I think my cat is pregnant...

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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Well, I was going to hold off until I could post some current photos, but since you asked…! :smiley:

Banshee is now six weeks old. I have to say, I never thought I would be posting such an update! I look back on the history of this thread and it all seems like it started so long ago - and yet its just been a couple of months…

She has transformed from a tiny, screeching, mewling, pathetic little scrap of a being whose very survival was in doubt, into a full fledged crazy ass kitten! She is of an age now where many kittens are taken away from their mothers to their new homes (yes, still young - perhaps too young - but it happens often at six weeks!) She races about like a little maniac, hopping and pouncing and playing. She has favorite toys - a wadded up piece of scrap paper, a milk ring, a golf ball, a roll of paper towels left on the floor, a fluffy little cat ball. And of course, her little stuffed lion ‘litter mate’ that she wrestles with and drapes herself over to sleep on in her crate. I have seen her use Markie as a stepping stone, jumping from the bed to his back to the floor, leaving him startled and nonplussed! She often does that little kitten trick of rearing back on her haunches with her little ‘arms’ spread out like a grizzly bear about to attack! Sometimes she miscalculates, rears back too far and flips over backward, immediately springing up unperturbed as though to say, ‘I totally meant to do that!’ She makes me laugh, a lot!

She eats kitten food now - although I had to be hard-hearted and let her get a little ‘hungry’ before she was willing to do so! But once she started, she did a complete turnaround and now has no interest in the bottle - yay! She has been using her litter box since she was 3 weeks old and often treats it like a kid’s ‘sandbox’ - just another play yard, to dig and play in! She seems happy, healthy and as well adjusted as any little orphan can possibly be! She is free of fleas, ticks, ear mites or worms (at least as far as I can tell!) She has not suffered from any of the common kitten ailments, no constipation or diarrhea, no respiratory infections, no eye infections, no distress of any kind - other than her early ‘orphaning’.

In a couple more weeks, I will take her to the vet for a check up and preliminary shots. In a couple of months, I will track down a low cost spay/neuter program in the area to get her fixed (I have a car now!). Although I know that kittens are frequently spayed at a very young age nowadays, I am reluctant to put her through that until she is older - at least four months. Maddie did not have her first heat until she was well over six months of age, so I am not anticipating that this will be a problem. Also, there is no way that this one is going to get even the slightest opportunity to get outside. I am able-bodied now, no longer trying to juggle getting the dog out but keeping the cat in while in a cast and on crutches, a situation that Maddie quickly learned to take advantage of…

All in all, Banshee is my little alchemist, turning lead into gold, tragedy into triumph and sadness into joy. I think she is here to stay… :slight_smile:

(I will post more photos as soon as I can.)

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Aww, what a sweet story! I’m so glad she’s doing well, and can’t wait to see the pics!

Just as a guideline for spaying, the lady at a foster site I read regularly takes her kittens in when they reach 2 pounds, so she goes by weight rather than age.

I’m sure your little survivor will come through it with flying colors! :slight_smile:

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Hooray! Way to go Lily! Banshee sounds like a strong spirit! The kitty gods have smiled on you both!

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LilyoftheField, I just wanted you to know…I’m currently deployed to Afghanistan, as an operating room nurse, and my days are pretty much filled with tragedy, and I have to do just do my best to not let it get to me, and get on with my job. Your story has made me smile in a way I don’t think I have since I’ve been here. I can’t tell you how happy I am that it has a happy ending. Thank you.

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Lucretia! You can’t know how happy I am to hear that I have brightened your day in some small way. My own son is currently also deployed in Afghanistan and it would give me great pleasure to think that there is someone out there who is making his job just a little bit easier to bear! :slight_smile:

Thank you so much for your service, for helping our sons and daughters who are at risk half a world away from us, and for your own sacrifices - it is so much appreciated!

(When my son read on my FB page about the saga of Maddie and Banshee, his immediate response - from Afghanistan! - was an urgent plea, ‘Save the kitty!’ Well, in spite of my own doubts and insecurities, somehow I was able to do this - and now I feel that it was not just for her, not just for him and not just for myself - but for everyone like you and the other SD readers who are able to take some joy and pleasure from Banshee’s story! It was so helpful to have the moral and emotional support from the readers of this thread, even as they, justifiably, shook their collective cyber heads in dismay at my failure to get Maddie spayed…)

Thank you for your response…! I will be sending out good thoughts for your safe return and the safe return of all our military personnel…

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Thanks for the update, Lily. It makes my day, too, to hear about little Banshee.

