Tuesday, February 09, 2016

Day Two

The incubation period for distemper is 2 to 10 days after exposure.   The most common incubation for distemper is 3 to 5 days. By tomorrow morning, 48 hours will have passed since that poor doomed girl kitty was in my bathroom and vomited there.

In the meantime, I've been in flurry of disinfecting everything, over and over.   I threw out anything that came in contact with her or the bathroom floor.  Unfortunately this included clothing items that I have in limited supply, like my shoes, like my bras, which I had on the floor, with other clothes, to fold, from the dryer, just as she arrived.

Besides a pair of hiking boots and summer sandals, I have one other pair of shoes, that I save to wear like to appointments and when I go see my brother, so I don't look quite as bad.  I'll have to start wearing them day to day now.  At least I have them.

I had gone over and over in my mind, what I touched after touching her that morning in the bathroom, because whatever I touched, and whatever touched the clothes that touched her when I held her can become a viral transmission site.

I cleaned everything, even spraying down chairs and my computer keyboard, because I touched that I know.  I sprayed down my car too, anywhere I may have touched after touching her, like the steering wheel, the gear lever, brake lever, door handles, everything.   I must have mopped the floors with clorox solution six times by now throwing out mop heads, doing it again.

I've not let any cat back in the bathroom.  Maybe I never will.  The privacy is nice.   I've washed everything in the bathroom including all bedding that was on shelves in cupboards.  I discarded the litter box that was in the bathroom and the food and water dishes.  I exhausted myself yesterday, last night and this morning doing this and took a nap this afternoon, awakening after the normal time I go feed the farm colony cats.  So I was late and they were all milling, waiting, hoping.  I would not let them down.

Yesterday I went and bought ten intraocular intranasal vaccines and re-vaccinated the tame cats here with those, since they can provide protection within 48 hours.  I figure those most vulnerable are Miss Daisy and Vision, my oldest gals, Miss D being most vulnerable due to age and the fact she over grooms.  I had a half dozen injectible vaccines and vaccinated others with those.  I'm out now.  Everyone had already been vaccinated but some not for awhile.

I was so stressed then, after buying the vaccines in Lebanon, that I failed to notice my car was almost empty of gas and the yellow warning light on.   I had $4 cash left after buying the vaccines, and gas right now is very cheap so with $4 I could get over 2 gallons and saved myself from walking miles home with my car on the side of the road.

Maybe that would have been good for me, a very long walk, relieved some stress.

This has not been an easy or cheap thing and it could still get worse if anybody here gets sick.  It only takes one tiny virus cell I missed, still alive and clinging to something, and a cat steps on it, licks its paw and that's all it takes.  With all the corners and crooks and indentations of objects and materials and spaces, I can't be sure I killed every tiny bit of virus.   I wish it was something that glowed under black light, something I could see.  But its not so I can only do what I can do.

I don't know where that poor kitty was exposed to distemper.  I am sure she had no sign of it day of surgery because when I went to pick up Char, even though someone else was picking up Barney, the girl who got distemper, I peeked at her in her carrier and she had pooped and the poop was very normal and healthy.  But it doesn't mean she hadn't already been exposed.

Still hoping for the best.




3 comments:

  1. You have done the very best you could. My heart is with you.

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  2. I had no idea everything had to be thrown out... I thought Clorox killed all those germs. I am so sorry for all you have gone through... you are one very caring person.

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    Replies
    1. Just direct contact things with surfaces like clothing has, difficult for anything to penetrate it all. Shoes are a common spread agent and difficult to fully adequately clean. Clothing also.

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