But last night was different. The first time I've ever felt that kind of sad. The kind of sad that intertwined with crushed hope, guilt and love.
I'm not a cat person. I'm not a loving person. I don't like cats or babies or anything small because they demand too much attention.
I need attention.
So I don't like having to give attention to others.
My husband however is a cat person, he did mentioned to me, giving me hints a couple of times whenever the mother cat at his parent's house gave birth to a litter or whenever he encountered kitten wandering around at his work/wherever. His eyes seems to have special kitten detector/sensor.
But almost every time he told me I just smile and not really responding to the idea. Neither agreeing nor disagreeing.
The last time I had a kitten was 20 years ago when the 10 year old me and my little brother heard a kitten cry on the other side of the road in front of our house in Penang. Its a Persian cat with blue eyes probably got left behind or abandoned by his owner. He's about 4-5 weeks old already walking on his own, so we asked the maid to help us crossed the road, pick him up, bathed him and feed him cat food. He slept and started jumping around the house after he woke up. He went on and lived with us for the rest of his life. In Penang we only have one neighbors, he was still a kitten so that neighbor love him as much as we do. But his last couple of years are not as nice because we moved to a suburb in Perak. He's grown an adult cat, sneaked in the neighbor's house, steal fishes and impregnate other neighbor's cat. Some neighbors like him, some don't. The ones who don't, REALLY hated him. We couldn't stop him, he has gone a bit wild and can't be controlled. He doesn't like being in the house anymore. And we are the kind of people who doesn't have the heart to neuter cats. He got beaten few times, we used to came home from grandparents house to find him covered in blood. Dad will take him to the vet. But after few months, he died poisoned by bad neighbors when I was in boarding school. My parents gave him proper burial and Mom make sure we didn't take in any more kittens afterwards. We might not be the type of people who could take care and train cats well. So afterward if my young hearts (who still have love towards animal or babies at the time) found a kitten, my parents would make me give it away after we fed them.
But on the morning of Friday 1st December 2017, it was a public holiday (Maulidur Rasul day) my husband went out to service his car, and came back with a box and I heard a tiny, long cry from inside it.
Felt like a dream because I was still sleeping, but I knew my husband had brought home the kitten he's talking about the day before.
Before I could say anything, he said,
"Syg sorry, aku jumpa anak kucing kat tepi jalan."
"Yang oren kat site opis syg tu ke?" I asked.
"Bukan..yang ni aku jumpa tepi jalan on the way balik service kereta tadi. Dia kecik sangat aku tak sampai hati nak tinggal, kalau aku biar nanti die kena langgar kereta."
I went to look inside the box.
I swear to God it was the littlest thing, half the size of my palm... eyes haven't opened, ears haven't unfolded, umbilical cord still attached. This one is barely a week old. Probably has just been born yesterday, or the day before. I told my husband, this is too young, he could not survive without his mother, he should've waited, maybe the mom came back for him.
My husband said he couldn't wait that long since he was in the middle of the road, and the kitten is moving towards the main road, he got no choice.
So I had no choice. I start googling what I can feed him with. (Never ever feed newborn kitten with cow's milk, human milk or any normal milk you know.)
My husband was already ahead of me, he already bought Kitten Milk Replacer from a pet clinic and a syringe to feed him with. Despite looking fragile, the kitten was otherwise active. He moves and cries a lot. He hasn't get the hang of feeding from a syringe yet but he still drinks. So we assume he's healthy enough.
We kept on googling on neonatal kitten care. So we found out that neonatal kittens couldn't pee and poop on their own so we need to rub its bottom to stimulate the eliminating process.
And so we did. I can say that was the first time a I could feel that happy seeing little poop coming out of a kitten's bum.
After pooping, he went on to sleep, probably tired of the day.