It sounds like you’ve got it covered, but a word of advice about the spaying - it seems like girl cats come into heat far earlier than you ever expect them to. The vet will probably have good advice on when to spay her, anyway.

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yes, I understand this Cat - this is why spaying at a very young age has become common, especially in shelter/foster situations. I understand the importance of not relying on new owners to follow through as they should (well - I was one of those new owners! although I did not acquire Maddie through a shelter or rescue group)

But I think its safe to say that I’ve learned my lesson. Banshee will be spayed - I just do not see the need to have it done while she is still so young. Please understand - I am still amazed that I was able to see her through to this age - I am not yet emotionally able or willing to risk her going under the knife quite yet. I feel confident that I can keep her safe until she is at least four months (preferably five or six) without her escaping and possibly getting pregnant. Remember - although I was remiss in getting Maddie spayed, she was almost three before she got pregnant! It was not until physical disability impaired my own ability to keep Maddie ‘in’ that she was able to answer ‘the call of the wild’!

And, although I know its no guarantee that the same will apply to Banshee, Maddie did not go into heat as early as some cats do. In fact, I think she was closer to eight months old before she had her first heat. Doesn’t matter anyway - for two years she was strictly an inside cat and it will be the same for Banshee.

And I know this will sound stubborn and cantankerous - but I don’t care what the vet says. Even if he advises getting her spayed immediately, I will still wait. I have already made up my mind that she is not getting this surgery before she is four months old at the earliest. I am just not willing to risk her to major surgery, no matter how ‘safe’ it may seem, before I deem that she is old enough. Keep in mind that I still have no way of knowing what killed Maddie - if it was a reaction to the sedative she was given by the vet - how do I know that such a thing could not happen to Banshee? Well, of course, I don’t know - and I also don’t know that waiting until she’s older will make a difference. But I do know that it will make a difference to me. So I will wait. And I will be careful…

I’m just not willing to take that risk right now…

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That makes perfect sense to me–if I’d invested that much effort into saving a little baby like that, I’d be a bit overprotective too.

When you’re ready to do it, if you do have any concern that it was a reaction to the anesthetic for Maddie, you might ask the vet to use a different kind of anesthetic. I don’t remember what it’s called, but we have a cat with a pretty severe heart murmur, and any time he has to be sedated, they use this kind on him. If you ask your vet I’m sure he/she can give you the details (or maybe somebody here can). I don’t think it’s much more expensive than the regular type.

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Thank you so much for the update, this totally made my day :slight_smile:

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Fair enough. :slight_smile:

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How’s Froggy dealing with the new baby?

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For cats with heart issues, the recommended protocol is to limit IV fluids and use Propofol, avoiding ketamine.

As a vet tech who works in feline rescue, I’m perfectly fine with waiting until 4 months of age. Our normal protocol is 2 pounds. I would recommend making sure to get her in right at 4 months, though, as it’s really the minimum time for her to possibly start going into heat. A cat in heat can be spayed, (we do it every day) but it’s a slightly more difficult surgery. Some vets also might charge more for the procedure if they find her in heat during the surgery. We charge an additional $10 at the low-cost S/N clinic. Often the surgery will end up taking 15 minutes rather than 10 minutes if the cat is in heat. It’s a significant loss of time if we can only do 4 cats an hour rather than 6 an hour.

If you were to wait until 6 months I would be afraid she’d already be in heat and that makes it a little more likely for complications. Healthy, sheltered, “safe” females pretty much go into heat and stay that way, so it’s not like if she starts you could just wait out the “cycle,” it’s unpredictable with indoor cats. Doing it at 4 months (or 4 pounds) would be much more prudent if you’re not willing to go as early as 2 pounds, but 6 months would be ramping up the risk just a little more. I don’t want to alarm you, but spaying a cat in heat can be - messy. We spay cats in heat all the time, so it’s not a deal-breaker by any stretch. I can go into more detail if you like, as to the why, but I’ll only do that if people really want to know. It really is better to get her in before she starts.

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Loving this saga too! Ditto what SeaDragonTatoo said about 6 months. The risk of certain cancers goes up considerably if they have even one heat Ask me how I learned that :frowning:

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Can I chip in to the spay fund? I know you plan on a low-cost spay neuter program, but I’d like to help defray that cost.

StG

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Me Too!

You know my situation, but I will be glad to help if I can.

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  • pulls up chair *

I wanna know! Fight my ignorance, please - I assumed “spay” = “yanking out an organ” so I didn’t think it would matter one way or the other.

