Tails from the Foster Kittens - 2018 a year in review

January:

This year started out, once again, without kittens. We had just moved to NH two months before and we were not settling into the house as well as we had hoped. It was a nice home, but it just didn't suit our needs. We had plans to renovate it but we were having a hard time getting anyone to help us with that and so we were quite frustrated.

I took some time to write a post about FeLV and I bought a new chair that I really like and I got a very good deal on. Yes, the blog was quite boring

February:

February was an incredibly slow month on the blog with just six posts and two of them being sponsored content. Fleurp started her spring molt a little early that year and looked quite rough for a while because she really hates it when I groom her.

March:

Things started to pick up in March. I shared with you how Jack liked to make me jealous when I was busy and couldn't pay attention to him. Twee had a dental and had a very bad reaction to the sedation so we are planning on never doing that again. I noticed a rather large lump on Eli - which is still there and hasn't changed so we are thinking it is a lipoma - since he has two others.

I tried to drum up some interest in this kittenless kitten blog by asking you which of The Crew you thought was the cutest and I ended the month with my annual "Make Mine Chocolate" post. I have owned two bunnies in my life and I love rabbits as pets, but they do have unique requirements and I think people should know about them before adopting.

April:

In April, Jack started shivering. I do not know if this was connected to what ended up taking his life in just a few short months, but I will regret not looking into this further. The vet wrote it off as his being an old man and it was very cold when he would do it. She was most likely right, but hindsight is never kind, is it?

This month I also went to Kansas City to go to BlogPaws. I was chosen as a Chewy influencer and they contracted with me to pay my way; my hotel stay and airfare. Unfortunately, I still haven't seen reimbursement for despite contacting them several times on this

I also wrote up a post about those little black cysts that cats get in their ears.. mostly because we were having issues with them.

May:

May finally saw kittens back on this kitten blog. Michaela came to me pregnant and gave birth here.

I also shared with you my trip to the Great Plains animal shelter (wow, not one post about Jack all month.. but there was one about Fleurp)

June:

June brought lots of cute kitten photos as well as the much loved "naming day" post.

One of the online groups I was in was having a huge debate over goat milk being an appropriate milk replacer for kittens, so I wrote a post about it. I have been using it for years and all of my kittens have been happy and healthy with great growth and weight gain and minimal if no diarrhea that many kittens suffer with when they are on commercial products. I was sold but so many people had been told there was no taurine in the milk (not true) or that there wasn't as much fat in it (which is true but there is more than enough) so the kittens would be undernourished in that regard (not true). People wanted facts, not antidotes so I spent some time pulling articles and contacting sellers of goat milk to get the facts so I could put them in one place so the next time someone told me emphatically that using goat milk was going to kill kittens, I could share with them the facts. .

Wow.. no Jack photos in June either, but there was a post about Twee and one about Skippy.. and I even updated you all on Fleurp's annual bout with anemia and how shaving her seemed to help.

July:

You know I was going there because this is the one post that still makes me laugh when I think about it..  The squirrel post came out better than I thought it would and I still love these collages of the kittens from birth until ten weeks .. it is rare that I have good headshots for all the kittens for every week they are with me, and considering the turmoil of the year I am thrilled I was able to get these.
I also announced that Michaela was leaving us to go and nurse another set of kittens that lost their mom..

I also found a photo of Jack that I uploaded but didn't make into a post, so you saw (but no one noticed - or if they did they didn't say anything) a post of Jack back at the old house.

August:

In August I finally announced that we were moving. It was an incredibly rough year, much more so that I have ever let on, and by this point, I was pretty close to losing it. Fortunately, my kitten supplier knew just what I needed and provided me with another batch of kittens.. Michaela and her new charges needed a place to stay and I had a kitten room that was aching for kittens. Fortunately, these kittens were happy to give massages

August saw a couple of informational posts, such as my experiences with giving CBD to my cats and another mythbusting post about Pedyalite for kittens - since there had been a great deal of fear-mongering about giving it to kittens. Skippy celebrated National Bow Tie Day and I shared with you my new obsession with the wildlife in my backyard

September:

Things were going well in September, unpacking this time around went much smoother, things were falling into place, the kittens were doing well - even if they were being obnoxious and were ready to move on - and then things went south quickly and then they got worse.

