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So, I've been fostering kittens for about 4 seasons on and off and I have never had this happen, so stick with me through the text wall.
I got this delightful pregnant Mama cat to foster. I was super excited because I love bottle babies, but my schedule didn't quite allow for every two hour feedings. Everything was going great, she had 4 healthy huge kittens, and they were packing on weight. Then, after about three days they started dropping weight, Mom's nipples turned black, and the kittens started having liquid diarrhea. It turned out the mom had stopped making milk (I suspect she was little more than a kitten herself as she was 3 pounds lighter than my last queen who was just nursing while full term pregnant) and they abraded them so badly the skin came off.
So I started doing supplementary bottle feeding. Three of them took to it, the fourth point blank refused. Like, this little dude would take his dewormer no problem but would actively spit out formula. Then, after a couple days of bottle feeding, everyone was still dropping weight, and the picky eaters tongue turned black and swelled up so much it was sticking out of his mouth.
At this point they got passed off to a medical foster. They eventually all developed the black tongues along with ulcers, and the survivors are still struggling with it 3 weeks later. I got news recently that, inspite of tube feeding, two of the kittens died, and the vet suspected it was caused by burns.
Here's the thing, I have no clue how this happened, I tested every bottle, and I want to know and accept responsibility so I can make sure it never happens again. So far I:
-Asked if the dewormer or the goat milk I was supplementing with could have caused an allergic reaction as they're so small (they said no).
-Heated up water to the suggested temperature to make sure I wasn't over or underheating it.
-Microwaved the bottle with the nipple on just in case I forgot to take the nipple off (the nipple doesn't retain heat)
My only thought is maybe the microwave heated the formula unevenly and caused hot pockets? I'll never use it again, but I can't imagine that would burn all four so severely it could last 3 weeks.
Does anyone have any clue what could have caused this type of reaction? I feel horrible, I have OCD and intrusive thoughts, so having my brain calling me "kitten killer" all day isn't great.
EDIT UPDATE: Thanks for all the kind words guys. The vets best guess is that it was a series of cascading minor problems. First, mom stops making milk, the kittens get desperate and abrade her nipples. I start bottle feeding the babies, they got a minor burn from unevenly heated formula, moms nipples got infected, and because neonates have no immune system, they got some kind of infection through the wounds. The vet has never seen it before. The two kittens left are stubbornly surviving, and mom cat has a home.
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