Cat Hoarders

I need some advice on how to approach my mother in law about her cat hoarding. I've tried over the past several years to open her eyes to her situation but she either is in denial or refuses to believe that it IS a problem. I worry that she is going to end up like one of those 'crazy cat people' you see on TV with dozens and dozens of uncared for cats in her home with a camera crew and the SPCA rescuing all of her cats.

She's always had a few cats which is awesome. I love cats myself, I don't think there will ever be a time in which I don't own a cat or two. But I take very good care of my cat. He goes to the vet regularly, no fleas or parasites, he eats only holistic foods, his litterbox is cleaned out by my husband who is like a bloodhound with the thing. He checks it about 15 times a day. Anyhow enough about my cat, he isn't the issue.

My husband and I live with his mother since his father passed away and left his house to my husband. Shes unable to work or support herself so we are here taking care of her, most likely forever now. When she moved into this house about 7 years ago she brought 3 cats with her. Her husband brought his 3 cats. So they had 6 cats in the house. After about 2 months in the new house they found a litter of kittens in the backyard with no mommy cat. They waited an entire day and when no mommy cat ever came around they gathered up the 4 kittens and took them inside. The kittens were left inside of a cardboard box for WEEKS. My in-laws insisted that they were just babies and needed as much dark and quiet time as possible. Now I'm not really one to argue with my elders, let alone my inlaws! So inside the cardboard box they remained. There was also a large towel over the top of the box so no light would go in and they could 'rest'. After they were about 5 weeks old I told them "look, these kittens need to be socialized if you want to re-home them when they are old enough, they are scared of everything right now".

Well that landed them out of the cardboard box and into a toddlers playpen, again with a large peice of wood over the top so they couldn't 'escape' and get lost in the house. At least they could see now, but they were still terrified of -everything-. Then by the time they were about 10 weeks old they were finally allowed out of the playpen and to have some 'free roam' of the house, which was confinded to the kitchen. The decision was made to keep all 4 kittens because 1. they didn't want to seperate the babies and 2. the previous 6 cats were somewhat old and they wanted 'replacements' for them. So 10 cats it is.

Then the ferals started to show up. My in-laws were very very insistant on saving these feral cats. There were two that just would not leave, most likely because there is food and water outside in the front yard for the cats, so every stray in the neighborhood comes here. So they finally caught and brought the ferals in. Now the ferals were loose in the house and hiding, going to the bathroom everywhere, spraying, etc. Oh yeah the 10 previous cats were not neutered yet so you can imaging the spray mania that went on for WEEKS. One of the ferals was extremely ILL. I begged my in-laws to get rid of it or take it to a vet for proper care. The animal was suffering. They finally did take the one to the vet after it suffered in the house for about 3 months. The vet decided to put it down immediately because of the extremely bad condition of the animal. It didn't have any skin left on it's back legs, it had been attacked by a dog and had wounds that were never treated and abcessed horribly.

Well after a while another 2 cats showed up, which were eventually trapped and brought into the house of cat doom. The neighbor was angry, too many cats. He started to trap the cats to take them to the shelter. He even went as far as to tell my in-laws "don't worry about your cats, we're going to find good homes for all of them" which just infuriated my in-laws.

So fast forward a few years. They were up to 16 cats. Now lets talk about the condition of these animals. They are fed twice a day, fed as in cans of wet food are mixed with dry and left out for 12 hours to get nasty and fly covered, then it's done all over again. There are 4 litter boxes for 16 cats and they are only dumped out once a week and new litter put in. I cannot describe the SMELL of this house, it's incredible. The cats use the entire house as their bathroom and my in-laws were OK with that. (???????)

When you walk into the house it's like playing twister to avoid stepping in cat vomit or feces, you can't get around the urine, it is literally everywhere. I had to stop sitting down in my in-laws house. I kept telling them "if the health dept. comes in here your house will be condemned!!" but they insisted "why, we are just rescuing poor helpless cats".

Then my father in law started STEALING cats and bringing them home. What?? He would bring home a new cat every few weeks and it would have some story that was along the lines of "well I saw this guy kicking it around and decided to give it a better home so I waited for him to go inside and I caught the cat and saved it". Oh so you stole it? He would never admit to that, just that he 'saved' it from a bad life. And brought it to the house of cat doom.

