VENTING!!! about parent from Preschool

[JaimieMarvon]

I've gotta rant BIG TIME!!

This morning when I was leaving my son's Preschool I just about got knocked out by the overwhelming stench of cat pee. My cats have all been male and I know what it smells like, both old and fresh... The half-wit, part time caregiver that I mentioned the stench to stated "Oh yes, Isabelle & Max's mother mentioned that something smelled funny." I went down the cubbys with my nose to see where it came from and when I got to their cube and smelled the beach towels that the mother had brought in today for summer water play days (its raining today). It was fresh pee and it was horrific! It was in her car. She must have smelled it bad there with all the windows closed! How could you not know what that smell is???

I marched myself right into the owners office and told her the problem and that she MUST get rid of it. Don't just put it in another plastic bag. The smell will permeate through everything. Its right across from the refrigerator. DISGUSTING!!! Even if you wash the towels the smell will never come completely out. Would you let your child be dried in a towel that you KNOW your cat PEEEEEDDDDD all over??

Completely irresponsible parenting!! I'm furious. I'm going back at lunch time to see if they got rid of it and if not I will take it upon myself and throw the towels out.

Does anybod think I am over the top with this??? I'd really like to confront the mother too!

[heidiiiii]

Yeah! Male un-neutered cat pee is the worst! you can never get the smell out. NEVER!

If someone found a way, I would love to know. My brother`s room smelled like that for years. Male cat hated him and used to wizz on his pillow, workboots, etc. He wasnt allowed in bro`s room. Mom said MingToy was getting even.

I would take them, put them in plastic bags and put them outside by the front stoop. They are her towels so I wouldnt throw them away, stinky or not. But I would take them out of the premises.

[Color Me Holly]

Does anybod think I am over the top with this??? I'd really like to confront the mother too!

IMHO, Jaimie, you shouldn't throw out the towels yourself. You informed the daycare owner of the problem. It is her responsiblity to take care of it. If you throw away the towel you could get kicked out of the day care. You are messing with someone's property on another person's property. Let her take care of the mother, too. It is also my opinion that the only course of action you should take is to remove your son from the potential health hazzard and call the health department or whoever inspects daycares in your area.

[JaimieMarvon]

Thank you! I was furious this morning and ranted. I have since calmed down and I will not be going to the school at lunch time. I'm sure they took care of it. Others that I asked here at work said the same thing, not to touch the other person's towels. I'm a big talker when it comes to ranting!

I called my vet's office and asked if the odor, as pungent as it is, was harmful to the children and the vet assured me that as horrible as it smelled, was defiantely offensive to the nose, but not harmful to the children, unless they came in contact with it by ingestion. And as gross as that is it would have to be alot to be truly harmful to them.

I am much calmer now! A mother bear can be quite defensive of her young.... *giggle*

[heidiiiii]

If you think cat pee is bad...Have your dog come sulking in all guilty smelling what at first you think is kerosene...And find out it is SKUNK!!

And skunk STICKS to everything! And I mean everything!

We were kept up last night to the sounds of baby skunks frollicking in the neighborhood..at 1am!

It happens every year. And of course that is the exact moment that the dog NEEDS to go out!

I would rather pick up the dogs pee puddle!

I always side with the offending mother at first. How many of you have gotten dog doo on your shoe and not realized it until you were in a store or someplace else.

The towels were probably ready to go and ole smelly cat seized the opportunity. Mom probably didnt smell it because it was fresh, rushing, you know how we moms can get.

Unless she is a repeat offender..that is different.

[hydroped]

Hi Jamie,

I think I"m an overprotective parent myself and so I totally understand how upset you are. I'd be furious. And as much as the vet says it's not harmful... I'd still be uncertain and would probably be more comfortable calling a pediatrician to get advice about this. This is a preschool - preschool kids may be more adult than I remember them but if I recal it seems some of them will stick anything in their mouths.. I wouldn't want my son or daughter touching that towel in any way and then going and having lunch! I'm not sure throwing the towel away would help anything - if the parent doesn't get retaliatory then they're still going to send another towel which may be just as bad. I think I would mention health concerns to the school and calmly discuss with them the options that you and other concerned parents can take against the school if they don't do something about the health and contamination problems that this one parent may be bringing to the school and that can affect yours and the other children. I've found that if a complaint doesn't do the trick - then the mere mention (and the calmer stated the better) of parents legal options and school (private or public) responsibility to child safety and health are usually enough to get pretty quick results.

Hoping you the best in this,

David

[JaimieMarvon]

Thanks David. The cubby was too high for the children to reach (maybe a really tall 4 year old!) It was about head level with me and I am 5' even. I only had to bend over a bit.

I will definately be watching this mother more carefully in the future. And if I am there at the same time she is again I will breifly mention how bad it smelled, in the hopes it will make her feel horribly guilty. Maybe in the future she will think a little more carefully before bringing stuff that smells so badly into the classroom.

