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- Feb 19, 2018
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A few months ago we took in an adult cat (about 6yo, neutered when he was an adult but well before we got him) who had been sort of an outdoor/stray cat most of his life. There's a thread about him in strays and ferals with more background.
He has adapted very well to being an indoor-only cat, and is quite attached to me. He's much less fearful than he was, but there are some behavioral issues that suggest to me that he's anxious, and I'm wondering if an SSRI would help. The two main issues, which are likely related, are 1) he appears fearful of our other three cats, and 2) he almost never leaves our upstairs, which is basically just our bedroom. We approached introductions very slowly, and we aren't seeing any concerning aggression, but it's pretty common for him to do a lot of posturing and sort of chase them off. We suspect that he was the odd man out when he was still a stray. He'd get chased off by other cats a lot of the time, often the last to eat, etc. So we suspect his behavior now is a way to maintain what has become his safe space: our bedroom.
We are seeing gradual progress. One of our other cats who used to sleep with us has started doing so again, but the new cat has moved back to sleeping under the bed in response. And the new cat only goes downstairs to the rest of our house when it's close to mealtime. And when he's down there he's very skittish.
Does this sound like something an SSRI might help with? We've tried gabapentin and it definitely chills him out, but it also makes him so sleepy and it's very temporary.
He has adapted very well to being an indoor-only cat, and is quite attached to me. He's much less fearful than he was, but there are some behavioral issues that suggest to me that he's anxious, and I'm wondering if an SSRI would help. The two main issues, which are likely related, are 1) he appears fearful of our other three cats, and 2) he almost never leaves our upstairs, which is basically just our bedroom. We approached introductions very slowly, and we aren't seeing any concerning aggression, but it's pretty common for him to do a lot of posturing and sort of chase them off. We suspect that he was the odd man out when he was still a stray. He'd get chased off by other cats a lot of the time, often the last to eat, etc. So we suspect his behavior now is a way to maintain what has become his safe space: our bedroom.
We are seeing gradual progress. One of our other cats who used to sleep with us has started doing so again, but the new cat has moved back to sleeping under the bed in response. And the new cat only goes downstairs to the rest of our house when it's close to mealtime. And when he's down there he's very skittish.
Does this sound like something an SSRI might help with? We've tried gabapentin and it definitely chills him out, but it also makes him so sleepy and it's very temporary.