Ok so fast foreward again to current times. My father in law passed away and left his son his cat ruined house that his mother still lives in. Things are getting bad. There is no money, the house is in foreclosure, we're all moving to a trailer soon and there are still 9 cats (that pee and poop everywhere). She doesn't clean the litterboxes expect maybe once a week still, and she still does the 12 hour feeding shifts with canned food left out to rot. I can't even begin to deal with the FLYS and MAGGOTS all over the kitchen due to nasty filth everywhere. I am BEGGING her to let me re-home her cats! She can't even entertain the idea. She insists that her cats are all she has left and she will not part with a single one of them. It's unhealthy! I even told her that I refuse to have a child in this household no matter where it moves because it is disgusting. My husband and I are trying to have a child but I've put it on hold because I will not bring another life, human or animal, into this house of doom! She doesn't understand this. Shes like "oh, that's sad!! I want grandkids". Well if we didn't live with her we'd have kids already. Other than the filthy house, overpopulation of cats and lack of room here, shes a chain smoker that goes through several packs a day! I've all but begged her to at least smoke in her bathroom or her bedroom with the door shut as I do not smoke and the smoke makes me sick and irritates allergies. No winning there, I think she'd get rid of her cats before she stopped smoking or at least took other around her into consideration.

So anyway, I'm leaving this as is, it's a long long story and I think that pretty much summed it up. So here is my question:

How on Earth do I get her to give up some of her cats? Should I? What should I do?? Arg, I love her and I love her cats but this has got to stop.

And the animal control has been contacted, they've come out and given her notices that say "you can only have 3 animals of any given species on your property". She does a remarkable job of hiding her cats so that when they come back around to check they are all inside and shes just the sweetest lady that the animal control people love. They have never been inside the house, though I'm starting to wish they did.

Should I report my own mother in law? Would that put MY pets into danger? I have a cat and dog that are well cared for and don't go into her house at all (we live in an attached house on the exsisting home) and they are extremely well cared for.

Any advice would be helpful, I'm at my wits end.

The problem is...if she indeed has a hoarding issue....even if these cats are removed...she will simply find others and the hoarding will begin again. So my suggestion would be to try to get social services involved to look into getting her councelling. In the meantime, I would try to get a rescue group or TNR organization out there to work with her. If she understands that the group is not there to take the cats "away" from her but to help her to possibly find them good homes and address the feral cat situation humanely, she may be more open to working with them honestly.

California has several TNR organizations:

http://www.alleycat.org/orgs.html#ca

Another thing you may want to do is join the feral cat yahoo group as I do believe there are some individuals on that list that have worked with hoarders:

http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/feral_cats/

Good Luck and thanks for caring for these cats.

Katie

All i can say is the cats are in danger from animal control taking them and putting down the feral/sick cats, and in danger by the way they are treated (healthwise) An unhealthy/feral cats wont last in animal shelters either they want friendly cats who are healthy.

If she cant care for them properly she shouldnt own any, or MABYE keep one (max 2), but they HAVE to be fixed and mabye you and your husband could help her get them to a vet once or twice a year if thats possible for you both to help with. 2 cats are easy to care for even for the elderly.

But as far as the others something must be done, but what? The ferals stand little chance at adoption, if they were taken away they will all be put down. It may seem weird, but if she decided to keep 2 cats, mabye keep 2 ferals. But like I said if she is angry she cant pet the ferals then her keeping them isnt good.

If a cat she has is healthy and friendly, try finding homes for those cats first, or young kittens who are friendly. You could put posters up at local vet offices, and ask any people you know personally who may consider adopting one.

All the cats need to be fixed, but sounds like there is no way financially to do them all. So focus on the non-pregnant females and friendly cats/kittens. But it sounds like you'll have to choose only a select few since you have so many.

Here's a short term idea (if possible)

I THINK if possible, you could put all the females in one room away from any males (with food,litterbox,toys,and cat beds),and if females have kittens that are nursing be sure to keep them with the females. If any kittens are weaned and female, still keep them with the females. (depending on the # of females, make sure a room would be big enough, and have a working door so they cant escape and be in contact with the males in the house)

If a kitten is weaned and male, let it roam the house with the other males.

Confining males doesnt sound safe because of violence towards other males, so if they roam the house they have more hiding space. Preventing any males getting to a female could help prevent any more pregnancies if you cant get all the females fixed.

