The litter boxes smell so strongly of pee I can't sit in the living room. Is it okay to change them…

no!!!! you are not suppose to touch it

I couldn't imagine what's worse for you...the smell or changing it.

You can put on disposable gloves .. The way bacteria travels into your body is by you touching your eyes or mouth while having it on your hands .. But you better avoid doing it ..

I had to do it I couldn't stand it. I washed my hands afterwards with antibacterial soap but didn't have any gloves to put on. @deiona_mom2b16 @jessica408 @stacy_

@bria.k, I would've done the saaaaaaaame thing

@jessica408, It's been so hard letting my SO do it this whole time because I'm kind of a control freak. I feel like he doesn't do a good enough job and he won't sweep or vaccum the area after so there's litter all over the floor and he doesn't ever clean the boxes to get the pee smell out he just scoops. He'll only empty them out completely when I ask. 😭😭😭 but he'll get mad if I tell him specifically how to do it or stand over him to make sure he's doing it right lol

it's only if your cats go outside and pick up the disease. if it's strictly inside cats than you are good. things aren't ALWAYS bad for a pregnant woman. sushi, lunch meat, exercise, caffeine, my doctor said even chemicals weren't bad for me since I had been using them before pregnancy. I just had to use less

That makes me feel better. He's been outside like twice and then cried at the door because he was scared even though he's the one who decided to jump out of the window haha. And I eat my lunch meat anyways (; haha

@momma_beffers,

Not true. Toxo can be retained from kittenhood or passed on from the mother. As it has no impact on the cat themselves you won't know your cat has it until it's too late. Also, gloves are very important bc of the potential of open sores but a mask is way more important since it becomes airborne when you stir up the litter to sift it. This is NOT comparable to caffeine, sushi or anything else that they say in moderation. I've know of 2 children with severe neuro complications bc of this, one of them being my OBs daughter. Toxoplasmosis is scary.

There is a test to see if you already have toxo when you get pregnant, I had my OB run it on me bc of my work with animals and I wasn't exposed (which is bad since only newly infected mothers have problems) but my 2 best friends both already had it when they had the bloodwork done (they're both vets) and had less chance of passing it on.

http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/toxoplasmosis/