Hello -
I posted a couple of weeks ago re: my cat Festus who has shown escalating aggression toward people outside of the family since my daughter was born (2 1/2 yrs ago), and a couple of weeks ago he attacked me (hissing, scratching, yowling, biting - it was scary). Anyway, people on this board were so kind in their support and advice, so I wanted to post an update.
We took Festus to a behaviorist/vet yesterday, where he checked out ok physically, but the dr. acknowledged Fessie being "a ball of nerves." Long story short, the behaviorist gave some good ideas for helping to calm, etc. - almost all of them involve treats, so my husband joked that we're just going to get him so fat he won't be able to attack.
I'd be happy to share the list of tips with anyone who's interested, since I know there are other aggressive cats out there. Also, Festus received a prescription for Paxil, which the dr. said has about a 75% chance of calming him/getting rid of the attacks. It's that 25% that I'm still concerned about, though - the dr. was very kind, but did say that the unpredictability of Festus' attacks are a concern, and there is a chance that he could attack our daughter at some point out of fear (e.g., something scares him and our daughter is the first person he sees to "vent" on). Anyway, we're going to give everything a try and just take it a day at a time for now.
Thanks again to everyone for their support, and I look forward to visiting/contributing to the boards lots more in the future!
Noelle
I posted a couple of weeks ago re: my cat Festus who has shown escalating aggression toward people outside of the family since my daughter was born (2 1/2 yrs ago), and a couple of weeks ago he attacked me (hissing, scratching, yowling, biting - it was scary). Anyway, people on this board were so kind in their support and advice, so I wanted to post an update.
We took Festus to a behaviorist/vet yesterday, where he checked out ok physically, but the dr. acknowledged Fessie being "a ball of nerves." Long story short, the behaviorist gave some good ideas for helping to calm, etc. - almost all of them involve treats, so my husband joked that we're just going to get him so fat he won't be able to attack.
Thanks again to everyone for their support, and I look forward to visiting/contributing to the boards lots more in the future!
Noelle