Good Luck and hopefully you can better the situation.

(and get her help like TNR said so she wont hoard anymore)

Originally Posted by LadyDayne

I need some advice on how to approach my mother in law about her cat hoarding. [...snip...] How on Earth do I get her to give up some of her cats? Should I? What should I do?? Arg, I love her and I love her cats but this has got to stop.

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For the sake of your mother-in-law and the animals, you need to report her to Social Services, Elder Care, etc. Do it NOW. Get them IN the house so that they can see the full impact of her hoarding. Yes, this is going to be very hard on you, your husband, your mother-in-law and other family members but it must be done. Today. Now. Do not delay.

What she is doing is actually a form of abuse. She won't see it that way (she's "rescuing" them after all) but as I understand it, hoarding is a form of mental illness - a complusion that cannot be controlled. It is unlikely that she will be able to make the change that without consistent, on-going supervision. How old is she? Is it possible that she is experiencing the onset of dementia? She should get a full physical checkup as well as a mental health check.

I am not a doctor and I do not play one on television. But I strongly advise you to get Social Services IN the house ASAP so that the authorities can begin to get things under control (she's not listening to you, perhaps she'll be compelled to obey them). Again, this is going to be very hard on you and your family; I wish you every bit of luck that I can.

It sounds like your MIL needs professional help. Hoarding is a compulsive disorder and Katie is right - you can remove the cats now but without help, she will only collect again.

This may sound really harsh, but you said that your husband owns the home that she lives in? Can he play "landlord" and put restrictions on her? Give her serious deadlines for finding homes for most of the cats and if she doesn't follow them, evict her. I couldn't help but think that by allowing her to live on your property with all of these cats, you are enabling her habit.

I worked with a no-kill humane society once to empty out the house of a hoarder. We left her 2 cats and 2 dogs and took the rest and adopted all of them. The animals left behind were speutered. Rather than calling animal control, try to find a no-kill shelter in your area as they sometimes will be more sympathetic to the situation. Many of these won't be listed in the phone book, but you can find rescue organizations in your area by going into www.petfinder.com and entering in your zip code. They will list the pets and the rescue groups that are sponsoring them.

Good luck - you have your hands full!

Thanks for the replies and concern. Luckily all the cats are male right now and all but two have been neutered at this point. One of the cats is female and she is also spayed. It's been slowly done over the years luckily. So the only new cats that enter the household are strays. Since my father in law passed away no new cats have come in at all, only the group there is now (unchanged in the past year).

My husband has tried talking to her several times about the abuse factor and how it is extremely unfair for the cats to live like this, no matter how happy and affectionate they seem. I've looked into putting some of them up for adoption and my husband has talked with his mother several times about the fact that she cannot move into a new home and take her group of cats with her, they cannot come destroy a new house. She doesn't have a way to support herself at all, she only gets $300 a month from death benefits and the state says she is not disabled to the point of not being able to work, though she insists that she is. I have no problem with allowing her to live with us until we can't care for her anymore, and I have no problem with her having cats at all, but we've got to set some limits here and get the proper care for the animals.

Anyway after reading these replies my husband agrees that it's time for some sort of intervention. Possibly even printing these replies out letting her read them. I never really considered that hoarding is a compulsive mental issue. Shes 58 years old right now and suffers from PTSD from a carjacking that occured a few years ago. I don't want her to lose all of her cats by any means, I think she could probably get by with 3 of them if she took it seriously and dedicated herself to properly taking care of them. Shes relied too long on the ideal that if they are fed and not bleeding then they are fine.

My husband has made a little progress also, he has talked her into training them somewhat, training them manners that is. They jump and claw, they bite, etc. If they want to be held and treated as small infants (as they are used to) and you don't pick them up your leg will be bleeding. She has bite marks on her face where they have bitten her whiles shes holding them. This is not acceptable in my opinion. I'm not one to have a cat declawed but my cat knows its boundaries and claws and teeth are rarely toward people. So he has shown her a few tactics to get the cats to stop being so demanding, most of which involved her just not giving in and telling them 'no'. Putting a knee up gently and backing away when they try to climb up the leg, putting them down and making them wait until you can hold them so you can do other things like, cook food or take a shower, without having a cat in your arms or scratching your legs.