As for The Crew, I noticed things weren't as they should be with Muffin and Jack. Muffin went to the vet and it was recommended that we give her fluids more often so I blogged about doing that in conjunction with a sponsored post hoping to make it a little more shareable and interacted with as sponsored posts are what keep a lot of bloggers going. Supporting those, commenting on those posts (not just here but any blog you visit) helps a great deal.

Jack's symptoms were minor and I was trying to decide if they were even a thing.. as I tend to be paranoid and no more so after things go bad..

I also shared more photos of the deer that visit my backyard

October:

I was still processing the loss of Graham when the unimaginable happened. Weirdly I posted a conversation about grief in the form of a poem I had with Muffin a few months prior the day before everything went bad having no idea what was about to happen. And when I say bad, I mean really bad. I mean "you take on a pregnant cat because you need a project to distract yourself and realize that isn't enough so you take on another pregnant cat" bad.

(my lamenting about Jack's passing has been hidden in white font, highlight if you want to read it, or just skip if you don't have tissues)

I didn't have the time to process his illness.. to give him a calm and serene goodbye I would have liked, that he deserved. Every time I went to check on him every fiber of my being, every cell, everything was screaming "NOOOO!!!" at him. I can't imagine how horrible that made him feel. I really wish I could have had even a few more hours to come to terms with it - but even to this day three months later my body is still whimpering "no no no no no no".  Emmy took over a year, Ollie took a little longer. Kit was only a matter of weeks but it was so obvious that she wasn't going to make it from pretty early on. Jack took just a few days.. from the nosebleed at night, to the vet appointment the next day, to his rapid and horrific decline so we made an appointment for that next day. He still looked healthy and beautiful... but he wouldn't even eat his beloved dry food - which I always joked would be his last meal.. 

But life moves on, and Darcy gave birth to five kittens and three survived, and Onyx gave birth to four. I was asked for a calendar of Michaela and her two sets of kittens so I created one. I have learned a great deal and if I do it again I will photoshop the images to have captions of names and a little more information about each kitten.

And then Twee ended up in hospital. (she got better)

November:

November was particularly hard for me. My husband's work was keeping him out of the house a lot and there was no Jack and kittens who weren't affectionate enough to make up for the loss. There were a few posts, like where I shared the names I had chosen for Darcy's kittens and Onyx's kittens.  I also wrote up a post about adopting one of my foster kittens if you ever think you might want to.. 

December:

As you can see here, I was able to get my Christmas card put together and ordered. I also put up the Christmas Tree which in retrospect seems like it was a bad idea since I became quite sick from whatever got into the cat toys and Fleurp tried (we suspect) to eat it.  She is doing better but is losing quite a bit of fur due to the stress of it all. Even now I hear her munching on the tree and I'm very close to pitching the thing right out the window.  (ho ho ho)

I did have quite a bit of fun with a six-part series of posts about the Kittens' Christmas sweater party. (1,2,3,4,5,6) Darcy and Onyx's kittens hit weight and were neutered and went up for adoption. The waiting list was long enough that the kittens all made it home by Christmas. Ren and Spottacus went together, Zephy and Wyatt went together. Kreb and Romy went together and Milo went by himself - which worked out really well because he was always okay playing by himself. Darcy and Onyx started becoming friends once the kittens were gone. I received notification that someone wanted to adopt Onyx so she left. I was worried about how Darcy would react but she took it in stride, much like when her kittens left. I think she likes being able to play without having to share. I just wish I could get Darcy out of her shell. I recently received notice that Darcy has someone interested in her so she won't be here much longer either.

Looking forward:

There are projects I have for the kitten room. I want new paint and new lighting for certain. I'd love to get new flooring in the bathroom down there but that might have to wait until next year. I have some shelves I would like to put up and some art. I'm actually searching Pinterest for baby room ideas - and man I hope I don't start getting baby advertisements now.

