The video below reminded me of an early-summer day in 1998, when I was walking Rosie (the best dog ever) and I found a litter of kittens in distress. There was a house in my neighborhood that always had about 20 cats in the yard, and the kittens were in the weeds near the house. The mother cat had been hit by a car. The kittens were mewing SO LOUD and were SO DISGUSTING – all wormy and blech. They were about a week old and one had already died when I found them.
I went to the house across the street and asked for some paper towels to wrap the kittens in. The guy gave me an old t-shirt and I stuck the kittens in it like a mini Santa sack and carried them home. OK. Now what? First, I had to de-grossify them so I gave them a quick bath. Then I started calling animal shelters that I thoroughly expected would welcome them with open arms. Ben (AKA Mr. Sensitive) was there to witness my phone calls. I think he said something like, “Don’t expect me to get involved.”
I’m a problem-solver.
The Problem: 4 extremely noisy starving kitties.
The Solution: Find someone to feed them.
NOT so fast. Each shelter I called said that they couldn’t take in kitties that young. Well, what the heck was I supposed to do with them? Drown them to put them out of their misery? When the woman at the third shelter said “no”, she added, “even the no-kill shelters won’t take them so it’s a waste of your time to call.” So, I did what any frustrated problem-solver holding 4 lives in her hands would do…I started crying. Mr. Sensitive thought I had finally lost my mind completely, because in Morocco cats are viewed about the same as rats.
When I started to cry and prepared to hang up the phone, the woman said, “Let me tell you how to take care of them. First, you have to help them go to the bathroom.” Oy. Mother cats do that by licking their babies’ butts. Uh-uh. The woman told me how to help them without any licking and it quickly became obvious why the kitties were in such distress. Then I sent Ben to Petco to buy baby kitty formula…who knew there was such a thing? It took some time to figure out how to get them to eat – they wouldn’t take a bottle – 
but for the next 5 weeks I fed them day and night. I took them to the office with me and kept them in the conference room. One died the first night but the others grew into ankle-biting furniture-scratchers.
Then it was time for us to leave for our vacation in Morocco, so I coerced my brothers into watching them for 2 weeks (the kitties were able to poop on their own by then). Brady & Monica ended up adopting one they named Monkey (they still have him) and Elijah and his friend each adopted another. Problem solved!
Here are some other problem-solving mommies: ..
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