I've tried just doing it all myself as well and it seems to get worse. The more I do for the cats for her (feeding, cleaning, etc) the less she'll do with them.

Boy, anyway! I don't mean to rant on and I'm sorry that I have. We're gonna start working on this issue right away. Thank you for all the luck, this family needs as much as it can get right about now.

I do have to say that I am glad to read they are mostly fixed. As to the strays...you should reach out to TNR groups/rescue groups to help with that.

Katie

Sorry I just wanted to add also that I have no problems with helping to take the cats to the vet, I have in the past. I buy a lot of their food for them because I'd prefer they have a urinary tract formula instead of whatever the cheapest brand is that day. I've told her in the past that I will completely take care of the cats for her but first I'd have to get it to a managable amount of cats, like 3 or 4.

Thinking about this I might be able to talk her down to 3 or 4 of them. Two are feral and not neutered at all, but they rarely leave the house anymore so they are almost like wild tame cats now, if that makes sense... One of them, the most recent one is only about a year old. She's spayed and doesn't really get along with the other cats. I'm pretty sure she is a Bombay mix. She is actually very well mannered and would be a great cat to go into a quiet household with no other cats (or at least reasonable cats). So there are at least 3 I think I can manage to get her to let go of after we start the intervention. I might even take the Bombay for myself because I think shes a pretty awesome cat.

But the ones that she bottlefed as little babies (that are 6 years old now) are like a part of her body. I think she honestly considers it be like giving up your children, and how could you pick which of your kids goes? I LOVE my pets and consider them part of the family, I've spent hundreds of dollars on my rats and thousands of dollars on my dog and cat at the vet, but there has to come a point where reality has to get a chance to play. It's not abandoning your children, by any means.

Originally Posted by TNR1

I do have to say that I am glad to read they are mostly fixed. As to the strays...you should reach out to TNR groups/rescue groups to help with that.

Katie

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I plan on doing just that, thanks for the links you provided earlier. I've been looking into information about this all afternoon on the internet. I won't take them to the shelter since it's not a no-kill shelter. Somehow we'll figure this mess out.

Im so sorry for the situation your mil is in,obviously she has been through a very tough time and is struggling to overcome the things in her life that has gotten her so down and to lose the one man she could depend on for support and love must be absolutelty devastating for her,She and her furkids have lost the love and care of the one person she could depend on for security love and support and to face the prospect of losing her home to!! I am not surprised she is struggling to cope with her babies and they are her babies,her and her husbands.

I do not consider your mil a hoarder I believe she is at a very low level in her life and is struggling to look after her 'kids'she may not be physically capable of looking after them herself which is why it is so important for her to have the help and support of her 'family'

I hope you dont take offense but if you live with your mil in the same house why are the cat food left so long that they get maggots?
It takes days for fly eggs to turn to maggots so do you mind if I ask why the y are left so long?

I dont know all the facts but just what I can make out from your post but it sounds like the house and the sale is a big issue too.

I know you said you were all moving to a trailer but is it possible you could make an enclosure for the cats outside the trailer so she could take her babies and then they wont have to go to be pts and your mil will still be able to look after them?

Originally Posted by nightcats

Im so sorry for the situation your mil is in,obviously she has been through a very tough time and is struggling to overcome the things in her life that has gotten her so down and to lose the one man she could depend on for support and love must be absolutelty devastating for her,She and her furkids have lost the love and care of the one person she could depend on for security love and support and to face the prospect of losing her home to!! I am not surprised she is struggling to cope with her babies and they are her babies,her and her husbands.

I do not consider your mil a hoarder I believe she is at a very low level in her life and is struggling to look after her 'kids'she may not be physically capable of looking after them herself which is why it is so important for her to have the help and support of her 'family'

I hope you dont take offense but if you live with your mil in the same house why are the cat food left so long that they get maggots?
It takes days for fly eggs to turn to maggots so do you mind if I ask why the y are left so long?

I dont know all the facts but just what I can make out from your post but it sounds like the house and the sale is a big issue too.

I know you said you were all moving to a trailer but is it possible you could make an enclosure for the cats outside the trailer so she could take her babies and then they wont have to go to be pts and your mil will still be able to look after them?