I do understand the morning rush and having a cat that pees on things. We had some issues of our own almost 2 years ago. Boy cat peed in 3 rooms all with carpet and we could not get he smell out. We had to replace them all! I took him to the vet and had him checked out to see if maybe there was something physically wrong with him, but he was OK. So we had to get "rid" of him. The vet was over $100, the cleaning materials and renting the steam vacs over $300, then the cost of replacing the carpets, WOW, you can imagine how much that cost!! It was a very stressful time. And a very hard decision. I love having pets but soooo not worth all that to me. Sorry if that offends anyone.

The day is going by fast. I'm anxious to pick up my son and see if it still smells in there. If not I'll ask the afternoon teachers if the know anything about it, or what happened.

[madhatter]

Hello All,

Iv'e had the same problem with my cats. My cat did have a problem that was fixed with pills and we changed her diet. Better food for my cats and less vet bills in the future im hoping. I know that stress will bring on this behaviour and it can also become a habit.

When we moved into our last house there was a concrete floor with two drains. The former owner had a cat previous to us moving in. Needless to say my kitty went crazy, the vet said that cement holds the smell forever. The only thing we could do was to build walls where the problem area was and keep her out.

Not before she distroyed 2 snowboard bags, a tennis bag, my husbands hockey bag and a few other things. The reason so much was distroyed was because I did not realise that she was doing this. Being in the basement I could not smell it until I got close.

The reason im writing this is because I believe that when you live with a problem cat, you can sometimes lose your nose for the sent somewhat. Just like people who put on tons of perfume because there nose can no longer detect the scent. Im not saying that you cant smell it, but ive been in lots of houses with dogs and cats where the owners have no idea that there house smells.

We did consider having our cat put to sleep, but decided to wait till we moved and she has not had any problems. Im glad we waited, the cats love there new home and can now venture out in our back yard because we have a fence. It's so great for them.

I hope all works out, this can be a sensitive issue, and i would imagine that the mother would probally be very embarssed about it. I know that when people came to our house it was realy embarrising, we did our best to solve the problem and eventually did.

But wow when a kitty gets that scent there isnt any stopping them.

Jenn

[lilpyrogirl]

As a mommy to a 15 year old cat with lots of health problems, we've had to deal with accidents around here a time or two and I have found the best product to deal with it. it's called Nature's Miracle (recommended by my vet) and you can get it online or I get mine at PetSmart. You just douse the stain with it...I mean, clean it up as best you can first, wash the towel in regular detergent or whatever else may be stained and then really really wet the area with the stuff. I don't even spray it, i just pour. Anyway, don't try to 'quicken' drying with a fan or by using the dryer, the enzymes in it need time to 'digest' the odor. We even had one 'accident' on a bed and now you can't tell where it was. It took more than one application but the stuff works very very well. I will say that my cat is female and i know their scent isn't as strong as a male cat's but when she has an accident (and it's been a very long time ...knock on wood), I can smell it as soon as I walk into the room. I'm worried about becoming less sensitive to smells like that being a cat owner so I'm kind of a freak about it. I add baking soda to the litter box every time I scoop. I change it more than once a week, and any towels or machine washables that get kitty pee on them get washed in detergent first, then I put natures miracle directly on teh stain and let it air dry and then I wash it again with nature's miracle in the washer and then just to make it softer, I wash again with detergent. I know...probably a waste of good water but I haven't had to throw anything away.

Also, cats tend to wet as a behavior problem when they get mad...if you have a stressed cat that's starting to use places she's not supposed to, there's an air diffuser that you plug into an oulet called "feliway" or "felliway" or something like that...and it's cat 'happy' pheramones and my vet recommended it after we moved and the cats had an attitude adjustment period and it worked VERY well. You can also buy a spray form of it and spray in the areas she's prone to using..or mis-using as an added 'oomph' to fix the behavior.

Good luck ya'll!

[heidiiiii]

I use Nature`s Miracle too. Do not dilute it. You have to use it full strength. It can take up to two weeks for it to kill the offending odor completely.

I used to have this stuff that came with a cat I adopted (i should have been wise when she gave me this stuff with the cat..tip off to dirty animal)

It is only sold thru distributor to animal breeders.

It was THE best!

If anyone knows what I am talking about can you tell us the name.. I could probably get it online.

[JaimieMarvon]

OK, First here's my update:

I was at day care this morning and asked the main teacher how long it took before Judy (owner) came in to get rid of the cat peed towels. She said she didn't wait for Judy to come that she took them herself and put them outside. Then I noticed I was sitting next the little girl at the table with the kids so I said "Hey Isabella! How many kitties do you have at your house?" I was SHOCKED at her answer. She said FOURTEEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I looked at the teacher in shock and Miss Donna just sat there looking at me like "Yep, she said 14!" she already had asked her. OH MY G*D!!!!!!! That is way too many cats. No wonder they peed all over the towels.