I am overly paranoid about all of my cats right now as well and I am going to have to get them all into the vet for a checkup over the next few months. With the moving and the holidays and the onslaught of vet bills, I am thinking of opening up my "scrapnipping" venture, where I make catnip toys out of scraps of my craft fabric that I have laying around.  It has been a while since I did this.. so I'm curious what you think a good price point would be. Would you like to buy toys individually or in sets?  Do you like pure nip or nip and fiberfill for a fluffier toy? I am pretty sure I still have some alpaca fur.. would fur stuffed toys interest you? No suggestion or comment is unwanted, please, I would like to know your thoughts. If you don't feel comfortable posting them in the comments, feel free to email me at connie at kittyblog.net

toys I made in 2016

I also want to take a moment and thank you for taking this journey with me. Whether you have just joined us or are a long time reader, I appreciate you taking part of your day to spend with my kitties. Your support is greatly appreciated.

I have mentioned this before but it has been a while - Your comments, your time, shared with me, helps me do what I do. Being active in rescue and within online rescue communities, I see so much of the bad side of pet ownership. It is people like you, who value cats, who find value in a little blog on the corner of the internet that helps remind me that there is good out there, that there are people who think cats are worth more than toasters..

Final Monday morning check in

Georgie, Marshmallow, S'more, and Doughboy

The quarantine over what happened with Graham is over and the kittens have just left the building to go to their next stage of life. Unfortunately, the families that had already signed up to adopt them backed out. There is still a waiting list so they will not be waiting for homes for long.

I thought I would try to take "glamour shots" of the kittens this weekend. I still haven't gotten my "photo studio" down to the kitten room - we might try to make that happen this before new kittens arrive but I'm not sure if that is going to happen or not. I have several plans but I'm still unpacking and etc..

So I tried them on top of the storage chest and boom, instant kitten studio..

S'more

DoughBoy

Marshmallow

Marshmallow and Doughboy

George

Michaela

Black Cat Photography for fun and amusement

Trying to get photos of black kitties without natural light is "fun". I thought I would try getting artsy photos with my 50mm lens but it was having a hard time figuring out what to focus on.. I very much need to upgrade my kit lens but I still haven't gotten around to it.. Maybe Santa will bring me something

As you can see these were taken before they were neutered last week. I also had a lovely series of photos of Graham falling asleep. I decided to put them in gif form

Saying Goodbye

Well, this was mighty difficult. Actually, the decision was very easy to make but carrying it out was the difficult part.

After I picked Graham up from the vet, I was optimistic. I was told that he was blind but he was navigating the room okay. He was walking around, he ate, I had hope.

He then settled down in the middle of the cold floor. I wanted to give him some comfort so I tried to hold him, he did not want that. This was unlike him. I tried to give him Happy Bear, he did not want that. This was unlike him. I was able to get him on a blanket and hoped that a good night of rest in familiar settings would help. I was exhausted and went to bed.

Because I posted the link, Stella was watching in on the webcam in the morning and saw him have another seizure. I went down post seizure and he was still out of it. I was able to cuddle him until he came around but at that point, he wanted nothing to do with me. He was covered in urine again, so I did my best to dry him off without upsetting him too much.

I went back upstairs to work and kept the camera running on my computer. Two hours later I saw another seizure and it was violent. He was still flailing as I got to him and I tried to keep him as calm as I could.  When it stopped he was once again nonresponsive. He sat there but it was like no one was home. I wrapped him up in a towel and was going to rush him right to the vet but I was pretty certain if I did that I would not see him again. I decided to sit there and hold him for a few minutes as he always enjoyed cuddling and I enjoyed cuddling him. I held him and talked softly to him and kissed his head many times. As he started to come around I knew this moment had ended and he would start insisting he be put down. The Graham I knew and adored was gone.

