Ok, I'd like to start off by saying, I am not usually a complete idiot, but I think I have totally messed up new cat introduction into the household, and I'm hoping and desperately desperately praying that you all might be able to advise me how to fix the mess I'm in.
So, I've had 2 kitties for about 9 months now, who are almost a year old. About a month and a half ago, I brought in a rescued pregnant kitty named Ms Friskers, who was quite friendly with people. She had her kittens about two weeks ago.
Prior to the kitten birth, she and the two kitties had some limited, supervised interaction, which mostly consisted of them checking her out, and her eventually getting scared, at which point we ended the interaction.
She then got to have my bedroom to herself for about 3 weeks, and very much claimed it as her territory. The other kitties stopped even trying to come into my bedroom. Kittens were born, she relaxed considerably.
I did the swapping back and forth with a blanket thing for a few days, with limited success. Our pre-existing female kitty (Ysa) was, simply, pissed. Any scent of the new cat and she hissed and growled.
However, about a week ago, Ms Friskers started showing interest in checking out life outside my bedroom. So I put the other kitties in a different room, and let Ms Friskers out for a few minutes to look around. After doing this for about a day, I tried leaving the other kitties out with her, and things actually went pretty well.
Hm, I thought, well, maybe this is going to go well. So, when I've been home over the past 4-5 days, I've left the bedroom door open so the cats can interact. The kitties have all slowly been pushing out into each other's space, and things SEEMED to be going great.
Until today. Ms Friskers got in a tussle with the other two this morning, which I chalked up as just a first physical interaction and figured was ok. But not so much. This evening, she attacked Ysa, twice, both times while Ysa was on my roomie's bed. The second time, Ysa peed and pooped all over roomie's bedspread (roomie is NOT happy). I've never experienced that sort of level of scared in a pre-existing cat, but I've also never had a new cat attack the already there cat.
It's my guess that Ms Friskers will be the dominant cat, in terms of stature and personality, but I don't want Ysa to be terrorized into it.
I feel like I must have rushed things, even though I was trying to be patient. We're already running a Feliway diffuser, though I am hoping to get a second one, and maybe try rescue remedy as well. But I think that probably I'm going to need some advice about behaviorally, how to handle this.
Can I undo the damage done? Both of these cats are "mine" more than my roomie's and the intention originally was for me to take Ysa and Ms Friskers whenever we move into separate places. But are they going to ever be able to get along? Is there any way to let them figure out the cat hierarchy without scaring Ysa so badly?
Help, help, help, what do I do? I love my kitties so much, and it hurts me that they aren't getting along, and it's probably my fault.
So, I've had 2 kitties for about 9 months now, who are almost a year old. About a month and a half ago, I brought in a rescued pregnant kitty named Ms Friskers, who was quite friendly with people. She had her kittens about two weeks ago.
Prior to the kitten birth, she and the two kitties had some limited, supervised interaction, which mostly consisted of them checking her out, and her eventually getting scared, at which point we ended the interaction.
She then got to have my bedroom to herself for about 3 weeks, and very much claimed it as her territory. The other kitties stopped even trying to come into my bedroom. Kittens were born, she relaxed considerably.
I did the swapping back and forth with a blanket thing for a few days, with limited success. Our pre-existing female kitty (Ysa) was, simply, pissed. Any scent of the new cat and she hissed and growled.
However, about a week ago, Ms Friskers started showing interest in checking out life outside my bedroom. So I put the other kitties in a different room, and let Ms Friskers out for a few minutes to look around. After doing this for about a day, I tried leaving the other kitties out with her, and things actually went pretty well.
Hm, I thought, well, maybe this is going to go well. So, when I've been home over the past 4-5 days, I've left the bedroom door open so the cats can interact. The kitties have all slowly been pushing out into each other's space, and things SEEMED to be going great.
Until today. Ms Friskers got in a tussle with the other two this morning, which I chalked up as just a first physical interaction and figured was ok. But not so much. This evening, she attacked Ysa, twice, both times while Ysa was on my roomie's bed. The second time, Ysa peed and pooped all over roomie's bedspread (roomie is NOT happy). I've never experienced that sort of level of scared in a pre-existing cat, but I've also never had a new cat attack the already there cat.
It's my guess that Ms Friskers will be the dominant cat, in terms of stature and personality, but I don't want Ysa to be terrorized into it.
I feel like I must have rushed things, even though I was trying to be patient. We're already running a Feliway diffuser, though I am hoping to get a second one, and maybe try rescue remedy as well. But I think that probably I'm going to need some advice about behaviorally, how to handle this.
Can I undo the damage done? Both of these cats are "mine" more than my roomie's and the intention originally was for me to take Ysa and Ms Friskers whenever we move into separate places. But are they going to ever be able to get along? Is there any way to let them figure out the cat hierarchy without scaring Ysa so badly?
Help, help, help, what do I do? I love my kitties so much, and it hurts me that they aren't getting along, and it's probably my fault.