Now do you think the mother is an idiot??? I love cats too, but 14 cats with 2 small kids, a full time job, etc.? Come on! You can't keep up the maintenence, unless you are Super Woman... and the last time I looked Super Woman was a cartoon.

Second:

I tried Natures Miracle, I used the blacklight, we tried several things nothing worked. The cat was not stressed, at least nothing that I could think of. He had plenty of food, same as beofre, and lots of love. We had been in the house for 2 months before he started this. The "previous owners" (aka: My parents... it is the house I grew up in) had a dog before we moved in and I can tell you that he never peed in that room where the cat started going. My parents had the house for 31 years.

And when I spoke about the situation at Preschool with my husband and parents (who are up from Florida visiting) My husband reminded me that the last straw was the cat poop he found in our child's bed! The cats were never in the bed. never found kitty hairs in his sheets, etc. Yes, we had 2 cats, but we haven't had a problem since Max has been gone. Like I said, it was a hard desicion, but it was either the cat, or my sanity and the safety of my child...

[lilpyrogirl]

fourteen cats is a reason to call the health department or animal services or something...I've never seen anyone (except a friend who had a farm and they were all barn cats) with that many cats and all of them healthy and well fed, etc. Any chance one of the cats just had a huge litter of kittens or something? I mean 14 while juggling kids and career is obnoxious.

I am surprised nature's miracle didn't work for you. Maybe it works so well for me because my cats are female and maybe don't have such a strong odor (they're spayed too). HOpefully you won't have any more problems/reasons to use it!!!

[heidiiiii]

Got a cat story for YOU!

We lived in this apartment for 5 years. Landlady and hubby 1st floor, Us 2nd floor, her 30 yr old dd 3rd floor.

Landlady ran daycare downstairs and kept garbage can in back hallway with dirty diapers in it (whole different story). She kept complaining about our garbage smelling in our kitchen (inside apt, near backdoor by said back hallway). We kept smelling an AWFUL smell coming from 3rd floor. It would come and go.

Then we would hear all kinds of strange noises upstairs. My mom used to say that *deb* was dragging bodies across the floor.

Well, *deb* bought the house next door. Strange thing started happening over there. First she put chained fence around entire property and then she had netting wired from fence to house. She totally covered the yard off.. You wanna know why?

She had 15 cats!!!!

She had 15 cats living upstairs in a 2 bedroom apt. and her mom was complaining about us!

When i ended up with 3 dogs and 5 cats.. I knew that was going overboard. I never intended to have that many animals. We always only had 2 cats. But things happen.

We now only have 2 dogs and 3 cats and we are not adding on. Ever!

Tired of the smell, expenses, and hair!

[LisaN]

I think fourteen cats is overboard, even if they live out in the country where they could be 'barn' cats. Little guy down the road my husband knows who rents a house on the big farm has alot of cats, but they are 'barn' cats--it's kind of neat to see them on the woodpile, and near the barn. And yes, they are useful-they keep the vermin down. But I wouldn't have fourteen cats in a house.

I have three cats and the two outdoors will 'spray' if they think another animal has come into the yard, etc. It is a way of marking their territory, so to speak. Sweetie Pie is old, I think she does not see very well and sprays certain things outside like the fence, or a bush, I think so she can simply find her way about. She never really leaves the yard.

I would just quietly speak to the lady like Heidi mentioned here--though it is unhealthy, and unsafe, it is very possible the cat jumped in the car and peed on the towels, without her knowing until she got up the road. Though it is aggravating, Heidi had a point there about not throwing the towels out yourself, etc. That's the day care director's job. It's possible the mother may have fourteen cats--but I would be very careful before jumping to conclusions--she could be running a boarding kennel, be a person who is a groomer, or breeds and shows cats. Fourteen is excessive, but not if she has permits and licensing. Someone mentioned they could have just had kittens, if this is probably the case, the kittens are not yet old enough to be weaned, sold, etc.

[JaimieMarvon]

Update:

My family and I had a garage sale this weekend. Today the "Cat Pee mother" and the 2 kids came to our house for the garage sale. We were so busy at the time that I didn't really get a chance to talk to her much but I really wanted to!! It would have perfect. I just wanted to blurt out "DO YOU REALLY HAVE 14 CATS???? No wonder they peed on your stuff! And how ignornat of you to "pretend" not to notice the smell and bring it into the school subjecting the children and teachers to that awful smell!!!"

I did, however, have time to point her out to my mother, whom I had told the story of the smell to, and was almost surprised that she didn't say something to the "Cat Pee mother"!!! LOL

If the opportunity arrised I may say something. She seems like a very nice woman, just not to smart I guess! Thanks for all your comments.