Even if this was something that he could come back from, would he ever fully come back? I did not know. I just knew that two seizures in two hours was something I could not handle by myself. I took him down to the vet and the techs took him out back while I waited for the vet to be free and the rescue to be contacted. By the time I saw the vet Graham had two more seizures. It was time in my mind. The vet very kindly took the long road to explain why they had come to the conclusion as well. I agreed with her telling her that the decision was the right on and the easy one to come to but most difficult to go through. I was asked if I would like to be with him and that is something I can do so I wanted to.

Despite what others will tell you, if you feel you are unable to be with them at the end do not feel you have to or you do not love them or you are less than. In many cases, the animal isn't aware you are there. There are times that not being there is actually kinder for the animal, especially if they are very sensitive to your moods. 

Graham was not only out of it from the seizures but they sedated him prior to the injection so he had no clue I was there.  I had my hand on his body and could feel his very rapid heartbeat despite the sedation. I held him, I gave him a kiss for myself, for all of you, and one for a safe journey. The whole thing took only moments..

Once he was gone I gave his body one final cuddle.

I will admit a huge part of me wanted to adopt him and not let him go. In not the way I would have preferred, I was able to love and care for him for his entire life.  None of us are promised a long life, but I was able to fill his with love and fun and food.. his life, while short, was great.

Graham the kitten and the very bad no good day.

Unfortunately, things have taken a pretty sad and serious turn here at Casa de Gato.  Everything seemed fine on Wednesday morning, but when I went to take care of them for the final time that night Graham seemed very restless. He was pacing the room. He would walk over to the food bowl, have a bite and leave and pace some more.  As I started to realize what was happening (it wasn't immediately apparent because the other kittens were racing around) I watched him and he seemed to be in more and more distress. I called him over to me and he came and laid down next to me but was not attention seeking at all. He just sat there and purred. 

I had noticed he was unkempt looking as he was pacing and now that he was next to me I was able to get a better look. His back end was all wet and smelled like urine. I found a drying puddle of urine on the floor and wondered if he was having issues with crystals or an infection. I attempted to gently feel for a bladder and found one. It wasn't huge or hard, but the fact that I could find one was concerning to me.  I called the rescue and to report what was going on and request a trip to the emergency clinic. Fortunately, there is one about 15 minutes from my house and we bundled him up and headed in. On the way, he started twitching. I opened the carrier and put my hand over his shoulders and he pushed up into them and had a seizure. I let the rescue know what was going on and things took a pretty dramatic turn. I went from a possible infection to *oh my goodness what on earth is going on*

The e-clinic took him out back for an eval while they talked to me about what was going on. I checked the carrier and noticed he peed during his episode, so at least I knew he wasn't blocked. At this point, it was midnight so we were only a few hours away from a vet being open so we wanted to keep testing to a minimum. I am all for figuring out what is going on, but if delaying the tests a few hours isn't going to change the outcome and it will save several hundred dollars, then that is the route I, and the rescue, wanted to take.  While I was talking to the vet he had another seizure. This changed things.

I authorized what they felt they needed to do for his comfort and safety and I left with a bill of $700 - because they require you prepay everything you authorize them to do before they do it and then refund you what they don't do.

I got home at 1 am and woke up at 7 am. I called the clinic for an update and that never goes well. Why to E-clinics not keep brief talking points at the phone for the receptionist?? Anyway, the doctor called and told me that he didn't have another seizure and he spent some time sleeping. She also believed that the seizures caused him to be blind. This is not uncommon. The director of the rescue was going to pick him up and take him to their vet. I was also headed out of town for the day. He spent the entire day at the vet and I was able to pick him up.  He is now home with me.

The vet said she could not find a cause for the seizures. It is either idiopathic and will clear up and never happen again, it is toxo and so she put him on antibiotics for that, or it is something very serious and if so most likely life ending.  I asked if it could have anything to do with the neutering, the vaccine he received at the time or the flea meds that he received on Sunday. She said those causes were highly unlikely.  I asked if it was a possible low blood sugar thing because everyone was so hissy lately and maybe they were preventing him from eating, and she believed not as he would have most likely passed out first. I asked about the blindness and was told that he was having some pupil response now but that she still thought he was highly visually impaired. She said if his vision wasn't restored in a week that he probably wouldn't get it back.

