Expert: Karen Craft - 4/10/2009

Question
My 1 year old cat gave birth to 4 babies about a week ago and the babies seem to cough and sneeze every now and again. Is this normal?

The bigger part of the question is the mom, its been a week and the day she gave birth her appetite came back and then some! She is seemingly very skinny now and today I noticed she can barely walk. She walked a little then leaner her weight in to her front end and was really laying half her body on the floor, not the same as stretching or raising her rear. She stayed like this for a minute or so before laying down. Now she is just hiding on the side of the couch and isn't running to her babies when they cry anymore. She can't be poisoned, we haven't sprayed any cleaners or any chemicals   since the babies were born or even before they were. And she's been locked in for the whole pregnacy but is normally an outdoor/indoor cat. We did notice she had those worms before she had her babies, saw the things that looked like rice grains on her rear but now I don't see anymore. She does not have fleas but we did see one or two before and combed them out and flushed them down the toilet.

The last piece of strange info I can give is that her milk bag seems so full and dropping towards her rear, we thought it was the babies at 1st and after they were born realized what they were. On both of these nipples she has those waxy dried up like black patches, we read it was a normal for this as to protect her from being clawed from babies? Either way she's now picked at one till its off and now its a little bloody and one of the patches seems to be covering her nipple.

There are plenty of nipples for babies but as she is sick and seemingly can't get around, we are going tomorrow to get supplies to bottle feed the babies.

So any info you can give me for the mom or the babies would be great. We are informed as far as bottle feeding goes but im very much attached to the momma too and don't know how id survive without her. I don't have money for a vet, she was a rescue about a year ago and im just a 24 year old college student so have little income.

Answer
Hi Nathan,

You need to get her to a vet right away. See if you make some sort of payment arrangements. Your cat sounds like she might have kittens left in her and they are getting toxic in her. She can die from this if you don't get her to a vet. Most vets will understand and will work with you  to make payments. But you need to get her seen right away. Good luck.

Ciao, Karen