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I completely understand where you are coming from, no offense taken at all. She has been through a lot in the past 6 years. She decided to remarry the abusive alcoholic she had divorced because he was willing to buy a house for them to live in together. She's not physically disabled at all, she just has post traumatic stress from a carjacking she went through about 6 years ago. She refuses to leave the house because she is afraid of it happening again. She only leaves the house with groups of people. So she refuses to work also. This is why my husband and I are living with her currently, she doesn't make enough money to support herself at all and shes not willing to go stay with her sisters or brother in another state because she won't be able to bring along her cats. After FIL passed away a year ago I thought she would almost have a sort of relief since her abuser was no longer in her life, though shes really co-dependant and not having someone to control her seems to leave her with no where to turn in life.

She doesn't consider my husband and I to be a part of her life as far as companionship goes, shes told us before that it's only her cats she considers her friends, we are merely 'the kids' who are here supporting her so she doesn't go homeless. Even with all of this I absolutlely love this woman. I don't have a mother to speak of so shes about all I have (even if she doesn't truely consider me a daughter, I've been with her son for 12 years). I couldn't imagine not being here for her and helping to take care of things.

After doing some research about hoarding etc, I have to agree with you that she is not a hoarder per se, but more as a widow who was left over with the mess that a hoarder has left her. It was her husband who was always bringing cats home and whatnot. Now that he isn't in the picture anymore no more new cats have come into the household.

The house is a 4 bedroom home, it has no equity and there is more owed on it than it's worth. I don't know how but my FIL managed to get 3 mortgages in 6 years and go bankrupt. The house is in probate still but it needs to be sold because we can't afford to make the almost $2000 a month in house payments anymore. The house is also destroyed, literally. I don't spend a lot of time inside of it myself (we live in an attached 'sublet' type thing on the property) because the ammonia levels are so high it makes me ill after a very short time. Plus her cigarette smoke is always filtering through the entire house and makes it gross in there.

I have tried to take more care of them myself but I'm not here 24 hours a day like she is. I've even offered to take care of them but if I'm the one to be solely responsible for them there will be less cats. This is the part she won't cope with. She has no physical problems keeping her from caring for them properly, just bad habits that are hard to break. I do throw the food away often when it gets nasty before the flies find their way to it, but she gets really upset and crys about "you're in charge of my cats and I can't do anything about it now" and "you rule this house and have to have it your way".

She went to Texas for 2 weeks in July and I took care of the cats the whole time. It was the best two weeks ever for them. No flies, no filth, no wasted food, clean water, clean litterboxes, etc. When she came back I was like "LOOK!! I got them on a better feeding schedule where I don't mix the wet and dry together (one dish with wet left down for 30 minutes, a dish with dry always available), and I've been cleaning their litterboxes every 6 hours. They haven't been puking or using the bathroom anywhere except in their litterboxes and they've been eating all their food!" It didn't take but 12 hours for her to have ended what I had done and make this huge bowl of wet/dry mixed food and leave it out on the floor all night long. It's like she is so resistant to change that even when you show her the proof of how well it works to take care of them properly she doesn't believe it. Or she thinks it's 'mean' of me to pick the food up.

She has an enclosure built outside of her office for the cats right now actually, since the entire neighborhood was complaining and cats started being trapped. She had this little caged room built so they could go outside but not be everywhere. That didn't last long, the cats don't like it so she won't make them use it. They do go out there to use the bathroom, and the little room has never been cleaned out. It's a nightmare. I've got plans to tear the whole thing down soon to try and increase the value of the house.

As far as the sheer amount of flies and maggots in the house, I think it has a lot to do with the carpeting. I've done tons of things to try and get rid of the flies but the carpets are so nasty that I think the maggots are breeding down in the carpet. I've even pulled all the carpet out of 2 of the bedrooms where it was the worst, which did help a lot. But between the nasty carpet, no screens on the windows (they've been destroyed by cats) and leaving the windows and doors open all day/night to try and get some sort of fresh air, AND the litterboxes and wet food left out all day/night.... it's like the hometown buffet for flies.