We already had plan that day to go looking for clothes to wear for my brother's wedding next weekend. Since it could take whole day, we took him along because we need to feed him every 2-3 hours. He was asleep most of the time in the car and we were wondering whether to wake him up when it's time to feed. The first two hours we did not wake him up because when he wakes up, all he do is cry and that makes us worry more. So we let him sleep. But around 7pm we woke him up and feed him anyway, cause he might not know he's hungry. It's a learning curve, but we couldn't take any risk. We just trying to use whatever information on the internet and combine with our common sense. At this age, any reason could be the reason. so we wake him up no matter how peaceful he looks when he sleep.
So that's DAY 1.
That's when our life started to revolve around him, what to do with him, what to name him, non-stop googling about him, endless worrying whether we feed him too much, too little, or the milk too hot or too cold. why is he crying a lot and is it normal for him to always moving about the box, (I thought all little kitten do is sleeping) or if we manhandled him too much his muscle/body hurt.
I started asking my friends whom I know have raised cats and kittens but most of them have kittens that is already more than 4-5 weeks old. The ones who have neonatal kittens, have their mother along, but they did help confirming what we've been reading on the internet, making us more confident to take care him, to make him survive.
DAY 2
Saturday, 2nd December.
The day before we decided to name him Olen. He has white soft fur but his ear was orange, his tail was orange and he has 3 orange dots coming up from his tail to his back bone.
We maintained feeding him every 2-3 hours, even waking up at night.
We usually go climbing on Saturdays so today we brought him along. Before that we stopped by at a Pet shop to buy him a bottle, hoping he could feed more from a bottle than a syringe. Also he got flea so the shop suggested a flea spray for kitten 2 days old and above. We already brought hot water, his KMR so we plan to feed him at the climbing gym later.
As expected, he slept almost all the time at the climbing gym, and we had to wake him up to feed him. And we were right, he loves the bottle more and he drinks way more now from the bottle than he did before.
On this day, we were worried that he hasn't pooped again since the last time he poop. he only pees a little and we are concerned that all the crying is due to constipation. But at night time, he did poop when my husband fed him, not because the stimulation we gave him. And its a lot. Now we worried if he got diarrhea. But he doesn't seem weak.
My husband planned to spray him with the flea spray tomorrow cause we afraid he might get cold if we spray him during the night.
We were sleeping in the living room, so we put his box on the floor next to the living room so we could always go and look for him.
DAY 3
Sunday, 3rd December
We read that kittens need warmth from the mother or siblings because their body couldn't regulate their body temperature yet. But all the site we read is from an English site. Most of them bought a heating pad for these newborn kitten and most of them has a litter. not a single newborn. We was wondering maybe because the weather in English/US country are colder than Malaysia hence the need of heating pad. Malaysia is already a hot country so we wonder if heating pad is too much for a kitten. We don't have any idea how much heat the kitten needs. So we put a lot of clothes in the kitten box and at night we put water bottles with slightly hot water in the box for his warmth. He seems to like it because he always sleep near the bottle or on top of the bottle.
Today we used the flea spray on him and make sure it doesn't get to his face. It was so satisfying to see all the fleas came out, paralyzed and drop dead on their own. He got less fleas after that.
Then we went out again, because we went out late on Friday so only my husband managed to buy his attire. As usual, Olen will sleep along the way until we woke him to feed him. We never switch on the car aircond and always wondering if he's too warm or not enough warm in the car. Because at home, he always cries and move around but in the car most of the time he'll sleep.
At home, whenever he's asleep he will wake up if we try to take a peek of him or if we try to lift the top part of the box slowly to watch him sleep. Then he'll cry and move around again until he fell asleep again. At the time, we were wondering if he cries a lot due to some discomfort.
He still doesn't poop today. And this cause us to question how many mL does we gave him the KMR cause when we use bottle he seems to eat more and caused him to overfed. We questioned about EVERYTHING at this point. By night, he pooped a little. We were relieved but we were still worried. We don't know how often he should poop.
DAY 4
Monday 4th December.
We both need to work today but since we both work in Cyberjaya, my husband planned to go back home to feed him every 3 hours. We planned to go to the vet for general check up and to ask about everything we worried about. So during lunch, my husband told me he'll bring Olen and pick me up at my office and we went to a pet clinic in Putrajaya.
