or so old, per the vet. Took her in some days ago for her shots and to schedule her for spaying.....
Vet called back and canceled the spaying appointment, the clerk didn't get the word up front when I set it up, should never have given us the appointment in the first place.
The kitten is much too far along in pregnancy.
The kitten is going to have kittens.
In the last week and a half or so, since the vet trip, and since she got all the parasites out and started getting some good out of the food she was eating, her belly has ballooned incredibly. I can feel at least three heads in there now.
I am hoping the stress of being pretty badly starved, this young, and this pregnant this young, hasn't harmed her health too badly, long-term. And also that the mal-nutrition in the early part of her pregnancy didn't hurt these new babies. We shall simply have to wait and see.
I do so hate having to euthanize new-born, deformed, still-wet babies, kittens or puppies. But it is best done as quickly as possible, immediately as they are born, so they are basically still-born. No pain - except mine - that way. And it hurts me terribly to have to do it. Even as many times over the years as I have had to, it still hurts. Calves, colts, lambs, kids, kittens, puppies, even rat and hamster pups. There are some really bad deformities that get passed around, when breeding is uncontrolled or random (think 'in-bred').
At least a couple of them feel and sound normally active in the womb. There is a great profusion of heart sounds without any of the tell-tale ragged noises that are the warning signs of damaged hearts. I can pick out several separate heartbeats with the stethoscope, at least three I think, but it's impossible to count fetuses that way. Too many different angles to hear the same heartbeat, and think it's a totally different heart. You can fool yourself easily trusting to ear alone.
Best guess, three or four kittens. Wish it was only one or two, but she probably won't be that lucky.
She's really young and really TINY, and this is quite likely going to be a difficult delivery. I'm getting set up for it, and doing it in a hurry, since we have NO idea exactly when she went into estrus or anything about her. With good luck (I don't count on it) I won't need most of the things I've gotten out and put in my kit.
Worries. I need more worries. Being bitten all up by a kitten in hard, painful, and difficult labour is not on my list of favourite pass-times. But I'll take the bites, if it means I don't have any deformed and DOA kittens.
But PLEASE, at least not breech. Fates, please spare me that. |
