Truffles the Kitty’s life is an impressive story. She was rescued as a stray in 2017 and started working in a children’s optical store. Soon fate led her to become an eyewear fashion icon and an vision ambassador for children. Now she’s the face of Truffles the Kitty Organization (TKO), a non-profit helping vision-challenged kids across the United States and the world! Despite wearing many hats (and glasses) for her day job, non-profit work, and as a pet influencer, she managed to make time for an interview!
Celebrity Pets: Thanks for your time Truffles! Let’s start by taking it all the way back. How did you and your meowmy meet?
Truffles: I was living outside with my cat mom at a church camp, just waiting for my furrever home. All of my sibling kitties found homes, but not me. My Meowmy saw me and of course fell instantly in love with me.
CP: Now onto your childhood, how was growing up in an optical shop?
Truffles: I get to meet lots of kids! I don’t want to brag or anything, but I am pretty sure everyone is there to see me even though Meowmy thinks they are there to see her. Kids call my name whenever they walk in the door. They yell, “Twuffles!” Then I come out and they give me treats. It’s the best!
CP: Do you recall the moment you realized glasses are your must-have accessory?
Truffles: I remembered the first time I saw myself with glasses on. I had been wearing glasses for a little while. Meowmy was teaching me to wear them and how to take them off. But she never really showed me what I looked like in the mirror, until one day. I mean, I was stunning! It was the perfect accent to my already elegant tuxedo. Meowmy said I was born to be an optician because I wanted to have all the glasses!
CP: How and when did you decide to turn your love of stylish eyewear into a way to help children?
Truffles: Me and my Meowmy started making videos to help empower kids to take care of their vision and to help them understand how to care for their glasses. We noticed that this helped so many kids! So naturally, we wanted to keep doing it.
CP: Can you share what “A Child’s Eyes” is all about?
Truffles: A Child’s Eyes is where I work. It is an optical shop just for kids! Even babies come here! It’s a lot of fun because we have toys and video games and of course me! We make the experience positive and help create fun memories.
CP: And I’m very impressed to see you’re a feline philanthropist. Please share a bit about “Truffles the Kitty Organization (TKO)”
Truffles: Thank mew for asking – It’s one of the things that makes me purr the loudest! TKO is my way of helping kids all over the world. It’s hard to go places as a kitty, but with the internet I have made countless furriends. And these furriends often need encouragement to take care of their vision and I help them by sending them packages. I also use my fame to teach others about the vision challenges that my little furriends go through. It’s important that we help kids get their best vision! I have made many furriends in the optical community as well and together we can help kids get glasses or patches that may have a hard time buying them.
CP: You have a focus on “Amblyopia,” can you fill our readers in on it?
Truffles: Amblyopia happens when one eye sees better than the other. Often this requires my little furriends to wear an eye patch over their one eye. This can be soooo hard and takes a lot of work. Sometimes kids are embarrassed or afraid and I help them by wearing a patch too! This way they know they are not alone. And our Pumpkin Patch Project helps spread awareness with an annual Pumpkin Patching Party!
Related: Truffles was featured in our Top 10 cat influencer Halloween costumes!
CP: You’ve had several campaigns, including Knowledge, Encouragement, and Assistance (along with Treats from Truffles) What are they all about?
Truffles: It’s my mission to spread awareness of the unique vision issues facing kids. But I also want to help kids who work so hard on their vision. Sometimes kids wear glasses, or patches, sometimes they need surgery or even need to use eye drops. So I came up with a great idea! Because I love treats so much, I send packages, which I call “Treats from Truffles,” to those kids. Any child can be nominated to receive a package or assistance just go to my website. It’s that easy. My favorite part is seeing pictures of my furriends getting their treats from me! They send me letters in the mail too!
CP: I also see you’ve developed your own app, “Patching with Truffles.” what does it do?
Truffles: “Patching with Truffles” is so fun! As I mentioned before, patching is so hard for kids but it works so well! “Patching with Truffles” is a free app that kids can sign up for. They get to put their patch on every day WITH ME! They watch a video of me putting my eye patch on and then they put theirs on too. So we get to patch together! It’s so fun because we also do challenges together and we collect special stickers. Kids create albums from these virtual stickers and before you know it, they’ve been wearing their eye patch as long as the doctor wanted them to. And they are one step closer to getting purrfect vision.
I’m just a natural model. I strut out and demonstrate how easy it is to put glasses on and help kids be less fearful about putting an eye patch on. And of course I look amazing while doing it.
Truffles the Kitty, on modeling to help kids get used to eyewear
CP: What is it like working with children and helping them feel better about wearing glasses and eye patches?
Truffles: It makes me PURRR! I love when I get to see the look on kids’ faces when they put glasses on for the first time. It also makes me happy when they say, “Truffles is like me!”
CP: What’s a typical day like for you working in an optical shop?
Truffles: To be honest… I take a lot of naps. But I always leave my ears turned towards the front door. If someone calls me or my Meowmy calls me. I get up! It’s my turn to work and greet and encourage our little patients.