The thing that we wanted to ask was,
1. Why does he cries a lot and does that means discomfort??
2. Why was he so active and moves a lot?
3. Why doesn't he pooped frequently?
4. and can a human hand manhandle kitten that age a lot?(We need to manhandle him for feeding)
So the vet told us, he doesn't poop because his bladder has no poop. That if we fed him right, he wont poop that much and the frequency is not everyday. Sometime once every two days. So that's normal. He doesn't constipated or got diarrhea, the poop color is normal for a milk feeding kitten. So that answers 1st and 3rd question.
Then vet also said, its normal for a kitten to cries a lot and move about, means he's healthy. the one who is silent and not active is the one you need to worry about. So that answers our 2nd question.
And when asked if we hold him too much might affect him, she said, you cant hold a newborn kitten when the mom is around because mom wont like human smell on her kitten and might abandon him if he's been manhandled a lot. but the ones with no mom, we need to touch him not only to feed but to give him love because he has no mother or siblings to do that. So that make us happy too.
I even hoped and dream to make him sleep with us when he's a little older.
I did asked the vet whether he can survive. What else can we do to make him survive.
She told us that even kitten older than him will be hard to survive without their mom, but we can try our best to make him survive, and for now Olen is still healthy so InsyaAllah you can try.
The visit to the vet really makes us even more confident to take care of Olen until he passed this first week of his life which is also the most critical and fragile week of an orphaned kitten's life.
The visit to the vet make us hope even more. It's already 4th day we took him.
He'll be one week old in few more days,
his eyes will open,
his ear will unfold,
and he'll be stronger..
Hes already getting stronger because he could climb up the box if we put warm bottle inside it. He's getting smarter!
Looking at all the fancy kitten food makes me eager to wait for him to be able to eat solid food. Just a couple more weeks to solid food..He's teeth will start to come out.. I cant wait for his first teeth to come out..
We have so many plans for him, my husband even planned to buy him a cage at the pet clinic but he was still too small for the cage. So we will wait for him to get a little bigger.
I took a liking to a cat playhouse that will also look nice on the living room, where Olen can play and climb on when he's bigger.
At other time, I did day dream about when we decided to have kids, Olen would be 1 or 2 year old and he could be our child's first friend.
After the vet, we are more relaxed and no longer worry too much. We were confident we could do this.
At this point, it looked like we did everything right.
So can you guess why our little kitten died?
DAY 5
Tuesday, 5th December 2017
We were getting used to waking up at night to feed him and my husband will go back home as usual to feed him during the day. Everything is routine by 5th day. These 5 days we take turns feeding him peeing and pooped him, played with him, or just stared at him. He has itty bitty round pink nose. Itty bitty paws. He has grown longer, if not bigger, his stomach will be well rounded after he's been fed. We'll get excited whenever he suckle aggressively to the bottle, if he wants more he will suckle to our fingers so we'll give him more, and whenever yellow poop came out from that little bum after we rub it,that's happiness for us. These five days, all our problems we've been having had been put aside, and we channel all our energy to this little thing. We mostly worried about him day and night but still having him make us feel warm inside..
He's almost a week old,
his eyes will open soon,
his ears will unfold,
and he'll be stronger..
He could run around soon..
He still haven't had that kitten smell yet, he just smell sweet like the KMR he's been feeding on.
Around 9pm my husband went to look at him, not his feeding time yet but we like to go and peek on him sleeping every now and then. Sometime if we managed to keep quiet, he will continue sleeping and we would watch him sleep but if we make a sound, he will wake up, move about actively and cry non stop as usual.
But that night, he woke up as my husband approach. But..he did not move about. He just move his head a little, and he looked weak, no cries, at all.
I freaked out.
We freaked out.
Because the vet told us, when the kitten is silent and not moving much is when we should start freaking out.
We had no idea what went wrong. I asked if my husband came back and feed him during the day. He said yes.
