Shailene Woodley is currently the face of a big campaign aimed at raising awareness for pet adoption . She’s working with the Mars Veterinary Hospital and the Calm meditation app. Shailene sat down with several outlets to talk about her experience raising pets. Right now, Shailene is the mom to two cats, siblings named Bear and Pharrah. While they aren’t her first cats, she considers them her furbabies. In an interview with People, Shailene talked about her first-ever pet, a cat that she named Kitten. She also shares how being a cat mom has changed her life.
Her first cat: “Her name was Kitten. She was a little black cat that was teeny tiny when I got her, and then as she got older, I just kept the name. I just remember at 16 years old having this responsibility. Even though I was still living at home, and there were other animals in the house, having the responsibility of her and her alone to feed, to clean her litter box, to make sure she was hydrated, it felt like an entrance into adulthood.”
They took care of each other: “It gave me a sense of knowing that this animal was literally dependent on me, but then also my dependency on her and how her greeting me at the door or her being there when I’d come home from school or needing to study for a hard test, or I was also working full-time on a TV show at that point in my life, knowing that I’d get to come home and lay with her took away any teenage angst or anxiety I might’ve had,” adds the star — referencing her time starring in The Secret Life of the American Teenager.
Bear and Pharrah: “It’s the first time I’ve ever had sibling pets,” she tells PEOPLE, explaining that it’s a “game-changer for them — and for me. When I’m at work, I’m not worrying if one of them is at home alone and lonely and just waiting for me to walk in. Knowing they have each other, to entertain and comfort one another, [is great].”
They complete her: “The affection that they share extends into the affection that they share with me, and the affection I share with them. And with them, I feel like anything is possible. I don’t feel alone. I don’t feel lonely anymore. I feel completely taken care of, and there’s nothing to complain about at all in my personal life, because I have this unconditional love and affection from them.”
Overall, Woodley says being a pet parent “transcends an idea of love,” adding: “It’s just pure energy. It’s something that I personally can’t find words for, knowing that they have given me their lives and entrusted me with their lives.”
Just having their trust, I guess, feels like such an honor, because I know the life that they lived before they came into my home, and it was a rough life. So the fact that they give me so much of their unconditional love and gratitude makes me emotional because I know how hard it is for me, in my personal world, to trust people. So knowing that they have chosen to trust me truly feels like an honor.”
”I don’t feel lonely anymore. I feel completely taken care of.” I can totally relate to this! When I was growing up, I was taught that there were dog people and there were cat people, and there was no in-between. My family had the most amazing dog, so I always assumed that if I got a cat, it would be some great family betrayal. I was so wrong! After we moved in together, Mr. Rosie brought over a kitten that had been born to a stray cat in his parents’ backyard. That cat changed my life. She was the absolute best, and she comforted me through *a lot* of tough sh-t. We got a new cat three years after she passed, and despite my guilt/worries, our new cat is so emotionally-intuitive that she sits with both of my children whenever they are upset and magically calms them down by letting them pet her. It is a super power that I do not have.
Also, I’m totally serious right now, but a friend and I somehow found ourselves talking about pet names recently, and she mentioned that she had a friend who named their cat “Kitten,” but called it “Kit” for short. I laughed out loud when I read that Shailene had done the same. Too funny.
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