He came home and didn't want to come out of the carrier. I pulled him out so I could take the bandage off his foot. He did not want to be restrained, at all, period. He doesn't want to be held or snuggled or even sit on my chest.  This breaks my heart most of all because I am no comfort to him. All I can do it sit by and watch him. He wandered around for a while avoiding siblings and other obstacles in the room. He walked right too me and weaved his way between my legs (one of his favorite things to do) without bumping into either leg. It is my belief that he can see. I threw a small toy in front of him and it garnered no reaction, but it was small and I tossed it quickly.. I tried another larger toy and he tracked it.  So while I don't think his vision is 100% I do think there is some function.

He ate several small bites. He would go to the food and eat a bit and then would wander off and pace the room again. He went back several times. He then went to the litter box. He dug and squatted, squeaked his displeasure, dug some more, squatted, squeaked his displeasure, etc.. I was about to have a panic attack when he finally found a hole to his approval and started urinating.  He produced a urine ball that was the size of his head!  He almost fell asleep while peeing - again, totally about to have a panic attack when he started leaning forward and resting his head on the side of the box but he finally finished and left.

He went to the middle of the room. I tried to take his bandage off quietly, but he wasn't happy at my holding his foot. He just sat there and purred at full volume.. which made me worry. I tried to pat him - which he liked - and I was able to kiss him, and wrap my arms around where he sat - so like a big hug without touching him.  I was not thrilled that he was on the cold floor, so I tried to put him on Happy Bear. Graham always liked Happy Bear, but this time he squawked his displeasure and got off. He was quite unsteady getting off and I think that was probably the reason. I went and got a blanket for him to sit on instead. He wandered to the edge of it and sat there and purred and purred.  Michaela who has been extremely bothered by the kittens since being neutered was concerned for him and actually worked her way over to him. She's been secluding herself so the kittens won't try to nurse so this was a very interesting reaction.. it appears that cats can tell the difference between happy purrs and purrs of self-soothing.

His siblings, for the most part, have been respectful of his need for rest. S'more was less than gentle with him a couple of times, but it ended pretty quickly.

I left him sleeping. I wish I could do more. I have a few thoughts I'll talk to the vet about tomorrow as I had them once I got home. I know I'm probably grasping at straws. I'm also hoping that I'll wake up tomorrow to a much improved Graham who is feeling much better and I won't need or want to do anything else. If you want to check on him, I left him sleeping in full view of the webcam in the kitten room

If anyone is motivated by Graham's story to help financially, the rescue that is sponsoring him could use some help to pay for the bills. I know people feel silly donating very small amounts, but even $5 can help. You can find a donate button or the mailing address if you prefer to send a donation at nhkittens.com or you can use my paypal address (the donate link is in the sidebar) and I can forward it on.

Monday Morning update on Thursday

Sorry for the lack of posts here. The kittens were neutered on Sunday and they came back quite drunk. I took these photos prior to being neutered

They came back Sunday evening quite drunk.  I've dealt with drunk kitties quite a few times, but all of them seemed to be favoring their hind leg as well. I wrote into the rescue and was told that they also received their vaccine in that leg.. well that explained that.

Unfortunately, they also reacted quite badly to the whole vet experience and have been setting off hiss storms for three days now. This is why it is such a good idea for kittens to recover at home with people who know what is going on and can try to keep things as calm as possible. They have been quite resistant to all of my "but you love each other!!" "suggestions" and while things are currently much improved, with a tortie among the bunch it doesn't take much to set them off. Torties.. you have got to love them!!

Actually, S'more has recently turned into a super lovey kitten who jumps right up on my lap and asks for belly rubs. Graham is awesome because he runs right up to me and attaches himself to my ankle, but S'more is the first one in my lap and I am a sucker for that.

I think they need a couple more days to fully get over everything. Then there will be the process of getting them through the system, getting their health checks and going up for adoption.. Won't be long now.

Wordless Wednesday - This is my happy place

Graham the kitten is just not this smug but he is that cute

S'more wants you to know that he is also that much of a ham..

Graham the kitten spots an interesting foe..