I swear to god I freaked out. Is he hungry? Is he cold? Is he overfed? Does he got germs from our hands? I tried calling the vet in Putrajaya but the clinic wa already closed. I google any other nearby pet clinic that is still open after 9pm. None around Cyberjaya/Putrajaya, Puchong or Seri kembangan, then I found one in Kajang, it opens until 10pm. I called and they said they'll open, even after 11.
So we refill his bottle with warm water and stormed out and bring Olen to Kajang. Took us 30minutes without traffic. God knows my feeling at the time and I cry the whole drive to the clinic. Having a panic attack everytime I couldn't see his stomach moving.
Saw me crying, the nurse asked to bring Olen to the vet right away to see if there's anything critical. Then she came out after 5 minutes saying that he's only sleeping and kittens are always sleeping, its normal.
We both almost screamed NO!!
THIS IS NOT NORMAL, WE'VE BEEN TAKING CARE OF HIM FOR FIVE DAYS
THIS.IS.NOT.NORMAL!
So the nurse asked us to wait our turn while the vet finished with the current pet in the room.
While waiting, I saw other people brought in their older cat in their carrier, while wondering whether I could see Olen reach that age. A lady on the dog side of the clinic is crying while her husband calm him. God I was so scared.
After about 15 minutes we were called in and we told the vet Olen's is suddenly weak and not moving about as normal.
She asked some question and she couldn't figure out what makes him weak and then she took out a thermometer, stick it on Olen's bum, and then there's the problem.
Olen's body temperature is too low. We told him we put warm/hot water in a bottle every night. Sometimes one bottle sometimes two because we don't know how hot is not hot enough or too much, so we just rely on our instinct.
Then the vet asked, only at night? We said yes because day time is already warm. She said no, you need to put the warm bottles during the day too, because he doesn't have a mother or siblings to warm him. And even you put the bottles at night, they'll lose heat after couple of hours and you need to refill again.
WE DIDN'T KNEW.
the previous vet didn't mentioned this.
after she took out the thermometer, Olen pooped a little and the vet confirmed he doesn't have constipation or germs problem cause his poop is normal. He's healthy, he's just cold. If he's cold he couldn't absorb all the nutrient from the milk and he'd be bloated or dehydrated and it's fatal for neonatal kittens.
She told us the cause of death for neonatal kittens are body temperature and dehydration. Elsewise, we've been feeding him right and he seems healthy.
So she refilled the bottle with hot water for our 30 minutes ride home because the water in the bottle is no longer warm. We told her we don't know how hot is hot and how is not enough. She told us, if you can stand the hotness in your palm then its okay for the kitten, wrap the bottle with a cloth and put two bottle if necessary.
Don't put his box directly on the floor. If you do, put more clothes below the box.
And the vet also said the normal body temperature of a kitten is 32deg C. If its lower the thermometer will only display L and it means the kittens temperature is too low already. I asked her where could I get the thermometer, she told us its already 10pm and most of the shop is already close. But she insist we get Olen warm and he'll be ok, if he's still weak bring him over again tomorrow morning.
So we did. We saw Watson outside the clinic but we're not sure if they sell thermometer. We were focused on getting him warm so we just want to go home quickly.
As we reached home, we put two bottles of hot/warm water, like the vet did, put his box inside another box so he's box isn't directly on the floor, and my husband change the cloth he currently sleep in afraid the cloth might be cold because he sometimes like to sleep on top of the bottle instead of on the cloth. So my husband took one of my old shawl, iron it to make sure it's warm and replace it with the old cloth. Its already past his feeding time but we didn't wanna feed him until he's warm first.
So we both sat next to the box and just watch him sleep. As long as his stomach keep moving, he still breathing.
I was contemplating whether all these were too hot for him. He's just a small thing. Can he handle the heat? Two bottles one at each of his side and a warm cloth underneath. Maybe he will move or cry if hes getting too hot. After 15-20 minutes, I don't actually remember how long, we could see he started to move, cry a little like he always did on his sleep, so we took it as he's already ok, and when we felt his body is starting to warm, we move the bottles, a little further from him. He also did move a little further up away from the bottle so we knew he now could move away on its own if he felt the bottle is too hot.
