Oh my, what a week it has been! First, I mentioned that I would introduce our newest foster kitten, Juice (Juicy? We’ve been told both names, so we’re just calling him Juicy or Mr Juicy for now). Juicy is a four-week old bottle baby. I don’t know anything about his history except that he was surrendered to the shelter as an orphan when he was three weeks old. He’s friendly but over-exuberant, with a propensity toward biting and aggressively-futile attempts to eat. Much like this kitten, except that he does this even when being held properly for eating. We have to purrito him to get any milk down his throat instead of splashing everywhere else. He’s at that age where his claws don’t quite retract yet (should be in the next few days) and he still struggles with the muscles that help him go to the bathroom (younger than this and he would need manual stimulation to go).

Honestly, I wasn’t expecting to pick up another bottle baby. I asked for one of the two smaller groups on the foster list, but they asked if we could take Juicy instead. You know how everyone always says that two kittens are better than one? It’s so very true. Singletons are incredibly difficult to care for. You have to teach them everything. How to play, how to fight without hurting others, how to snuggle, how to eat, how to be a cat. With groups of kittens, they teach each other, finding the right boundaries, and we can focus on helping them learn the difference between “cat” and “human” when it comes to play and affection. Singletons often lack a lot of social skills, especially when orphaned young. Juicy was clearly orphaned before he had a mom or sibling teach him not to chomp on things. He bites HARD, harder than any other cat I’ve worked with. It’s not meant to be mean, he just doesn’t understand. I’ve been training him by giving a high-pitched yip of pain when he does it and pulling away, and already I’ve seen his bites get softer. But this is a job I prefer kittens do together, rather than with me.

Especially now, with Fleabag in the house.

Here’s this story: I went to pick up meds for Juicy on Thursday. A woman arrived at the same time as me, two toddlers on her hips and a cardboard carrier. She asked the shelter if they had room for an intake, as she’d rescued this tiny kitten from the street after it was almost hit by a car. She’d been to several vets that turned her away, and the shelter was also full with a waitlist of 15 ahead of her. They were advising her to go to Animal Care Services, a location about 30-45 mins drive away, as she was near tears. She hadn’t planned to be out with her kids so long, had six animals at home already, and her family was leaving to go out of town in a few hours.

While she was there, I took a look at this kitten. It seemed about 7-8 weeks old at first glance, dehydrated but uninjured, and crawling with hundreds of fleas. I was not going to let that baby just die, and so yes, maybe I’m just a sucker, but I brought her home with me. L and I scrambled to convert my bedroom/bathroom into a makeshift foster care situation. We washed and scrubbed the kitten twice, picking off fleas with tweezers between washes, and we still didn’t get them all. Flea baths, blankets, litter box, water, but no food yet because she needed to warm up completely first. I scheduled a vet visit for Monday, the earliest time they had available. L put flea meds on our other cats in case the fleas spread in spite of our best efforts. (Fleabag herself was too young/small for the topical meds we have.) Jason left work early to come help, because in addition to everything we were doing for the new kitten, I had to care for Juicy (who needed to be fed every 4 hrs) and take L to an afternoon doctor’s appointment.

The kitten, who we’d accidentally named Fleabag because it was the first thing that popped into my brain when the vet asked me, was becoming more lethargic. We knew she was dehydrated and possibly anemic, given the number of fleas on her, so Jason began a pedialyte treatment via oral syringe while L and I were at the doctor. By evening, she’d become more alert but still hadn’t eaten (and she barely weighed 1.1 lbs despite being at least 6-7 weeks old!), so we had to syringe-feed her watered-down kitten food. We didn’t know if she’d last through the night, but she did, and by noon the next day, she ate a little on her own and her nose had a slight cool, damp feel to it for the first time. Our vet had a cancellation, so we were able to get her in Friday afternoon for dewormer and such. All out of pocket, of course, because unlike official fosters, no one helps with the babies you rescue on your own. (Note: The woman who found the kitten took down our Venmo info and sent us some money for the intake fee at the shelter, which was very kind of her. Every little bit helps!)

(Let me just take this moment to say: please, spay and neuter your pets. If you feed strays, please get them fixed, too. This kind of situation is so preventable. A full half of kittens born outside will die, often miserable, starving, illness-ridden deaths. TNR – trap, neuter, return – works and it saves lives. Please find local resources that can help, low cost clinics or TNR organizations who will come to you. Don’t just assume someone else will do it. This takes all of us.)

Thankfully, Fleabag is doing marvelously well. We discovered that she prefers kibble to wet food, and she has perked up enormously, though she has yet to gain any weight, so we’re not entirely over that hurdle. She wrestles with the bath mat, she’s stepped into the main room briefly, she’s purred in my arms even though she runs if you try to pick her up still. A typical curious kitten raised outside and timid around humans, in a brave new world that she doesn’t yet realize is the VIP life. Juicy is also doing well, and we can’t forget him, because he is The Darkness, and he says that no one should forget it. But also, I’m now caring for two different singletons with two different and unique challenges, and I’m beyond exhausted. TBH, I’m considering returning Juicy back into the shelter’s care, to be fostered by someone else while I’m unofficially fostering our little Fleabag. So far, I haven’t had to care for both alone, and maybe by the time J goes into the office again on Tuesday, Fleabag will be independent enough that I can spend more of my time on Juicy’s socializing and needs. This is not a situation I’d gladly enter another time, though. Oy.