Falling in love again

Sometimes, I just find myself freshly enamored of one or all of the kitties. Lately, they have all been really darling, and I am just so delighted that we have these four bundles of beautiful, hilarious joy in our lives.

Everyone should know such cat bliss.

Hitting home...

It's been quite a while since I posted a blog entry!

Here's the comedy - our normally relaxed and groovy cat household recently erupted with the problem I last posted about - fear aggression. Blar. It's no fun to deal with.

Veers, our normally buddha-esque big boy, suddenly became terrified of our eldest, Jiji (aka The Sultan, aka Mr. Pants), and was showing his fear by aggressively hissing and starting fights. Delight! To make matters worse, Veers was also reacting negatively anytime my husband Brian (who is normally Veersy's true love ) spoke.

So, Jiji+Brian's voice = angsty trouble

To make matters worse, when Veers would display these behaviors, little Ozzel would attack him, either out of his own fearfulness at the odd behavior or out of solidarity with Jiji.

We ended up separating Veers from the other cats for a couple of days. Then, we jacked up the apartment with Feliway, which is a synthetic pheromone that makes cats feel relaxed. Then, we slowly reintroduced Veers and Jiji, using treats and mealtimes as incentive to be cool around each other.

It's working. I won't say the problem has completely passed, as we still have episodes of mild hissing a week later. But day by day things seem to be normalizing, and our household is slowly returning to a feline hippie love situation. Phew!

How we got a Zissou.

I've already talked a bit about how Jiji came into our lives, so I thought it might be good to give some background on where our other kitties came from.

So, here's Zissou's story:

When Jiji showed some medical problems as a kitten, I was terrified for two reasons.
One, I was so deeply attached to him from the first moment I held him that I knew it would be rough if something really bad happened.
Two, as rough as it would be for me, I knew Brian would really struggle with such a loss.
So, I nagged Brian into agreeing to a second kitten, largely under the guise that it would be good for Jiji socially. But in some ways, I wanted us to have a buffer animal in case the worst came to pass with the Ji-Bear.

So, the hunt began.
I took days off work. I went to nearly every shelter in the greater Atlanta area. I met a great many wonderful cats, but none of them were OUR cat.
I had a list of requirements, aimed at making a good match for Jiji. Our new kitty had to be within a month of Jiji's age, and had to be unlikely to challenge Jiji for the Alpha position in the cat hierarchy. And I had to connect with it.
So, kitty after kitty after kitty was met, but nothing clicked.
Until New Year's Day, when we walked into Petsmart. (Yes, I am lame enough to be doing pet supply shopping on January 1st.)
There was a pet adoption day going on, and I had barely gotten in the front door of the store when I experienced my "click." There she was: a little gray, black and white whorled tabby, all gangly and awkward looking and beautiful at the same time. She was three months old, but she didn't look so much like a kitten as she did a shrinkulated cat, with adult proportions.
I just stopped in my tracks and said, "That's our cat."
We had already decided on the name, so I walked up to her cage and said, "Zissou?"
When she meowed back and looked at me as though to say, "Yes?" Brian knew to go get the crate from the car.
I filled out the adoption application as quickly as I could and had my interview with the rescue group, all the while holding my little girl, not wanting to let go of her for even a second. Once all the hurdles had been cleared, we scooped her into her carrier, and whisked her away to settle into her new home.
She squalled throughout the car ride, and I sat next to her in the backseat, talking to her and smiling ear to ear.

Introductions between Zissou and Jiji were a little tricky, but before long, they formed a tentative friendship. Nowadays, they're fine together - not exactly best buds, but able to peacefully cohabitate and sometimes even snuggle or play together.

Little Zissou has become my sewing cat, sleeping next to the sewing machine while I work, sometimes reaching out a paw to touch me, occasionally batting at fabric as it passes through the machine. She is the smartest of our brood, and learns tricks faster than the boys. She sometimes can be a loner, but when she wants attention, she'll march right up and ask for it with a polite little "mrow."

