Coping With Feline Herpesvirus

It all started back in Jan. 2007 when 3 stray cats showed up in our yard two moved on and one stayed. The one that stayed took about 3 months to before she was comfortable enough for us to touch. The female became pregnant having 5 kittens that eventually decided that they wanted us to take care of them. They were fine except for the fact that they did not want you to pick them up or touch them(they were wild of course). The first to get sick showed up on a Friday acting like he had been in a fight just very tired and would not drink water. He then disappeared come Sunday we found him in the rose bushes dead. We had our funeral and moved on with the 4 left. Wednesday another kitten is sick presenting the same way except this time in addition to the other kitten she was wobbling/drunk acting and meowing like was in pain she died that same day. We started to think well it must be poisoning because about 2 years ago one of our neighbors decided to put out anitfreeze to kill some of the local animals. We knew it was antifreeze because our next door neighbor took his dog to vet who told him it was antifreeze. So assuming that was happening again that was what we assumed was going on or was some kind of poisoning. The 3rd kitten disappered on Thursday did not show up till Friday afternoon same symptoms wobbling/drunk acting, tired, his nose was stopped up plus draining, drooling really bad from mouth and nose, drool was yellow looking. 4th and 5th kitten went to vet on Friday because I wanted to know what was going on was it really posioning and we got the news it was herpes virus however was told by our vet that this should not kill cats then we read all the information on the website that tell us it can kill cats. We started giving the last 3 kittens the anitbotics and the lysine powder. The 3rd kitten I spoke about earlier started to leave again Friday evening so I quarantined him in a room with water, food, and a blanket just in case he got cold even though it is summer in South Carolina. Later on I moved him to a a different location stayed up with him most of the night Friday into Saturday morning. He just kept getting worse the drool went from yellow to red then blood cots. The kitten sounded to be in such pain we kept giving it meds. I spent much time wiping the drool off nose and mouth and trying to put water or milk down its throat to try to help it keep hydrated and feed. By Saturday afternoon the kitten could hardy breath so we decided to end it suffering and kindly killed it. Right before we decided to end his suffering we climbed into my lap and just layed their which is weird because he was the wildest and hardest to catch when we was well. The other two kittens (knock on wood) are doing better. They both are eating, running, and playing. They both are putting on weight though they hate their meds. The little female really hates having cream put in her eye. I hope this helps someone so they do not have to go through what I did.