Anyway I don't mean to ramble on like this. I am totally willing to help take care of the cats it just needs to be reasonable. I'm only one person and there are just too many cats! If she only had like 3 or 4 then I'd be a lot more willing to do all of the care for them myself. She has this REALLY bad habit of being lazy and once I start cleaning the litterboxes it's like pulling teeth to get her to do it again later. She'll say "Oooooooooh thank you for cleaning the litterboxes out, I was -just- about to do that!" and I'll say, "hey no problem, you can check them again in 6 hours to make sure they are clean" But she won't. She's even said "well since you cleaned them I can go back to my pogo games" then she won't touch the boxes for days and days. There will be cat poop on the floor outside of the litterbox and she'll sprinkle carpet freshener on it and walk over it. ?????????????????????????? I do not understand this. I'll go out there and pick up the poo and clean the spot up and shes like "Oooooooh thank you so much!!! I was going to do that". When? After the carpet freshener dried? After it gets so old it sticks to the floor? WHy did you cover it and just walk away anyway?? I don't want to flat out call her lazy, but come on.... don't sprinkle carpet freshener on cat poo then walk over it and leave it there, for hours.

We've even told her once in a desperate moment "we're going to move to a new place and if you want to come with us then you can't bring ALL of your cats, you have to pick 3" that sent her into the deepest depression I've ever seen, she actually started to go to counselling, then stopped about 5 weeks later after she decided the therapist wasn't helping her at all (because the therapist wanted her to get out of the house and start living life again, AND the therapist recommended getting rid of some cats since they are such a high stress point and really remind her of her deceased husband).

I think I'm going to catch the two unaltered male ferals in the house and get them neutered, then try and have them rehomed, maybe out on someones farm as mice catchers or something. I live in a very rural area full of orchards and farmland so there are always mice catching jobs. After that she'll only have 7 cats and we can work it out from there. She won't be happy that the two are gone but I think eventually she will understand it was for the best. Shes just too diluted in the mind right now.

And again I want to stress, I LOVE my mother in law. I love her cats. I just don't love this situation. I want to help her, and I'm willing to help her. I just need her to believe that I'm "helping" her and not trying to control her and just run all her cats off. That is the last thing on my mind, the first thing on my mind is the proper care of these cats.

Those poor, poor kitties - they are victims of your MIL's mental illness. I hope that you can contact the social services and get some help. Be warned, though, if you can't convince the authorities that you will help out with the cats, the authorities may just order them all removed to a kill-shelter. Also, you'd best check with your local public defender or another attorney and get advice. You want to make sure that the county doesn't try to do a guardianship petition on her - not to scare you, but sometimes Adult Protective Services is like child protective services and the next thing the family knows, government is involved and things get complicated. I suppose that it could be considered that she is unable to care for herself, allowing herself to live in such a filthy house, but with medication, who knows how much brighter the future can be! I know that the United Methodist churches have "timothians"? that will visit people and just be friends with them - maybe if she could get a couple of them to stop by occasionally and say "hi", she'd be more receptive to getting the mental help she so desperately needs. As for you & the kitties - sending plenty of prayers and vibes of support and encouragement

I am so very sorry to hear about your MIL being so sick like this. It does indeed sound like a form of hording or mental illness. People like that cannot see how filthy and disgusting their home has become.

My husband's great grand mother was a hoarder but not of cats. She kept news and magazine clippings EVERYWHERE, they were rotting and some of them were from the 1950s. She bought dozens and dozens of things off tv and never touched them, just let them gather dust. Her bedroom was so full of junk that she never even opened the door she just slept on her rotting couch. Things moved into her bedroom through the broken window and died beneath her unused bed, the floor rotted out from the furniture in the middle room....her kitchen was the worst of all. Packed with garbage, maggots, unclean dishes and a refrigerator of vile rotten food. This is the same woman who cared for her children, put food on the table, clothes on their back and kept her home spotless years before.

It's very much a mental illness and you can't fix her unless she wants to be fixed. I know you love her but in loving her you need to get her help. Living like that in her home is so dangerous for her health and the health of the cats. It may be that you need to put a hard line down and make her give up all but three of her cats.

good luck! You have a lot ahead of you but I know you can do it. It's great your husband is behind you on this!

TODAY. Contact your local social services agency, your MIL's doctor if you know him/her, ANYONE who specializes in mental illness. You can have her declared incapable of taking care of herself and get conservatorship.

You can not allow this to go on. You can NOT. Contact a local rescue group to help you with the cats. Contact the police if you have to to get your MIL out of the house and into a treatment facility. She needs HELP.

Do it NOW.