Why is your cat terrified?
Poppi when we first got her in 2012 was absolutely terrified of bad weather, the bathroom, women screaming and bass male voices. A bit of background she was adopted from RSPCA and she had come from a abuse case. We brought her home and were watching a program and there was a scene with a woman screaming. Poppi was sitting with me and she looked at me with sheer terror in her eyes, just shaking. My husband very quickly switched to a Antiques roadshow episode and we spoke very softly to her and calmed her down. She wanted to be held and cuddled.She would wail when went into the bathroom but if we let her in she shook in terror by the door especially when we flushed the toilet. Bad weather would send her to velcro against me. After about 3 weeks she realised we were very calm people and she started to relax around us. It helped that Thalia was so easy going around us.How we found out about the bass voice fear. we had to have some tradies out to work on the roof and one of them had a very deep voice. (Note we had other tradies out before and she just kept an eye on them.) Once he spoke she vanished! I found her curled in a little ball (3.5 kg cat) just shaking with terror behind the computer room door! I couldn’t get her to come out until after they left and then I couldn’t even move without her trying to climb inside me.Poppi still doesn’t like bad weather but she just burrows into her comfy spot. She isn’t terrified of the bathroom anymore (thinks we’re nuts to take showers). She knows the difference between a program on TV and real life. But a real bass voice will still send her into terrified hiding. Because we were never told any details we thought the abuse was just neglect/abandonment as she does have food anxiety issues ( upset if she can see the bottom of the food bowl). From the way she acts she was witness to, or even the victim of physical abuse by a bass voiced man.
Cat scared of litter box?
I had the same problem with my kitten when we first got her. Leave the kitten in the bathroom for a day or two with food and the litter box (check on her every few hours.) Don't think leaving her in an enclosed area for a couple days is cruel; some vets recommend kittens to spend the first year of their lives in a small room. This will force the kitten to get used to having the box around, or at least sniff at it. Make sure the litter box does not have a cover because the height may intimidate her. Some cats don't like the smell of fresh litter, so it make take a while for her to become used to it. But truthfully, you really can't force a kitten to use the litter box; the online sources were right when they said it comes naturally.
My cat sits in his litter box for a long time.?
You cannot take any chances at all with this. The possibility your cat has urinary tract crystals and now has a partial blockage is something that can't be ignored. You can't "wait and see" because if he does block he can die very quickly. Ideally you should get him to the vet tonight that is how serious a blockage is. You need to get him to the vet asap.
My basement flooded and now my cats are terrified from using the litter box down there. I’ve moved it upstairs but I keep trying to get them used to going downstairs but they panic. What should I do?
Nothing is going to help except time. Stop trying to get them to go down there to pee. You can try other things, step by step, to normalize the space. Put treats one step down. Then two. And of course leave a box down there with a bit of poo for smell. But take it VERY slowly.The basement is seared into their brain as "very bad place". Their instinct to avoid is pure survival instinct. You can't reason with that to make it go away, any more than you can reason with PTSD. All you can do is try to overlay it with good associations until the bad ones are diluted.There may be a residual odor down there they don't like. It doesn't smell like home anymore. Try leaving a litter box down there with a little used litter, maybe that will help. If *you* can smell any odor, scrub until it's gone. Have cleaners come in if necessaryHere is an out of the box idea: Build a unit that can sit on a couple of steps with a small platform on top. Put a litter box on that. It should have a lip around the top so the litterbox can't slide off and be fastened down in a way that is can't be knocked off easily (if the stairs are carpeted, velcro glued on the bottom will do that.). Then put it on the very top stair, so the box is at the same level as the rest of the house. Like part of the upstairs, If you can get then to use that, then a little later you can move is down one stair. SLOWLY. Normalize the space stair by stair.Of course you will have to dodge around it going downstairs yourself, but the payoff in the end might be worth it,
Can cats be scared of swing litter trays?
Hi there!Cats can develop fear towards anything that spook them. The trick in allaying any cat's fear towards a particular object is in how we introduce objects to them. A large majority of the time, the problem is not with the object itself; rather it is in the placement of the object, and the manner in which it was introduced to the cat.To introduce anything new to the cat, never place new items near locations that the cats need to feel secure: food and water place, the cat toilet, and the cat sleeping place. Just leave the object in a neutral area, and let the cat introduce itself to the object. Gradually place the item nearer to the intended location, until one day, the old item is replaced with the new one. In your case, slowly replace the old poop box with the new swing litter tray. Place them side-by-side and put litter in both the boxes. Once your cat starts using the new one comfortably, you can eliminate the old poop box.I hope I answered your question. Thanks for the A2A!
Why is my cat afraid of the litter box?
Well, your situation might be different from mine, but I will share my story just in case it helps.I also had a problem with one of my cats not using the litter box. At first I thought it was a territorial (due to the fact that this kitty was very jealous of my older cat) issue. It never crossed my mind to take my kitty to the vet, because I was “SURE” it was territorial. I cannot express how very stressful this situation was, and it went on for months!I finally became aware that perhaps it would be a good thing to take her to the vet. The vet informed me that my cat not only had a bladder infection, but it turned out she was also diabetic!The point is that you might want to consider taking your kitty to the vet! Once I started giving my cat injections twice a day, she started going to the litter box again!Having told you what the problems were with my cat, if your cat hasn’t been to the vet in a while, I would highly suggest taking your cat to your vet.On the event that you have taken your cat to the vet recently, and therefore your cat checked out perfectly, some other reasons your cat doesn’t like using the litter box could be a territorial issue, it could be because your cat doesn’t like the kitty litter, it could be because its food and water bowls are near the litter box (if they are), it could be because the litter box isn’t cleaned at least once a day (if that is the case), or it could be that, for some reason, it got “spooked” by something on the way to the litter box.If the above could be why, I would still at least call your cat’s vet to see what he/she thinks, along with perhaps some solutions for your situation.I hope this helps! :)
My cat is TERRIFIED of our christmas tree! What do I do?!?!?
Move her litterbox somewhere else so she doesn't have to see the tree. It's something different in her world and she's not sure about it. Given time and patience the problem may go away. I'd just leave her alone to work it out. Some cats are more "fraidy" than others. (I had a cat that was afraid of a doily, so go figure.)
My cat is scared to go into the basement where his litterbox is!?
We recently moved and temporarily had our cat's litterbox and food on the second floor in our bedroom/ office so that he could be with us and get used to the house. We have a baby on the way and also the smell of his litterbox was getting annoying. We moved his litterbox and food to the basement where we want them to be long term. He knows how to get there but is still scared to make the short travel downstairs. Every time we carry him into the basement, he just wants to run back up to his "safety room" on the second floor. I am worried he won't eat or use the bathroom.... or start spraying around the house. It has only been one day so far. I am guessing when he is really hungry he will go down. Any thoughts?