if it does exist, Clyde never displayed any “symptoms.” He was elated to be the center of attention for two and a half weeks, demonstrating impeccable litter box etiquette from day one. As advertised, a belly rub session was all it took for him to melt. He was — is — meant to be my lil’ puddin’.

Yet in the days preceding our other cat’s arrival, I was gripped by apprehension, afraid I had done or would do something terribly wrong. I created a strict feeding and play regimen to ensure Clyde was stimulated and fretted if, say, he did not consume full servings of his food. I frantically scheduled his introductory appointment with our vet of nearly 20 years who gently counseled me to calm the hell down. “You’re an expert at this,” he said. “You know what you’re doing.”

The mean rescue sentinel did not think so. What if she showed up at our door to reclaim Clyde? This is not some unfounded paranoia; it happened to Ellen DeGeneres in 2007 after she rehomed a rescue pet. And who am I? Nobody, that’s who.

Fortunately no such madness occurred. The place did not even call Bonnie to check on Clyde’s well-being.

Instead, our Maine Coon kitten arrived and instantly became Clyde’s partner in crime. Today those two monsters love each other more than the humans who care for them. My spouse and I might as well be their butlers: grooming them, cleaning up behind them several times a day, serving them the best food available.

In exchange — to be honest — my husband has survived a few midnight nut punches, courtesy of the pee-wee linebacker I gifted to him. Happy birthday, hon! 

There was also the time Clyde woke me up by nipping my chin hard enough to leave a welt because I had not served his breakfast quickly enough.

Aside from that, like the cats that came before, these two remind us to find the slices of sunlight in our lives whenever we can. This is welcome on dark days, when we have received news about friends diagnosed with serious illnesses or phone calls from an aging parent who has been rushed to the hospital again. When we absorb the reality of what the next four years and beyond will look and feel like. Life’s turns are unpredictable, but so are your pet’s random bursts of joy.

This outcome would not have been possible if we did not have certain advantages. My husband and I both have jobs, don’t have kids and are blessed with great friends like Bonnie who share our yen for petty justice.

We also have the means to purchase a purebred pet from a woman who raises her cats in an immaculate home, where they take turns snoozing on a blanket in front of a fireplace. Our beast spent the first few weeks of his life in a happy, well socialized clowder monitored by a veterinarian.

Weeks after he came home with us, she checked in to see how we’re doing. Not to surveil, but to see how well he was settling in and to offer helpful tips.

Few rescues can offer that level of personalized follow-up, but all the animal welfare experts consulted for this story stress the importance of supporting clients with education and encouragement instead of discriminatory gatekeeping.

Adopting any cat should not require exploiting a connection, a studious application of loopholes and other chicanery. In the universe’s grander design, Clyde’s fee would have supported a more universally welcoming place. 

But it was evened out by how snugly he fits beside the gentle mammoth that, yes, I shopped for when I had reached my limit of trying and trying and trying to adopt.

In the end, Galaxy granted me absolution. “I’m going to give you props for, OK, would I have preferred that you didn’t go to a breeder, that you would have gone to a rescue? Of course,” he said. “But you wouldn’t have done that had you not been turned away in the first place.”

The kitten distribution system ended up working in my favor after all. The trick was to game it a bit once the litter of disgruntlement buried the last of my patience.