I am so thankful every single day that we found out little girl. She is my total opposite as far as personality goes - quiet whereas I am loud, submissive whereas I am dominating, gentle whereas I can be a bit of a brute at times.
She teaches me everyday what true grace is in her gentle way. It's a lesson I hope to be learning from her for a long, long time.

Cat Aggression and Fearfulness

This entry is a response to our friend Jaime’s query about cat aggression. She has a three cat household, with one of the cats seeming to display fear-related aggression.

Well, Jaime, here are a few ideas to start with:

First, if you haven’t already, you’ll want to get Sugar evaluated with a thorough veterinary workup to rule out any medical causes for the behavior. Hyperthyroidism, hyperesthesia (extreme sensitivity to touch), and epilepsy can all exhibit as aggression and fearfulness.

I don’t mention these things to sound alarmist, but it’s best to approach a problem like this with all the information you can gather. Once Sugar has gotten a true clean bill of health, you can proceed with the behavioral approach.

A big no-no when dealing with a fearful cat is accidentally reinforcing the fearful behavior with coddling. If your tendency when Sugar gets scared is to pick her up and cuddle her and tell her everything is ok, you’re actually rewarding her for hissing and striking out defensively. If this has happened, don’t beat yourself up over it. We’ve all been there. It’s normal for someone who loves their animals to want to take care of them and soothe them when they’re upset.

Just know moving forward that you’ll have to fight this nurturing instinct. It’s difficult, and sometimes you’ll feel like you’re turning your back on your kitty, but it will be better for her in the long run.

Ok, now, for a vast number of things worth trying. You may have attempted some of these before, so I apologize for rehashing old info.

• Try feeding the cats in the same room, but separate, on opposite sides of the room if possible. Then, with each successful meal with no negative interaction, you can move the bowls slightly (I’m talking inches) closer. Continue moving the bowls progressively closer until you can confidently let them eat in fairly close proximity. This will help create positive associations among the cats to foster a better situation for additional behavioral therapies.
• Make sure you have plenty of space for the cats, especially vertical space. This might mean additional cat furniture, like trees or condos, so everyone has plenty of options for good nesting spots. Ideally, you want to provide a situation where there’s at least one primo spot for every cat, and more is even better
• Ensure that you have a glorious bounty of litter boxes. The rule of thumb is one per cat plus one additional box. Sometimes, aggression can stem from box territory issues that are so subtle, humans might not perceive them. It may not be the source of the problem at all, but everything you can do to ensure a harmonious environment for your multi-cat household is worth the trouble.
• It may be worth starting the introduction process from scratch. Be willing to take a couple of months to do this.
• All of the introduction techniques are fair game to re-build cat-to-cat associations in a more positive way. Scent mingling is a great trick. Rub a sock or towel on each member of the cat household, and keep cycling it around the crew so everyone gets rubbed with everyone else’s scent. You can do this for several days in a row, while the cats are separate, so when they do encounter each other, they all smell familiar and less foreign or threatening.
• Let Sugar encounter the other two cats in a situation where her safety is assured. Put the other two in their carriers and let her sniff around them as long as she likes. If she can control the approach, she is less likely to act defensive.
• It is also a good idea to let Sugar interact with just one of the other cats at a time. If she’s more comfortable with one of the other two cats than another, start with the one she’s most confident around. If you can encourage them to have a friendly relationship, it will encourage three-way harmony when all three cats are together.

If you’d like to once again try treats as part of your rehab process, remember, you want to give treats to reward good behavior, rather than using them as a lure. In situations where there is tension, cats may grow even more resentful of one another if they feel they have to go hungry or miss out if they want to maintain their safe distance from one another.

