I’m taking Fred (yes, it’s a she) to get snipped this Friday. Do female cats undergo any major personality changes after they’ve been fixed?
I hope not, She’s nuts (in a good way) and I’d like her to stay this way, but I don’t want her to continue suffering being in heat.
My cat was pretty hyper before she was fixed. Toe biting, climbing on bookcases and knocking things onto the floor, yakking everywhere, tearing up papers, etc. She’s now a mellow girl, but still fun. She went from a little hairball of a monster into a pleasant and loving companion. She still has tons of personality, it’s just not the kind that requires clean-up.
Hanna Banana was spayed at five months of age, she is almost two years now. She is still a little spaz cat, maybe a little mellower. She has a great personality and loves to snuggle and be near me. I would say her personality has changed a little, but I think that is more to her maturing rather than the spay.
Mud (aka HyperKitty aka Purr Monster aka Your Majesty aka Dammitcat) still has all of her personalities and mood since she was spayed 5 years (or more?) ago. She was whining, yowling, and tearing about the house a a microsecond’s notice. After she was fixed, she now makes a weird gurgle while tearing about the house, is still prone to pouncing up on a mid-maid bed (she will leap onto the bed when the top sheet is put on, but before the comforter is put on - does a weird little spin like she is looking over her shoulder, then takes off down the hall again). In effect, still the active, lovable moody kitty she ever was.
Let me warn you, though. When we took her in to the vet’s, she did a lot of screaming, bit the vet, required four shots to finally sedate her, pissed all over herself when they (five people at once) tried to put her back in the cage, and it was four days before she would even look at us. But she eventually forgave us, and everything is back to (somewhat) normal [‘somewhat’, meaning she is again tearing about the house, flinging a clip-on ALF character in a game of feline hockey.
My two bad asses were pretty much the same.
The only difference was that they quit trying to sneak out the door.
Best thing for them…I couldn’t stand to see them wallowing on the ground like that.
It was pretty embarrassing when I had company over.
“What’s wrong with your cat?”
“Umm…….” :o
I’ve had many cats over the years and had them all spayed. I really didn’t notice any marked change in any of their personalities afterward.
None of my six girls changed so that I could notice. Neither did my male, Larry. Ditto with my dog, Nalle. Yes, I have seven cats and a dog., and love them all. So does my wife. We have no other children 
She got a bit meaner, but that might have just been natural progression. She wasn’t very nice to begin with.
I’ll never forget the angry little ball of orange and white fur curled up in the middle of my mother’s bed after it was done. When anyone would speak to her, her tail would lash. Her eyes stayed closed, her body didn’t move…all of her irritation was concentrated in that tail, and it was the only part of her that would dignify us with a response.
[QUOTE=Mr. Blue Sky]
Do female cats undergo any major personality changes after they’ve been fixed?
QUOTE]
No. That’s a misconception fostered by the fact that optimal spaying time is about the same time most cats are starting to outgrow their kitten rambunctiousness and develop their adult personalities. Fred might get calmer and less playful in the months following her spay, but that’s a function of age, not hormones.
Over the years, I’ve had a few female cats, and spayed them all. The only personality change that I noticed was a decrease in heat behavior. My current cat, Sapphire, STILL will present her rear end to my husband, but she’s not as aggressive about it since she got spayed. And, of course, she rarely calls any longer. Whew!
My calico was a grouchy wench (I mean that in the best way possible) from Day One, so I saw no real changes in that respect. However, she did pork out enormously and now has a fat, swinging belly. IANA vet, but it seems to me that spaying leads to plumpness in female cats. She’s now on a major diet, which she is hating. YMMV, but once your cat makes the transition from kitten to full-grown, be sure you adjust your food type and serving sizes accordingly.
Mine didn’t change a bit. And she didn’t get any bigger either-well, once she was full grown anyway. I’ve also never had a male suddenly gain weight after neutering. I’ve never believed that part of the whole affair-seems based only on anecdotal evidence.
No, Ruby, spaying doesn’t lead to plumpness. Overfeeding leads to plumpness. Just like humans, cats tend to have a slowdown of metabolism as they go from adolescence to adulthood (the 8 months to a year point), and you have to reduce food intake accordingly or they’ll get fat. Six months to a year is the most common age for cats to be spayed, so what tends to happen is the cat gets spayed shortly before its metabolism slows down, the calorie intake doesn’t get cut accordingly, and the resultant weight gain is blamed on the spay instead of on the owner.
Oh, and there is one way that spaying can affect your cat’s personality, but the changes are temporary. If your cat is spayed while pregnant or in heat, the resulting sudden hormone changes can make them really temperamental for a couple of days to a week. Eponine turned out to be about 5 or 6 weeks pregnant when we spayed her (risk you take adopting a stray female), and she was massively pissy for a few days afterward, but then reverted to her normal self. She still has her moments of massive pissiness, but that’s just part of her personality.
I’ve only had 2 female cats. With the first one, not only did she not have a personality change, she stayed in heat constantly! Before I had her spayed, she got pregnant twice a year.
The second one had a major personality change. She actually had a hysterectomy instead of a spaying because of problems with her uterus after her first heat. Afterward she acted more like a male.
Spaying is a hysterectomy. An ovariohysterectomy, to be precise. The ovaries are removed to keep them from going into heat and to reduce their chances of mammary tumors (a tumor in one gland can rapidly metastisize all through the chain, and that can get ugly fast), and the uterus is removed to prevent the possibility of pregnancy, cancer, or pyometra (potentially deadly uterine infection, very expensive to treat). Sometimes cats can have a bit of ectopic ovarian tissue that gets missed and still pumps out the hormones and sends them into heat, but that’s very rare. Cats can also get what we call “stump pyo”, where the uterine stump gets infected like a pyometra, but again, that’s very rare.
Oh my goodness, did my cats settle down when I got them spayed! Both my girls (one now lives with my parents, one with me as I… inherited my SO’s 4 and one of mine did not Play Well With Others) had had a litter when I adopted them from the shelter, so I had to wait a few weeks to get them spayed.
What a couple weeks.
I had male toms HANGING ON MY SCREENS trying to get to my girls. They were in heat constantly. Yowling crying loud no sleep at night for me heat. They’d fight each other, to the point where I was afraid to leave them alone. Every single night I’d wake up to screaming fits of them throwing themselves at the screen trying to get to the male cat, and fighting each other for the toms.
It didn’t so much change their personality as settle them down a bit. No more constant heat/screaming fights. They’re still nuts but are a bit more manageably nuts.
She was pretty young still, she was sooo playful and loving. She would sleep on my face at night and always want to play - but she was never annoying about it. She just barely started going into heat when we got her fixed and she was never the same. Immediately she became angry and cold after that. Never wanted to play or be held or act cute like she used to. She’s about 11 now. She’s nice but she never was that playful and loving baby she once was.
My foster kittens were all spayed at 3 months, when I returned them to the shelter. And all my adopted females came spayed by the shelter. (I guess I got some males before I started working through shelters.)
Cats personalities change a lot as they mature anyway, so it’s awfully hard to say.
I have always left dry food available for my cats to eat at will. And I’ve never had a plump cat. I suspect most cases of cats getting overweight has to do with them not getting exercise.
All my cats have either had companion cats in the home, or been outdoor cats, so they didn’t depend on humans with jobs to keep them entertained.