So Bagheera is a rescue. He was approximately a week old when he and seven siblings were brought into my vet's clinic where I happened to be with my dogs Loki and Kenya for our annual boosters and rabies vaccines. He was the runt and virtually unresponsive, mostly bald, and in severe need of some food when I saw him and decided to be a "foster" until he was old enough and healthy enough to adopt out.
I brought him home and bottle fed him for 12 weeks until he finally weaned off onto macaroni and cheese of all things with a bottle for liquids, then onto A & D canned kitten food, then onto moistened kitten food, and finally onto kitten crunchies. Admittedly the mac and cheese isn't the best food for a kitten, but my vet said that if he'll eat it, let him. Needless to say myself, my husband, and our kids got attached and kitty ended up a part of the family. Our children are 16 and 9 FYI, and complete animal lovers. We watched this palm sized runt grow into a long legged, healthy, furry!, active kitten.
At about 3 months we started to notice that he tended to be more aggressive than "normal" cats. He bit, he scratched, he freaked out, and he tore anything he could find up including a briefcase, two sofas, table cloths, throw pillows, comforters, towels, etc. He was a four pawed wrecking machine and viscious. He'd attack while you were sleeping, in the shower, walking across the floor, eating, and on the couch. We invested in "soft claws" and tried those out, but as destructive as he was, they stayed on maybe an hour before he was back to bare claws and tearing something up or climbing the walls in our home just to spite us.
At 5 months, we noticed he started having fixations on certain toys. Our dogs prefer stuffed animals to rubber toys in the house, and they have several of the long squeeky doggy toys you get at petco.... Well the cat latched onto them and started carrying them around and attacking them. He has toys all over the house, baskets of toys, the kitty condos, and everything else but he prefers the dog toys. So we let him play with them and even bought him his own for Christmas last year that he to this day carries around with him. However, the fixation on the toys did NOT stop the attack cat behavior and my husband finally said after being attacked one night in his sleep "Have him declawed or he has to go." So despite our intense dislike for declawing, we had Gheera neutered and declawed.
Now fast forward 7 months.... He's still just as aggressive as ever, only he's fixated his aggression towards me. He just LOVES strangers and my husband, children, and friends that don't like cats. He rubs between legs, lets people pet him, purrs and rolls over for belly rubs... But me? I'm his personal whipping girl. In the last 24 hours he's bitten me in the face, attacked me in the shower, latched onto my pants with his teeth and ridden across the floor, and jumped out of a decorative ficus to attempt to tear my eyes out with his teeth and he STILL climbs walls. The lack of claws hasn't fazed him in the least. He still tries to sharpen his claws, climbs walls, sneaks into baths and showers, and he still thinks he can do some serious damage with his front paws when he attacks. He's viscious.... yet not at other points. As I write this he's cuddled into my side on the sofa on his back allowing me to sit beside him while he sleeps and he sleeps with my husband and I. He's a cuddler when he thinks your aren't looking. Haha! He also loves baths and showers, and has been caught playing in his water bowl and moving his dishes across the room to draw attention to the fact his food bowl is empty. He's convinced it should always be full.
We've tried kitty pheromones in collar, spray, and plug-in variety, kitty valium, and kitty prozac... and none of it really helped much. The valium even made it worse for a while and has left us with a now skittish attack cat. We've never hit him, never tried spraying water at him, and overall we're a quiet and mostly calm family... We've also had him thoroughly vet checked and x-rayed to rule out a pain related behavior problem.
Any ideas what could be causing this hostility? He is a member of the family... We love him, but I could completely do without being attacked while trying to shave my legs in the shower. Any ideas would be appreciated!
I brought him home and bottle fed him for 12 weeks until he finally weaned off onto macaroni and cheese of all things with a bottle for liquids, then onto A & D canned kitten food, then onto moistened kitten food, and finally onto kitten crunchies. Admittedly the mac and cheese isn't the best food for a kitten, but my vet said that if he'll eat it, let him. Needless to say myself, my husband, and our kids got attached and kitty ended up a part of the family. Our children are 16 and 9 FYI, and complete animal lovers. We watched this palm sized runt grow into a long legged, healthy, furry!, active kitten.
At about 3 months we started to notice that he tended to be more aggressive than "normal" cats. He bit, he scratched, he freaked out, and he tore anything he could find up including a briefcase, two sofas, table cloths, throw pillows, comforters, towels, etc. He was a four pawed wrecking machine and viscious. He'd attack while you were sleeping, in the shower, walking across the floor, eating, and on the couch. We invested in "soft claws" and tried those out, but as destructive as he was, they stayed on maybe an hour before he was back to bare claws and tearing something up or climbing the walls in our home just to spite us.
At 5 months, we noticed he started having fixations on certain toys. Our dogs prefer stuffed animals to rubber toys in the house, and they have several of the long squeeky doggy toys you get at petco.... Well the cat latched onto them and started carrying them around and attacking them. He has toys all over the house, baskets of toys, the kitty condos, and everything else but he prefers the dog toys. So we let him play with them and even bought him his own for Christmas last year that he to this day carries around with him. However, the fixation on the toys did NOT stop the attack cat behavior and my husband finally said after being attacked one night in his sleep "Have him declawed or he has to go." So despite our intense dislike for declawing, we had Gheera neutered and declawed.
Now fast forward 7 months.... He's still just as aggressive as ever, only he's fixated his aggression towards me. He just LOVES strangers and my husband, children, and friends that don't like cats. He rubs between legs, lets people pet him, purrs and rolls over for belly rubs... But me? I'm his personal whipping girl. In the last 24 hours he's bitten me in the face, attacked me in the shower, latched onto my pants with his teeth and ridden across the floor, and jumped out of a decorative ficus to attempt to tear my eyes out with his teeth and he STILL climbs walls. The lack of claws hasn't fazed him in the least. He still tries to sharpen his claws, climbs walls, sneaks into baths and showers, and he still thinks he can do some serious damage with his front paws when he attacks. He's viscious.... yet not at other points. As I write this he's cuddled into my side on the sofa on his back allowing me to sit beside him while he sleeps and he sleeps with my husband and I. He's a cuddler when he thinks your aren't looking. Haha! He also loves baths and showers, and has been caught playing in his water bowl and moving his dishes across the room to draw attention to the fact his food bowl is empty. He's convinced it should always be full.
We've tried kitty pheromones in collar, spray, and plug-in variety, kitty valium, and kitty prozac... and none of it really helped much. The valium even made it worse for a while and has left us with a now skittish attack cat. We've never hit him, never tried spraying water at him, and overall we're a quiet and mostly calm family... We've also had him thoroughly vet checked and x-rayed to rule out a pain related behavior problem.
Any ideas what could be causing this hostility? He is a member of the family... We love him, but I could completely do without being attacked while trying to shave my legs in the shower. Any ideas would be appreciated!
. Hopefully someone here can give you some advice you can relate to.