You may find that the three cats never really get to be friends, but there are additional things you can do to at least encourage a peaceful cohabitation

• -In additional to Feliway (which I know you mentioned wasn’t really helping), you can add a few drops of Rescue Remedy to their water dish.
• -Bell the other two cats so Sugar always knows their whereabouts. Normally, I’m not a fan of bells, but if it helps keep the peace, it’s worth it.
• -If you’re comfortable altering the doors in your house, you can install an electronic or magnetic door to one of your rooms and only give Sugar a compatible collar for entry. This doesn’t even have to be a full room – even a sizeable closet with a comfy space works great. (The idea is not to make her into a recluse, but to give her a safe haven when she’s spooked.)
• -If nothing else works, it's worth a trip to the vet to discuss drug therapies. Some vets are huge proponents of Prozac for cats, others prefer a naturalistic approach, but if you’ve really exhausted all your options, most will be willing to at least discuss the option. The generic equivalent to Prozac only costs pennies a day, and it is often very successful in treating a variety of anxieties.

Lastly, my favorite: trick training.

Seriously.

Cats respond extremely well to clicker training, and it is a great, non-stressful way to build confidence in a fearful cat. Felines can easily learn to sit, speak, and almost any other command one can think of, and it only requires 5-10 minutes a day.

You might be surprised how much a little confidence affects your kitty!

Two books I recommend on the subject are:

Cat Training in 10 Minutes by Miriam Fields-Babineau


Getting Started: Clicker Training for Cats (Karen Pryor Clicker Books) by Karen Pryor

Phew! I know that’s a lot of information, but fear aggression can really cause a lot of upset (as you know), and if you are indeed thinking of adding children to the mix, you’ll want to have your feline children squared away first. Please please PLEASE keep me posted on Sugar’s progress – I hope with all my heart you can help her overcome her fear, and that you can have a relaxed, peaceful household!

Everything I needed to know about love, I learned from my cat Jiji.

Let me set this up:
The first eight years of my marriage were pet-free.
I would see adorable cats or dogs and I would make the casual overtures to my husband that we should get a pet, but then he would remind me that pets come with poop, and I would back down.
(I should mention that my delightful spouse is not an ogre. More than anything else, he never really got past the loss of his beloved childhood dog Digby, to the extent that any cute animal he encountered in the years following Digby's death just looked like heartache to him. He knows all too well that we are generally destined to outlive any of the furry animals we open our hearts to.)
We even had a couple of adorable cats show up at our apartment, and found them homes rather than take them in ourselves.
At some point in our marriage, however, the deal was struck that if a black kitten ever showed up on our doorstep, I would get to keep it, no questions asked.

Well, the kitten got the wrong address -- it showed up at my work.
One of the security personnel scooped him up and put feelers out for takers, one of my coworkers mentioned it to me, and after a certain amount of cajoling and deal making (I would be responsible for all cat care), we had adopted our first cat together, a tiny seven-week old bundle of purr with no tail.
I named him Jiji after the chatty, snarky cat in Kiki's Delivery Service (LOVE that film), and fell in love with him so quickly, I thought my heart might burst from the rapid expansion.

Right away, we realized there was something not quite right with Jiji.
He would get in the litterbox and strain, but with no results.
We called the vet, and they suggested a mild laxative. The thinking was that since he had been out on his own for an unknown period of time, there was no telling what he had been eating.
Initially, the laxative helped, but Jiji continued to have trouble passing stool. Sometimes, he would stand in the litterbox and cry, which broke my heart.
He was in and out of the vet's office pretty frequently the first month we had him, and eventually, our vet (whom I adore) and I had a very serious discussion about Jiji's future.
She told me things with him could either get better or worse, but we wouldn't know what his real chances for a healthy life would be until he reached at least six months of age.
She also told me she felt like he had a really good shot, but that I would have to be very committed to his care and we were going to have to monitor him closely. I agreed that I was willing to do anything and everything I could for him, and if we had to make a hard decision down the road, I would try to make it based on what would really be best for our little fluffy man.

