What It's Like to Be a Professional Kitten Rescuer

From Cosmopolitan

Known as "the Kitten Lady" to her nearly 400,000 followers on Instagram, Hannah Shaw spends her days fighting for baby cats as a professional neonatal kitten rescuer and activist. She rescued her first kitten, Coco, out of a tree - seriously - eight years ago, and decided to take care of her after finding out Coco was too young for a shelter. Neighbors found out and started bringing her kittens they found, and her reputation grew. She’s since raised several hundred orphan neonatal kittens (unweaned kittens younger than 6 weeks old) to an adoptable age in her Washington, D.C., home and found them families. Shaw documents it all on social media in the hopes that her followers will be inspired to join the cause.

There is no such thing as a normal day when it comes to my life. I do so many different things - I rescue and raise neonatal kittens, do consultant work with shelters around the country, and am an advocate for cats. Really, almost everything in my life revolves around kittens and cats. I didn’t realize it at the time, but finding Coco was the start of the rest of my life.

I wake up, and the first thing I do is go take care of the kittens. Right now I have a litter of four kittens that I got while I was visiting New York City for Cat Camp. This litter is named after different Japanese noodles.

The first thing I do when I get new kittens is assess their health. Judging by their weight and development, this litter was about 8 days old when I got them. One way you can tell how old they are is if their eyes are open. Around 7 or 8 days they start to just open them a little, and that’s what these kittens were doing.

At this early age, I’m waking up every two to three hours [at night] to take care of the kittens. That means feeding them, cleaning them with baby wipes, and stimulating them to go to the bathroom. My main focus is fattening them up. They still can’t walk. When they’re not eating, they are sleeping, which makes taking care of them really easy. I’m a little worried about one of the kittens, named Soba, because she’s weaker than the rest of the litter, so I always give her special attention to make sure everything is okay.

Some people have a baby nursery in their house, but I have this really cool Kitten Room. It’s filled with all of my supplies, plus toys for the kittens to play with when they’re old enough. The walls of the nursery are lined with paintings, photos, drawings, fan art of kittens I’ve raised and my cats. I try to keep everything contained in there so I can still have a normal life outside the room.

At this young age, I literally bring the kittens with me wherever I go - to the hair salon, to get my car fixed, to eat dinner. I’ve even snuck them into government buildings when I needed to.

Taking them with me takes a lot of prep time, far more than it takes for me to get ready. I like to be prepared for anything, so that means two or three bags with anything I could possibly need: a warmed heating pad, formula and a bottle, a measuring cup, towels.

I work with really supportive people who help make fostering kittens affordable - and the excess costs are covered through generous donations. When it comes to standard care for the kittens, I work with local veterinarian Dr. Erica Ellis. She volunteers her time, which is really amazing.

For more complicated cases, I make the trek to Nova Cat Clinic in Virginia. Ellen Carozza, a licensed vet tech who specializes in neonatal kittens, is my go-to person when the kittens need X-Rays or surgery. The clinic gives discounts for cats that are being fostered. I talk to both Erica and Ellen on the phone probably every day, and meet Erica at least once a week for kitten check ups. They’re the ones I turn to when things get tough, or every once in a while when I go on vacation.

I’m also lucky that my partner, Andrew Marttila, is just as obsessed with cats as I am. He has a huge following on Instagram for his cat photography, which are hysterical portraits that really capture the animal’s personality. We met when a friend of mine suggested I ask if he wanted to come photograph some of the kittens I was taking care of.

I don’t think either of us knew it was basically a date. I thought we would only talk about cat stuff once he got here, but we connected so far beyond that. You do not get into cat welfare expecting to meet a hot dude, so I was in shock that I met this hot, bearded guy who loves cats as much as I do and is so talented.

The hardest part of rescuing kittens is sometimes you get one that can’t be saved. The litter I have right now started out as five kittens, but I knew it would be more humane to euthanize [one] because she was injured and in a lot of pain. It’s always really sad to lose a kitten, but you can’t let it discourage you. I never forget how sad it is when a kitten dies, and I almost always cry and bury them and sit over the grave for a minute, but then I have to come inside, wash my face, and keep going, because the other kittens in the litter need me.

People seem to think that I just sit around playing with kittens all day, but it’s really a small part of what I do. When I’m not taking care of foster kittens, I’m being an activist for them. I write for several online publications, plus manage a lot of advocacy resources like my kitten care booklet, named “Orphan Kittens.” It’s a free resource that I’ve sent to more than 300 shelters and rescue organizations so far and is filled with everything I’ve learned since I first found Coco.

I also make instructional YouTube videos, where you can find tips on how to properly feed and care for kittens, and lots of fun extras like raps I make up for the kittens. I’m able to do this full time thanks to the generous support of my followers who have bought t-shirts, sent me items from my Amazon wish list, or made donations.

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When it comes to making videos, I’ll usually just set up a tripod and talk - while I have an outline, I don’t like to practice too much because I want you to feel like I’m your friend talking to you and giving you advice on caring for cute kittens.

A huge part of my advocacy work is my social media presence - It’s a great way to recruit and educate people on how to properly care for kittens. I put a lot of thought into the content I put on social media, because I want it to be interesting and educational.

As I learned more about caring for neonatal kittens, I found out how terrible they have it. I always assumed that cats have it so good, especially kittens, because everybody loves them, but neonatal kittens will be euthanized immediately when brought into a shelter because there’s nobody to provide 24-hour care for them.

I want to be clear about this: It’s not the shelter’s fault. Animal shelters are typically government run or contracted facilities and they are overburdened and understaffed, so they just don’t have the resources. Once I learned this, I decided to focus on saving them.

The consultant part of my life involves a lot of traveling. I’ve worked with animal shelters around the country helping them figure out ways to sustainably rescue animals and reduce euthanasia. I also help with fundraising and volunteer efforts. I have been getting involved in the policy side of things as well, supporting no kill efforts.

In the little spare time that I have, I like to spend it with my friends. I have this amazing group of girl friends; a lot of them are activists in some way, and they’re always down for me to bring the kittens along. I also love camping and hiking, and to go to the rock climbing gym. I usually try to be in bed by midnight - especially since I know I’ll be waking up in two hours to take care of kittens again.

Learn more about how to rescue and care for kittens at The Kitten Lady's website and Instagram.

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