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well…those who know more than I can chip in, but from what I understand (and my understanding is based entirely on ‘book larnin’!'), when a cat is in heat, the organs that require ‘yanking’, are more engorged with blood at that time than they would be normally. Thus the procedure can become bloodier and riskier…

There was a time, not all that long ago, when vets simply would choose not to perform a spay surgery on a cat in heat, due to this increased risk. Nowadays, it is not as dangerous as it used to be (although still riskier than spaying a cat who is not in heat) and deemed to be ‘worth the risk’ insofar as its better to not risk pregnancy at all. Not just because of the ‘too many cats’ factor, but also because a spayed cat is at lower risk for future health problems…

So…like many things in life, its a balancing act - risk vs risk…

I want to thank St Germain and Foggy for their very generous offers - but I am going to try to man up and foot these expenses myself - as I should! I do not have much in the way of income, but so far I still have some credit! (the foreclosure has not caught up with my credit card yet!) So, if push comes to shove, I can still use credit to get her spayed. (And, yes - I could have, should have done this for Maddy - but I have been working for quite some time to get my debt down and not increase it - and clearly I underestimated the risk!)

I took some pics today, but I don’t have the proper cable for xferring pics from my camera to my computer - so I will have to wait and borrow the cable from my brother before I can post them. You’re not missing much though, 'cuz that little girl won’t be still for a minute! It took my daughter at least thirty attempts to get the couple of good photos that I last posted, lol!

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Well…truth to tell, Froggy has not really met the new kid yet. I have been keeping Banshee upstairs, mostly confined to my room. Froggy lives downstairs primarily. She has her own personal ‘space’ which is a utility table located between the kitchen and the dining room. Her food is served on the top of the table and her bed/basket is located on a shelf, one ‘floor’ down. This keeps her relatively secure from harassment from the dog when she is eating or sleeping. She pretty much keeps to that area during the day, and only comes out to prowl the house at night, when she is unlikely to be bothered.

I have brought Banshee downstairs just a few times - enough so that Froggy knows she exists, but has had no real contact with her. She mostly just gives kitty the evil eye from the safety of her table. If past history is any indication, as Banshee grows, she will probably have no real problem with Frog. Maddie was only a kitten when I acquired her, but it did not take her more than a few months to establish dominance over Froggy - even to the point of sometimes kicking her out of her own bed! Many times I would find poor Frog curled up asleep atop her table while Maddie snoozed contentedly in Froggy’s bed!

If Banshee is anything like her mother (and I think she is!) - she and Frog will quickly establish a hierarchy. Probably with Banshee on top - in the animal world especially, a disability usually precludes dominance.

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In general, if the animal (cat or dog) has not come into heat at all, or even outside of heat, the organs (uterus and ovaries) that are removed are relatively small, with a slightly smaller less blood supply, which has to be ligated and cut to remove the organs. Even in normal, non-heat conditions, these arteries pump enough blood that the animal can bleed out if the ligatures are not firm and/or the bleeding is not controlled in time.

In cats in heat, the organs to be yanked out are larger, engorged, and with more blood supply. Unlike the relatively simpler procedure of removing something small, you have now something larger, more sipplery, and more messy to remove, and be slightly more careful and mindful about those ligatures.

I’ve spayed a cat in heat. I had to ask someone else to confirm that I had grabbed the right organ and was not just scooping intestine, as the diameter was much bigger than I had previously encountered. Once I got confirmation that I was not going to cut intestines, I proceeded as usual. It was a bit more slippery, bloodier, and messier, but not THAT bad.

PS. Yea, if you’re in a high-volume situation, spaying an animal in heat will take a bit more than a non-heat animal, and you also use slightly more material than for a non-heat animal.

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Yep. Thanks KarlGrenze!

For anyone pulling up a chair for just a little additional gory detail…

The only thing I can add is the friability issue the doctor can run into when trying to fish the uterine horns out with the spay hook. In the high-volume situations, the incision is tiny - as in 10-15mm tiny in most cases, so they use a “hook” to pull the stumps out in order to ligate them. When engorged from being in heat, the tissues can become thin and the process of pulling them out can make them basically fall apart (friable). When that happens, there’s nothing left to ligate (tie off) to stop any bleeding. Most of the time, the bleeding will stop on its own and the cat is fine. She might take a little longer to wake up from anesthesia since she lost a little more blood than usual, but sometimes (rarely) the stump could keep bleeding. When that happens, we have to “go back in” and the doctor has to make a larger incision to do a minor exploratory and find the bleeding to stop it.

In the three years I’ve been involved with high-volume S/N, I think we’ve had to do that twice. So out of about 8,000 surgeries, hopefully that won’t terrify anyone!