By hamiltonma - 01/08/2015 03:20 - United States - Boone

Today, while volunteering at my local animal shelter, I was asked to clean the cat room. This entailed taking each cat out of its cage by hand and cleaning the inside. They forgot to mention that some of the cats were feral. I now look like I belly flopped into a cactus. FML
I agree, your life sucks 23 943
You deserved it 2 315

hamiltonma tells us more.

hamiltonma 22

OP here! The people who were running the animal shelter literally put me in a small room with around 25 cats in cages and told me to clean them. I asked for gloves, and they had none. They also didn't mention that most of the cats in the room were caught off the street and were waiting to be spayed, and then re-released. I went to grab the first cat from the cage and put it into a carrier so I could clean the cage, and it literally went crazy. It grabbed ahold of my hand with it's teeth and started scratching all up and down my arms. After I showed the person in charge, they shrugged and told me to keep cleaning! I went home with scratches everywhere! Needless to say, I will not be returning! Thanks for all the comments everyone! I am feeling better today, and have been religiously applying hydrogen peroxide to me wounds! Thanks again!

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Top comments

Awesome1a36 9

You should "forget" to mention that you are done volunteering there.

150 5
Jowisee 29

Wow, sounds like a health and safety nightmare. Is there a service you could contact to complain?

137 1

Comments

soverybored 6

Good job on volunteering you should be very proud :)

3 1
Ishilied 11

On one hand... The shelter was being pretty negligent, both in your case and the cats. On the other hand... Why weren't you expecting feral cats? A shelter isn't exactly a vets.

0 6
noparlpf 13

@OP, vet student here. You want to go to the ER and get a rabies shot plus immunoglobulin, and probably ten days of clavamox (antibiotics). Cats, especially feral cats, can have pretty nasty stuff in their saliva. Don't worry about the people saying not to use hydrogen peroxide. Use it once, then apply an antibiotic ointment for the next few days. In my opinion, a day or two's delay in wound healing isn't a big price to pay compared to the infections you can get if you don't use a good antiseptic right away. And you should probably call the ASPCA, because this place is not being run safely. The cat that bit you could be killed (depending on state laws, I don't think that's a federal law) if it hasn't been rabies vaccinated. Any shelter that puts untrained people into contact with unvaccinated animals and doesn't care about injuries needs new management.

10 1
missnuthin 10

OP, you NEED to contact the police and report that "shelter". They endangered your life, literally. Making you handle feral cats with no protection. There is a chance you could have caught something as bad as rabies. I'm seriously NOT joking or exaggerating. I volunteered at an animal shelter here in Oregon, and we were not allowed to interact with the "unprocessed" cats or even go in the room with the sick ones. Only the vets and techs were allowed to handle the cats that weren't given a clean bill of health and put up for adoption. Also, if we got scratched or bit, there were signs posted everywhere that we HAD to report it, for legal butt-covering reasons along with the fact that if a cat up for adoption was violent, they had to know. I don't know what the laws are in your state, but that "shelter" is truly awful. Please please please go to a Doctor and get yourself checked!

8 0
Eivana 37

I have worked at an animal clinic and they have tools for moving cats around. Maybe you should ask for one? Not sure how shelters work.

0 5
fantasyworld 37

That doesn't seem like a good place to volunteer.

1 0