CP: I heard if I had to bet on who the “employee of the month” is, the money is on you. What’s your record currently at?
Truffles: I started working officially at 6 months of age and I’ve been employee of the month for 6 years!
When kids have a hard time choosing their glasses, they often ask me. They put their choices down in front of me and then I paw at the one I like the most. One time a mommy did this! I’m a good helper that way. I like changing tears to giggles. When the tiniest kiddos come in they often cry, I put my glasses on and like magic they start to giggle.
Truffles the Kitty, on what motivates her to help kids
CP: How many pairs of glasses do you own? Have any favorites?
Truffles: I have 25 pairs. My favorite is always my green pair, followed by my colorblindness glasses.
CP: Are you involved with the design process of your glasses? Or how does your mom come up with them?
Truffles: My moewmy designs them for me under my supurrvision. I get very excited when she decides to make me a new pair. I watch her carefully. Sometimes she will let me choose what color I want. One time she made glow in the dark glasses for me and that was a BIG surprise!
CP: So you have a very special pair of “colorblind” glasses. What’s the deal with those?
Truffles: I really like these a lot. Sometimes, I want to keep them on all the time. It makes things look different. I have a color deficiency similar to the red/green color deficiency that kids can have. Approximately, 1 in 12 boys have this and 1 in 200 girls. When meowmy put these glasses on me I was shocked at how different things looked.
CP: Now onto some personal questions. With a busy schedule that includes being an optical shop employee, vision ambassador, app developer, social media influencer, philanthropist, big sister, and you even ran for President! How do you like to spend your downtime?
Truffles: Napping. And keeping track of my Meowmy. I follow her everywhere just to make sure she doesn’t get into trouble. I like playing on my iPad. Oh, and there’s this light that keeps coming around bugging me… One day I WILL catch it!
CP: What would your mom say makes you unique? Do you have any funny quirks?
Truffles: I do not like being held or pet more than 3 times. I also don’t like being picked up, I would much rather you called me. I growl when I’m unhappy, but it’s harmless. It’s just how I set my boundaries.
CP: Can you share an Instagram post that captures your personality?
CP: Besides looking glam in glasses, do you have any other special talents or do any tricks?
Truffles: I can do a lot of tricks! Sit, high five, paw bumps, wave hi and goodbye, I can jump through my meowmy’s arms. I can also pick out pictures on the eye chart! I’m brilliant.
CP: What’s the naughtiest thing you’ve done? (We promise not to tell mom)
Truffles: Apparently, crawling in the tank with the hermit crabs is not allowed. But I fit, so I sit! (It’s basic math)
CP: If you hosted a TED Talk, what would the topic be?
Truffles: Kitties helping Kids: How to find your purrfect place in the world
CP: If you were stuck on a deserted island, what are the 5 essential items you’d take?
Truffles: Meowmy, my green glasses, my colorblindness glasses, Tiki Stix, Mouse Prime (my favorite mousey, I’ve had him since I was adopted), but I’d have to take all my other glasses too. Can 25 glasses count as 1?
Mew, meeeeeow, mee, owe, mewy, meow. (I’ll know what it means)
Truffles the Kitty, on advice she’d give her younger self
CP: Can you share the story behind this Instagram post?
Truffles: This is my furriend Emery! I make her happy about wearing her eye patch because she knows I wear one too. I’ve never met her in real life but I get to be with her every day because she has one of my Truffles recruits with her.
CP: So you became a big sister for Christmas. Please introduce us to Gumdrop!
Truffles: This is my little brother Gumdrop aka Dumbdrop, Gumball, Goofball and little buddy. He is very silly, I’m training him to be an Opticat. He’s got a lot to learn but I see his pawtential. He already gives kids high fives! He has a very short attention span, but Meowmy said it will get better.
CP: Have any exciting plans coming up?
Truffles: It’s my goal to help kids all through their vision journey. I hope to be a part of vision screenings and education for kids in preschools and elementary schools. I’m also working on my autobiography.
CP: If readers would like to help your cause, what’s the best way to do it?
Truffles: If you’d like to pawtner with me you can visit my website trufflesthekitty.org.
There you can make a donation or sponsor a package for a little one. Please share my posts on social media to help spread awareness. And don’t forget to give encouragement to my little furriends by leaving a comment!
CP: I heard you’ve received a couple of awards for all your hard work. Please fill us in!
Truffles: I don’t usually brag but thanks for asking. As a vision ambassador, Eyebuy Direct kindly awarded me their very first Eyebuy Direct Eyecare Award – Which helped me start my non-profit Truffles the Kitty Organization! Then me and my meowmy were also awarded the Bonnie Strickland Champion for Vision Award from Prevent Blindness.
If I can do it, you can too! Be purroud of all your hard work. I’m purroud of you! And never forget, you’re not alone because I wear glasses and eye patches too!
Truffles the Kitty, on her message to kids who are hesitant to wear glasses or eye patches
Thanks for your time Truffles, love all the amazing work you’re doing, keep it up! And make sure to stop by trufflesthekitty.com and follow @truffles_the_kitty on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and YouTube.