Sudden mood changes in my cat

by Ashley

Hi, I was wondering if you could help me try to figure out whats wrong with my cat. All morning she has been acting as if something really scared her. She is being aggressive with the other cats. Even though they are not doing anything wrong, like just for walking past her. She keeps on hissing and growling at them. She is also being aggressive with me. But when my pet rabbit goes up to her, she calms down.

One of the cats peed on the basement stairs yesterday, we don't know for sure which one but we think it was her. We have caught her peeing where she is not supposed to before. I'm not sure if that would have anything to do with her sudden mood change or not, but I thought it would be a good idea to mention it.
If you could help me figure out what wrong with her that would be great, thanks!


Reply
Hi
I think the urination incident is probably connected. cats use this scent marking practice when they are feeling insecure or anxious. It serves two purposes , it tells others animals that this is her territory and it also hep her to calm down as if the environment smells of her everything must be ok.

Now there are two possibilities as to her sudden change in mood and behavior. Either something has upset her and made her afraid. cats react to fear aggressively. Or she is feeling unwell and this is making her anxious and fearful.

the trouble is working out which it is.

If she is still eating and drinking ok and does not appear to have any other symptoms of ill health then you can start with the fact that something may of upset her.

It could be something silly like a loud noise or a new scent in the area. The trouble is often we cannot identify the cause.

My advice would be to give her a couple of days to calm down, a sort of time out. This is done by keeping her in one room for a few days with her litter tray , toys an bed etc. This gives her less to be worried about so she is able to relax again.

If she remains the same after a few days then it may be worth having her checked over by a vet to make sure that there is no physical illness which could be causing her anxiety.

If she gets the all clear then, you could tray a few more days using the litter training method or you could tray some of the cat calming treatments available.

i will give you a couple of links to pages about the confinement method and also one about anxious cats.

https://www.our-happy-cat.com/cat-litter-box.html

scared-cat.html

best wishes kate

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Same thing
by: Anonymous

Not sure when this was posted or if this is an active community or not.

But I literally had the same thing. Want out of town for the weekend, and literally came home to an entirely different cat. Completely aggressive, peeing and popping even at mere attempt of just getting close to her sometimes as bad as just the mere looking in her direction. She always been a left alone cat but would at least hang out and be on the coach with me. Just a total spaz and happened what seems like overnight for me. Because she been peeing pooping so much, I finally had to house her off in the spare bathroom we have, and setup a cat box and food there, and she been relatively content sense. But she literally living there for 3 weeks now and has no intent getting out, even if i leave the gate open.

After a vet visit it turned out part of it is possibly due to the pancreatitis reading being high. Got her on new cat food, and did a few rounds of medicine the vet provided, but still not really seeing any improvement in the aggressiveness. She will sometime be chill enough when I go to the bathroom, talk and meow, and allow petting, but then other times the sightless movement will make her go 0 to 10 spaz. Not sure the Pancreatitis medicine doing that much or new food. Has anybody else experience this before? Any guidance?
Mood Change
by: Nick

I have a five year old female cat who has always been a little anxious but has recently become very reclusive and seemingly depressed (for want of a better word). This has been going on for several weeks now. If there is no improvement this weekend, I will take her to the vet. The problem with visits to the vet is that it traumatizes her. It can take her days to recover from a vet visit which starts off with vomiting, hiding and not eating. Whenever I take her to the vet I give her a small dosage of Alprazolam which seems to take the edge off her anxiety. She has always slept on the bed with me which she no longer does. She wont even go into the master bedroom. It breaks my heart to see her like this. It was her 5th birthday today. I tried to give her treats but she wasn't interested. Her appetite, stools and urination all appear normal but I notice she is shedding a lot of hair. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!

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