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In the House of Jupiter
Minnesota Mandy
by Amanda McCallum

Jupiter was never meant to be born. When I first met her, she was a little black-and-white kitten about the size of your palm, with a tenacity that didn't match her size.

My sister Beth brought her home unexpectedly one night. She had found her in downtown Minneapolis while at a party. The poor little creature was about 5 weeks old, not even weaned yet, but so hungry that she was trying to eat old food off of the street. Her mother and littermates were nowhere to be found, and little Jupiter wouldn't survive much longer without help.

Beth picked her up and immediately felt that there was something seriously wrong with the little kitten. Her rib cage was seriously deformed. We later found out that some people had given the mother cat drugs while she was pregnant, and Jupiter was the only survivor. In a normal cat or kitten, the ribs come together in a soft "v" or "u" shape on the underside. Jupiters ribs looked more like a "w". Instead of curving around her back and sides, and coming together at a soft point on her chest, the ends of her ribs curved in and up into her chest cavity. Imagine your hands formed together like a roof-top, with your palms facing each other and your fingertips touching. This is a normal cat's chest cavity. Now allow those fingers to cave downward until your fingertips are level with the bottoms of your hands. Those are the ribs that Jupiter was born with.

Beth had no choice but to bring little Jupiter home. On the way, her friends stopped at a store and bought kitten milk replacer formula and a kitten milk bottle. Poor Jupiter was so hungry that she chewed the nipple off of the bottle to make the milk flow faster! We knew then that she had fight in her, but we had no idea what the severe birth defect meant for her health.

We fed this little kitten and kept her warm and comfortable all night. We got her to the vet as soon as we could, anxious about what he would have to say about the severe deformation in her ribs. The vet examined her thoroughly and seemed very concerned about Jupiter's longevity. He wasn't sure the ribs would grow or expand at all as Jupiter grew... and as it was, her chest cavity was very crowded from the ribs pointing the wrong way. He advised us to be watchful of her respiration as she grew, and to take any signs of discomfort or fatigue very seriously. His prognosis was that she would not be able to live beyond a year, because her heart and lungs would simply not have enough room to operate properly in that tiny chest.

But we had named her aptly. Jupiter, the biggest of all planets, now the most powerful of all our cats, she is a feisty six-year-old with absolutely no health concerns. The vet is amazed at her progress. Although her ribs remain obviously deformed, her heart and respiratory development were not affected, and today she is a beautiful, lithe, active and stubborn cat.

Her malnutrition as a kitten has stunted her adult size. Full-grown, she only weighs about six pounds, but she puts my 18-pound male cat to shame. We nicknamed her Spitfire and she is the ruler of the roost. When you meet this little fighter, you know you are in the House of Jupiter.

Never forget that we are all creatures of God. We are entrusted with the care and well-being of our fellow creatures who cannot care for themselves. This is a gift and an honor.

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