This post is half looking for advice and half venting, because this problem is beginning to grate on me.
My girlfriend and I have a Cornish rex named Lily, who is 6 years old. We originally lived in San Antonio, TX, but I got a job in San Francisco and we moved out here in December. When we moved into our new apartment, Lily began exhibiting signs of anxiety. She was obviously not very happy about the move. The place we moved to was smaller than where we were before, and San Francisco is much cooler than San Antonio. She was pacing around all the time, sporadically just running through the apartment, and letting out these very sad sounding meows. She also began to pee on the bed, a behavior she started exhibiting in the fall while my girlfriend was finishing up her student teaching.
We have taken Lily to the vet, and she does not have any physical problems that would be causing this. She does not have a urinary tract infection, and she has had a full blood panel that shows her kidneys are fine. We've been treating this as a behavioral problem, but things don't seem to be getting any better. Based on our vet's recommendation, we gave her an extra litter box, set up private places for her to go the bathroom, and we make sure her boxes are cleaned every day. This didn't stop the behavior, so the next step was to put her on Fluoxetine, which she's been on since April 4th.
This seemed to do the trick for awhile. This past Saturday, however, I noticed that she had peed on her cat bed, and also pooped outside the litter box. This afternoon she was sleeping under the covers on our bed, and when I pulled the covers off of her, I saw that she had peed under the covers and was sleeping right next to the urine stain. This seems like very odd behavior to me, since I thought cats didn't like to pee where they sleep.
We're basically at our wit's end. We thought she'd be able to adjust after living here for six months, and I really thought the Fluoxetine was working. She seemed much calmer and more at ease with her surroundings. With these latest two incidents, however, I don't know what to think. This time the cat pee actually got on the mattress; before, she'd only peed on top of the covers, and they'd soaked everything up before it got through. I've treated the mattress with Nature's Miracle, but if the smell doesn't come out we may need to get a new one (that we can't afford right now), which she'll probably just pee on again. The only thing I can think of is to completely shut her off from the bedroom, but when we try to keep her out at night she just meows and meows until we let her in.
I'm beginning to think that the only solution is to find Lily a new home, because it seems like she just isn't happy here. This isn't a very good solution, since we've really grown attached to her and she can be very sweet. My girlfriend is especially fond of her, and would probably not even considering giving her to someone else.
If anyone has dealt with a problem like this in the past and has any advice, I would appreciate it. We just want to figure out something that's best for us and the cat.
My girlfriend and I have a Cornish rex named Lily, who is 6 years old. We originally lived in San Antonio, TX, but I got a job in San Francisco and we moved out here in December. When we moved into our new apartment, Lily began exhibiting signs of anxiety. She was obviously not very happy about the move. The place we moved to was smaller than where we were before, and San Francisco is much cooler than San Antonio. She was pacing around all the time, sporadically just running through the apartment, and letting out these very sad sounding meows. She also began to pee on the bed, a behavior she started exhibiting in the fall while my girlfriend was finishing up her student teaching.
We have taken Lily to the vet, and she does not have any physical problems that would be causing this. She does not have a urinary tract infection, and she has had a full blood panel that shows her kidneys are fine. We've been treating this as a behavioral problem, but things don't seem to be getting any better. Based on our vet's recommendation, we gave her an extra litter box, set up private places for her to go the bathroom, and we make sure her boxes are cleaned every day. This didn't stop the behavior, so the next step was to put her on Fluoxetine, which she's been on since April 4th.
This seemed to do the trick for awhile. This past Saturday, however, I noticed that she had peed on her cat bed, and also pooped outside the litter box. This afternoon she was sleeping under the covers on our bed, and when I pulled the covers off of her, I saw that she had peed under the covers and was sleeping right next to the urine stain. This seems like very odd behavior to me, since I thought cats didn't like to pee where they sleep.
We're basically at our wit's end. We thought she'd be able to adjust after living here for six months, and I really thought the Fluoxetine was working. She seemed much calmer and more at ease with her surroundings. With these latest two incidents, however, I don't know what to think. This time the cat pee actually got on the mattress; before, she'd only peed on top of the covers, and they'd soaked everything up before it got through. I've treated the mattress with Nature's Miracle, but if the smell doesn't come out we may need to get a new one (that we can't afford right now), which she'll probably just pee on again. The only thing I can think of is to completely shut her off from the bedroom, but when we try to keep her out at night she just meows and meows until we let her in.
I'm beginning to think that the only solution is to find Lily a new home, because it seems like she just isn't happy here. This isn't a very good solution, since we've really grown attached to her and she can be very sweet. My girlfriend is especially fond of her, and would probably not even considering giving her to someone else.
If anyone has dealt with a problem like this in the past and has any advice, I would appreciate it. We just want to figure out something that's best for us and the cat.
