After losing her two cats within months, a woman from New York wasn’t ready to welcome a new pet in her life—until a tabby showed up to her door and forced her to adopt him.
In a viral Reddit post shared on Tuesday under the username u/danooli, she shares pictures of the feline making himself comfortable in her home, trying all the furniture and window sills, acting like he has been living with her all his life.
“I wasn’t ready for a new cat after we lost one in June ’24 and another this past March. This tabby decided we were ready when he marched in and made himself at home,” the woman says in the caption.
“We’ve named him Albert after the character from Little House on the Prairie. The vet cleared him healthwise and did not find a chip so he’s staying I guess.”
The poster, Dani, told Newsweek that, one morning, she was in her backyard, feeding the feral cat who has been visiting her and her husband for over a year, when she suddenly noticed another feline watching from his hiding place on a cypress tree.
“I made the pss-pss-pss noise and got their attention and I was meowed at in return. It was a feeble, small mew, more than a full-throated meow, so I made up a bowl of food for them as well. When I brought it over, I saw he was a boy, and I was even allowed to briefly pet his head. The other cat—we call her Miss Cici—would never allow us to pet her, so I felt special.
“That evening, as I was bringing dinner for Miss Cici, this new cat was also waiting. After he ate, he found a catnip plant we have in our yard, and he went bonkers on it. Seeing how happy he was, my husband brought out a long nylon string to see if we could entice him to play. Immediately, he showed interest and played for a while.”
Then, when the family opened the door to their home, the boy cat—now Albert—immediately ran inside and sat down in the kitchen, refusing to leave the house.
“My husband is actually allergic to cats, so we weren’t planning on allowing him to stay, but he really didn’t want to leave. So we opened the flap to the cat door we had installed years earlier for our departed cats—who were both Siberian forest cats, which are hypoallergenic—so he could leave when he felt like it, but he ended up falling asleep under a table so we left him and let him stay.”
In the following days, the cat kept coming and going through the flap, and once the family realized he was there to stay, they took him to the veterinarian to check for a microchip and for a checkup. Now he is an official member of the household.
“Miss Cici and Albert get along very well, and she seems a lot more open to us after we brought him in, so we are hoping she will eventually allow us to love her properly soon!” the poster added.
The post quickly went viral on social media and has so far received over 12,000 upvotes and 213 comments on the platform.
One user, Wendigos_and_witches, commented: “As someone that felt this same way when I lost my familiar … Albert understood the assignment! I just imagine your two going through a CDS catalog. ”Yup! He’s the one. Send him in!'”
Illustrious_Lion7671 said: “Who can blame Albert? He found an excellent home with a comfy sofa, warm lap and premium entertainment (live squirrel TV)!”
EnleeJones wrote: “I love how cats will just waltz into a house and be like ‘I live here now’ and we go ‘Okay.”
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