Nine weeks!  Nine!

My little kittens are now nine weeks old!  I don’t know what happened to eight weeks, but I guess I missed it.  Please don’t assume that my silence about Carlo and Bunny is a sign of lack of love or lack of interest.  I adore them, but Carlo’s continued bowel problems mean that their care is extremely time-consuming, and between that and having a lot of freelance work to do, I just haven’t found time for photos.  I do have at least three structured playtimes with them every day, but I’m often too exhausted to get the camera.  Luckily, Flippy was feeling artistic today, and she took a ton of photos.  Here are their grown-up portraits:

carlo_9_weeks

bunny_9_weeks

As I mentioned in a post a few days ago, I’ve thought since they were a day old that a specific person was going to adopt them.  That person has backed out, and doesn’t want Carlo if he has health problems.  As I don’t have that luxury (not that I’d exercise it), I’m persevering with the adorable fellow but he’s not making progress.  He’s a normal kitten except that he’s small, and he has bowel problems.  More graphically, his stools have always been soft, they’re abnormally frequent, and they seem to be associated with cramping and gas.  He’s been on every dewormer in the universe with no results.  Metronidazole didn’t work.  He’s now been on sucralfate for a week for “IBD”, and it hasn’t helped either, except that his stools are no longer “puddles”, but are more like “soft serve”.  Besides his obvious discomfort, he’s stopped using the litterbox for 90% of his bowel movements, and that really concerns me.  I’ve kept him confined to an area with a linoleum floor, and every.single.morning I have to get down on my hands and knees to scrub the entire floor with bleach and water.  I then do it all over again two or three more times each day, which is why I’m lacking for time to take pictures!  I’ve kept him on the same food since he started solids, so I guess he could have a food sensitivity, but he’s one of my rare foster kittens who didn’t have constipation problems.  He’s been a diarrhea kind of guy since he was born.  In contrast, Bunny is a litterbox champ.  At least Carlo pees in the litterbox all the time, so that’s one potential problem which didn’t happen.  Still, can you imagine trying to find someone to adopt him in his present state?

I need to call the vet’s office to report that sucralfate hasn’t worked.  I also need to call to order Eli’s eye meds, as mentioned below.  Both kittens need their first set of shots, too.  They still haven’t been tested for FIV/FeLV, and Carlo hasn’t had any liver function tests performed, but I was advised to hold off on that until the kittens were twelve weeks old.

These photos show just how mature they’ve become.  They’re ready to march out into the world to slay dragons together, but so far, only Carlo has ventured out by climbing the confinement gate, and he only made it as far as the livingroom.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 05/25 at 06:16 AM

AddThis Social Bookmark Button

  1. What absolutely adorable little kitties. If we weren’t doggies (who belong to a dog person), we would lobby for them. (In fairness, our human is an animal person but she prefers dogs.)

    Posted by Roxie, Sammy & Andy  on  05/25  at  08:10 AM

  2. How cute are THEY!!??  Hella cute.  What a serious drag about Carlo’s pooping issues.  Perhaps it is a food allergy.  Or a gastro reaction to all the medications.  Who knows, huh?  Poor delicate little flower.

    Posted by Von Krankipantzen  on  05/25  at  09:18 AM

  3. How gorgeous are they?  Let me count the ways.  While I’ve never really warmed up to Siamese, Carlos is worming his way into a teensy corner of my heart.  Seems like he has two problems:
    1.  Bowel stuff
    2.  Behavior stuff/ litterbox

    Re 1:  Has he been tested for FIV?  My girl Emily, who was FIV+, developed serious puddle poop issues that no flagyl would cure.  However, yoghurt and a bit of pumpkin did help solidify things.

    Re 2:  Lolita, whom I found wandering a parking lot when she was a kitten, had to be litterbox trained only for the pooping.  For a few weeks, I kept her in a huge carrier with a litterbox and food bowls and a large towel, and eventually, she understood that the box is for both #1 and #2.  These days, it’s a hit-and-miss (70% in, 30% out), but at least it’s solid.

    Any chance that these suggestions might work?  perhaps the space in which Carlos is confined is still too big for him (so that he’s too comfortable pooping on the floor)?

    Hugs and cuddles to the little guy!

    Posted by charlotte  on  05/25  at  12:34 PM

  4. Bunny is a stunner!

    I wish I were closer and had more funds so I could take care of Carlo. Yet another thing to add to the If I win the Lotto list. (rent a camper. Find someone willing to go on a long vacation and have them go pick up Carlo and drive back with him, giving him great care all the way home.  Alternatively, give you the funds to hire a maid for his poo and his vet bills).

