Poor Kitty Locked in Closet

When I got home from work yesterday, a heard a meow coming from the coat closet. My poor 4-month old kitten had been locked in the closet all day long. He must have snuck in there when I put my coat on in the morning, and I didn't notice. I felt so bad, since I was gone for 10 hours. When I let him out he immediately ran for his food dish. I searched the whole closet for 'surprises,' thinking maybe he couldn't last that long without a litter box. But he seemed to be pretty good. I sure felt like a bad mommy, though. I'll have to be extra careful every morning to see where he is before I leave.

Kim, Don't cats get into the most unexpected places? We had one of ours get out into the garage, climb up in the rafters & fall down between the walls! It took us awhile to track down the pitiful meowing & then we had to cut a hole in the sheetrock to get to her! Needless to say, we've not patched the hole permanently

coat>> closet. My poor 4-month old kitten had been locked in the closet all day>> long. He must have snuck in there when I put my coat on in the morning,>> and I didn't notice. I felt so bad, since I was gone for 10 hours. When> I let him out he immediately ran for his food dish. I searched the whole>> closet for 'surprises,' thinking maybe he couldn't last that long without>> a litter box. But he seemed to be pretty good. I sure felt like a bad>> mommy, though. I'll have to be extra careful every morning to see where>> he is before I leave. get >out into the garage, climb up in the rafters & fall down between the >walls! It took us awhile to track down the pitiful meowing & then we >had to cut a hole in the sheetrock to get to her! Needless to say,

Unexpected that is an understatement..about 7 years back I was working two jobs and living with a roommate..well to make a long story short I came home from the second job at 12:30 am...opened up the refrigerator to get a drink and whola poor cold Trouble aprox 8 wks old..laying across the shelf..looked at me and gave a pathetic meow..after warming him up I went to ask my roommate how this happened..a few drinks too many and a kitty to curious caused poor Trouble to be locked in the refrigerator for more than 5 hours..he was okay..thank Goodness..but boy what a shock.

One summer, a friend's cat got into a vent, and into the walls, and ... well, kitty ended up trapped in the furnace. Being summer, he was fortunately not in peril, but, still. Apparently, he heard this pitiful mewling in all rooms - through the vents! It took over an hour before he could track it to the basement. Poor little guy!

Sorry about snips. D##n server.

Been there, done that. Now I make sure Rocky is in sight when I leave.

i hear you - except mine was the opposite of these stories......

when i was 11 years old, we briefly lived in a mobile home and we had a very pregnant outdoor cat. one day after school, i arrived to find her in the process of giving birth to her kittens on my BED (guess who she was closest too!!).

i was alone during that afternoon, but i learned a little about life and definitely grew up that day.

OOP!! i forgot to mention in my previous post that the cat had crawled in from underneath the trailer through the heating vents, thus warranting such a huge surprise when i came home....

sorry, i am new at this....

Although you, of course, want to be careful in the future, I wouldn't feel too badly. Ten hours for a cat to be without food or water is not close to being life-threatening. We have a cat who loves to hide from us and spent the night in our utility room this week. We usually do a cat count before going to bed and before leaving for work but we missed once in 5 years so she spent the night with the washer and hot water heater. I would like to think she has learned something from this but I doubt it. She'll hide anywhere just so we'll sit around and call for her.

When my daughter wasn't home, her kitten started playing around the kitchen base cabinet and found her way inside, tore a hole behind it and jumped in. She was stuck between the cabinet back and wall. We had to remove the cabinet, sink, countertop and all, to get to her.