We never left his side, I just did my puzzle next to him, and look at him every couple of minutes. My husband fell asleep on the floor on the other side of the box. So I told him to go sleep on the mattress. I kept looking at Olen's sleeping, sometimes moving, switching position. I do my puzzle. Cant really sleep. Worried. Waiting for him to wake up cause we still need to feed him. Or if his bottles getting cold, I need to replace them.
Its daunting not knowing what he felt, I was just hoping he could give me a sign. Is he hungry? Is he getting too hot? Is he comfortable? No? Just watching him sleep not knowing, I was just so afraid.
I couldn't remember how long has it been, maybe one hour?or two? not too long. When I took a peek at him again, and saw him no longer moving.
Lying on its side.
The round stomach no longer moving up and down.
His jaw already drop...
And my heart broke...
I screamed to my husband and woke him up.
.
.
"Olen da tak gerak..."
.
.
He took him on his palm, trying to give him CPR.
I tried to gave him CPR,
nothing..
I just couldn't stand watching him lying on my husband palm, frozen, unmoving.
I just ran to the other side of the room and cry my heart out,
while my husband keep on calling his name, like trying to wake him up from one of his sleeps...
My brain just couldn't comprehend, but I came to conclusion..
He was too hot..he was..
He was getting warmer.. but then its getting too hot..
He couldn't handle it..
We didn't know..
We didn't remove one of the bottles..
We watch him sleep through the heat..
We watch him die..
He couldn't move..he's too weak..
He couldn't handle the heat..hes just a little thing..
If we can stand the heat, he might not..
We were so stupid..
We didn't think of common sense..
We should've bought a thermometer..
So we know when to remove the bottles.....
I was so frustrated, guilty and mad with myself..
Even though he has no mother, he couldn't stand a chance being raised by two clueless, stupid giant of a human.
Now we never get to see him grow...
We never got to see him running around the house..
They said little kitten eyes is always blue, but i wont know..
cause his eyes will never open..
his ears will never unfold..
He wont get any stronger..
My husband don't get to buy him a cage,
I don't get to buy him his play house, or feed him fancy solid food for kittens.
Our future kid will never have Olen as his first feline friend.
Olen is gone, because of his two caretaker's stupidity...
I cry the rest of the night, woke up in the morning, cry again, goes to work, keep crying, took a half day off, and sleep.
There's no DAY 6 for Olen.
My journal of him stopped at DAY 5.
God lend him to us for 5 short days.
That little bundle.
I couldn't get his image out of my head, trying to distract the image by sleeping and watching TV series.
The image of him suckling on the bottle, climbing out from my palm, his cries.. him lying unmoving at the end. The images keeps on coming. I just couldn't live with the guilt.
I couldn't sleep, whenever i feel hot under my blanket I'll think of him, felt gulity and cry, when I drink water I think of him and cry, all the while hearing his small cries all over the house.
Please forgive us little kitten.
Please forgive us the stupid giants..
the next day I have to listen to Quran's to keep me calm enough to sleep, and last night I watch stuffs in YouTube till I fell asleep.
Today is DAY 8, exactly the same day last week my husband brought him home.
Now hes gone.
But after all the sadness, today I no longer cries and I could write this without crying.
I could work.
I can move on.
I hope he'll forgive us from whatever heaven hes in now.
For all the people out there, who are or will be in our situation, take this lesson from us.
Their mother is their best chance of surviving for newborn kitten under a week old.
But if the mother's gone, try your best to not neglect any espect.
1. Milk- only KMR or goat milk for kitten.
2-3hours a day, about 3-4mL depending on his weight.
Weigh him always so u know how many milk u should give.
2. Stimulate him to help him eliminate.
3. Buy a thermometer and make sure his body temperature didn't drop. 32deg and above. No less. And don't overheat. Please.
We did not succeed,but others do. So you might succeed too.
Just try hard and dont make mistakes like we did.
To my little angel Olen,
Thank you for coming to my life those 5days.
I love you.
We love you.
Forgive us.
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