    Posted by Georg  on  05/25  at  02:51 PM

  5. I hope Carlo gets beteer.  I was going to mention the pumpkin too.  So sweet.

    Posted by Ruth  on  05/28  at  06:01 PM

  6. I know pumpkin is good for constipation, but how would I use it in this situation?  Is the idea that if I bulk-up his stools it might make them easier for him to control?  I’ve added the teeniest pinch of Benefiber to his food that seems to have helped absorb water, but his “volume” is still through the roof.  His sister has one bowel movement per day, and he has at least twelve.

    Posted by Leigh-Ann  on  05/28  at  06:57 PM

  7. In dogs, pumpkin also works to help form more solid stools. Use it the same way you’d treat constipation in a kitten.

    I think Carlos should have daily access to some probiotics. Correct bacteria in his gut will (or can, if his gut is receptive) help train the DNA in his gut to learn to process foods correctly. Use a combination of yogurt or kefir and pumpkin. Kefir using real grains is best because of the wealth of polysaccharides and microorganisms there. Does he get fresh natural food? can he eat bugs like a fat moth? The enzymes will help him if he can heal. Processed and heated food is damaged (the structure of protein changes in heat, and enzymes are deactivated in high temps). Human babies who get mothers milk and natural sources of bacteria, develop guts that are better able to handle things as the baby grows. Babies raised on formula, esp soy milk, do not develop the type of baby gut normal flora that helps develop a strong immune system. Even cow calves do not do well on pasteurized milk because it is damaged. Cooked foods raises the WBC response in the gut, inflammatory response which probably excacerbates his situation.

    Perhaps Carlos especially needed colostrum type sources of nutrition when he was a wee one. His gut may still benefit from training with whole and natural foods that have undamaged protein and enzymes.

    Fat moths and bugs are so good for kitties. Slightly related… Cats that get access to live insects do not get hairball or need manmade remedies to resolve it. smile

    Flippy takes the BEST KITTEN PICTURES! Yay Flippy. Carlos is just beyond cute. He is breaking my heart :( - please get well Carlos.

    Posted by Semavi Lady  on  05/29  at  01:26 AM

  8. Aw, thanks for the compliment, Semavi Lady.  I think with Bunny & Carlo, I’ve encountered two instances of super lucky timing.  One picture of each of them has made it to the top of my list of my very favorite pictures.  The picture of Bunny with the doorway shadow was one extra lucky shot.  It was early in the morning, and we’d stayed up extra late, so it was the first time I’d been able to take pictures of Bunny with natural lighting.  Otherwise, 99% of her pictures end up with red-eye.  I was so excited when I saw that the picture had come out clearly.  She’s such a pretty little girl, and I always felt guilty that we had more good pictures of Carlo, because he’s extremely photogenic.  It’s difficult to take a bad picture of the little guy.

    Posted by Flippy  on  05/31  at  12:33 AM

  9. Well, I tried pumpkin and it sort of worked, then sort of didn’t work, so things are still up in the air.  I’m going to try an herbal supplement called “Happy Tummy”, which is actually vet-recommended, and I’ll see about getting my hands on yogurt as well.

    Carlo will be tested for FIV and have liver function tests next week—the vet wanted to wait until he was 12 weeks old.  I wrote about it in another post, but the vet thought Carlo could have feline distemper, and just needs time to allow his intestinal lining to recover.

    Posted by Leigh-Ann  on  06/05  at  07:38 AM

  10. Georg, I’m begging for that maid you suggested, and I hope she has a big supply of bleach.  It’s not pretty around here. 

    Charlotte, I think Carlo’s litterbox problem is a control problem, and I don’t think it’s behavioural yet.  He gets severe cramping where nothing comes out but gas, and then other times he’ll have lots of little drips, spaced out.  I think he moves around in discomfort, and because his pooping process can take such a long time.  If I can get him to a point where he can just stand in one spot and poop one firm and normal piece of stool, I think he’ll use the box for that.  I hope.  He’s still confined to a bathroom when he can’t be supervised, so the area is small.

    Posted by Leigh-Ann  on  06/05  at  07:50 AM
    11. Page 1 of 1 pages

Name:

Email (required, but will not be made public):

Location:

URL:

Smileys

Remember my details for future comments?

Let me know about new replies to this topic?

What is the sum of 2 and 8?

Next entry: Cows and whales, coming to a farm near you?

Previous entry: Return of pannus

<< Back to main