The next several months had ups and downs. Phrases I never thought would come out of my mouth were uttered like, "We're here for the kitten's enema."
At around 5 months old, Jiji started to exhibit some urinary incontinence. You can imagine how fun that is.
We got his constipation issues more or less under control through diet, but his "leaking" continues. We manage it by giving him a wipe down once or twice a day, keeping him shaved in his nether regions to prevent moisture getting trapped near his skin and giving him a rash, and washing his bedding often.

The bottom line, though, is that as these problems progressed and persisted, I never gave up on my crazy little child, and without even thinking, I dealt with some fairly gross stuff.
At some point I realized that my capacity for love was much greater than I had previously thought. I could actually prioritize another living thing in my life other than myself or my husband (who is, seriously, completely easy to live with). It gave me a new sense of self, truly, and a pride in the level of care I am able to give my pets.
Don't get any crazy ideas -- it hasn't made me want kids or anything. Even a challenging cat is still NOTHING compared to a little person.

Jiji is three now. He very rarely goes to the vet for anything other than his routine yearly exam, because he has really flourished, and we have been able to manage his care needs with a fairly regular routine.
He still doesn't like baths, but he tolerates them and just about everything else.
And to top it all off, he has such a fun personality. He's not a lap cat by any means, but he finds odd little ways to tell me he loves me. When I put his food down, he always runs back to me and rubs my legs once before heading to his dish, even though he's a glutton and would rather eat than do almost anything else. Every night, he sits next to my chair as I watch television, occasionally rubbing his face on my foot or hand to let me know he's there.

For every effort we've ever had to put forth, he's repaid us a thousand times over.
Moreover, he has taught me the true meaning of unconditional love.

My tiny wang.

Apparently, my secret is out.
Lately, EVERYONE with an email address and a helpful enterprise has been sending me penis enlargement advice.
Now, I'm no spring chicken when it comes to spam, and I know that since the invention of the internet, various folks with dreams of collecting big money from small gents have been attempting to capitalize. Just the same, the volume of my emails of this nature have really increased in the last several weeks... odd.
So, aside from the fact that I am a woman with no gender-bending stuff going on (aside from the fact that I tend to dress like a 10 year old boy), now you know that I apparently need penile enhancement, if I'm to believe everything I read in my inbox.

Welcome to the Monkey House!

Howdy, all.

Welcome to the Crazy Cat Lady Gazette, where you'll be treated to my slightly skewed view of the universe, a few rants here and there, and ridiculous amounts of discussion about my four cats.

Who am I? A mix of a billion things, a jack-of-all-trades, a fan of more things than any one person should obsess over.

Right at the moment, I'm demi-obsessed with business card cases.
I recently bought a Charmmy Kitty card case for my business cards. If you don't know Charmmy Kitty, she's one of the more recent additions to the Sanrio universe of painfully cute characters. She's Hello Kitty's Persian cat (yes, HK having a cat of her own is weird and could potentially bring up some disturbing class-relation issues, but I'm just not in the mood to over think the cute, frankly), and she is FREAKING ADORABLE.
Like, make-my-itty-bitty-grinch-heart-swell-up-like-a-balloon adorable.
Anyhoo, I bought a darling card case with a lovely enameled Charmmy on it, and for a few days, I knew bliss.
But then, online, I found the holy-crap-I-might-explode level of cuteness Kuromi (also Sanrio) case pictured above. Curses!
So now, I basically am going to have two card cases.
I so don't need two card cases.
In fact, I feel compelled to mention that I am rarely asked for my business card, and even then, it's just by friends who want one because it has my company's logo on it.
But those marketing and design people at Sanrio know that I am a consumer whore, and that I will buy things whether I need them or not.
Just ask my friends -- when I step into a Sanrio, it's like a crack addict at the crack factory.
I run around in a frenzy touching everything, squealing repeatedly, and inevitably buying more than I should.
Sigh.
So now my dilemma is, how will I use the two cases in such a way that I'm justifying having both?

I will have to make a usage schedule of some sort.
More on my calendar addiction later.