I'm pissed off about being pissed on. (Cat help?)

In My Humble Opinion
1

We adopted a tom named Alex 2 years ago from the local humane society. He was 2 years old at the time and had a friendly personality. As the years went by, his personality really came out. He’s enormously friendly with everyone, even the kids, he plays fetch, he cuddles, and has a couple other cute personality tics (if he’s chasing a pesky fly and misses, he curses at it with a hiss). With the plusses, there was always a minus, he was never declawed and has pretty much destroyed a living room chair while completely ignoring the scratching post.

But, in the last year, we’ve had a problem. At first, it was just in a corner of the living room. His litter boxes were clean, so a quick spritz with Nature’s Miracle and we chalked it up to a mistake. A week or two later, he did again, in the same corner. And then a spritz. And then a week later, again in the corner and upstairs in the closet. Then on the floor. Then on a bed.Then on the chair. And the sofa on the porch. It was then we took him to the vet. She kept him overnight and we left with a prescription food and medicine that was supposed to calm him down because there may have been crystals in his urine. There was an incident or two afterwards, but it seemed to have subsided. But then we found more urine elsewhere and a couple poops. Sigh. Back to the vet who kept him overnight and didn’t find anything. She said to make sure that we use a blacklight to uncover all of the spots and spray them thoroughly.

We have been doing that. Unfortunately, it’s not only not working, it’s gotten worse. My SO and I left for a week and our oldest kid (16) stayed at home while the young’uns stayed at Grandma’s. The cat was taken good care of while we were gone, fetch was played, cat was petted, litter boxes were cleaned. And cat peed and pooped in everyone’s bed except oldest kid’s. Gross. The smell is horrible and seems to be everywhere too. I talked to another vet who gave us more of the prescription food and medicine to see if that would help and he’s been on it for the last week. This hasn’t stopped him.

This morning I felt him jump into bed beside me. It was 5:30am and he felt unusually warm. He then jumped out of bed about a minute later and I wiped the sleep from my eyes, I feared the worst. The part that had been warm was slowly getting colder. I touched my leg and hoped that was sweat. Nope. The cat has pissed on me.

I really love this cat. He’s awesome and I’ve been grudgingly ok with the furniture getting ruined for sharpening claws. But getting pissed on? Literally? I want to draw the line there. It seems that we’ve come to a dead end with the vets too as they’re not sure what else could be causing this. Any ideas?

2

Sounds like you’re doing all the right things.

Is he still a “tom”? Maybe neutering would help.

3

Our cat did the same thing.

He was a rescued outdoor cat. He became an indoor cat, who was only let out supervised. He want out more than that.

As he got more frustrated, he started pissing here and there once in a great while. Then, one morning, he got in bed with me. He KNEW I was awake because I stroked him and talked to him for a moment. He then backs his ass up and deliberately sprayed the top of my head.

He now goes out almost any time he pleases. He rarely leaves the yard, but he likes to get a few hours of savannah lounging time in apparently.

4

Our vet called the Humane Society where we bought him after the first visit to make sure that he was fixed and they had sent over the paperwork showing he was. My so has taken him into the vet again this morning. Now that I think About it, there was an outdoor cat that came up to the glass front door last night and chatted with our cat for a while. I wonder if that’s related somehow.

5

I love The Litterbox site for litterbox problems.

6

The SO just got back from a new vet. This one has confirmed two intact testicles. The question I have is, will a 4 year old cat change his behavior after being fixed?

7

  1. For the cleaning: vinegar is the only thing I’ve found that will really get the stank out. That and Nature’s Miracle.

  2. Looks like you solved why he’s still spraying. I’d still advocate hosing down the house with Feliway. It’s a hormone that gives them the happies and supposedly prevents them from spraying in locations where the hormone has been sprayed.

  3. My cat’s peeing was related to struvite crystals. He was on the Hill’s diet for a while but I’ve since switched him to Innova Evo (sometimes mixed in with Royal Canin SO) and there have been no more struvite episodes. I also invested in a fountain and I mix water into his wet food (and I switched off of friskies).

I’d say neuter him and see if it clears up, but in the meantime, try out the Feliway.

Also, not in relation to my cat…but one of the ones at my parents’ house. We also had vets tell us he was neutered, no he wasn’t, yes he was…I have a great vet here in California but I feel like it’s hard to find one who is competent. And they say it’s harder to get into vet school than medical school. What the hell? Did Vet 1 not notice his testicles?

8

And how mortifying for the cat! “My ballz, rite here, see um?”

Sadie still piddles occasionally – about once a day. The puppies for dummies book says don’t let your pup see you cleaning up after her. Don’t draw her attention to the mess. Cleaning up is what momma does, and pup will think piddling indoors is okay. Maybe the same reasoning applies to cats?

We mixed vinegar and water in a spray bottle and use that after cleanup. So far, she hasn’t piddled in the same place twice.

Baby animals are so much fun! :dubious:

9

The only time my cat ever started peeing in obviously incorrect places it was because he was in severe pain and had developed crystals in his urine. He almost died and required lots of emergency surgery. Take your cat in to the vet and have him checked out.

10

Another recommendation to take your cat to the vet. My old Buzzsaw peed the bed and after going to the vet, it turned out to be a bladder infection. Infections or a build up of crystals causes painful urination, so the cat tends to associate the litter box with pain.

So then they pee in inappropriate places.

11

Take him back to the humane society and have them pay for the neutering. If that doesn’t help let him go outside. When our cat was doing this it turned out he had a UTI.

12

One of our cats is a year old shelter cat (neutered), but has demonstrated the same sort of behaviour - every day or so peeing on clothing, the bed, baby gear etc. We got him checked out by the vet for a unrinary tract infection, but that came back negative. Our vet suggested that there were two angles we could then try - behavioural training and drugs.

We tried locking him away at night with a friend, lots of fussing etc - which fixed the peeing on our stuff, and just meant it was confined to where he was sleeping. We also tried the Feliway, with no success.

Drugwise, there are 2 drugs we were suggested - Buspar, described as Dutch Courage was prescribed to see if it could amp up his confidence - the theory being he was the smallest bunny in the house (we have 4), and was struggling to find his place in the food chain. A month of so of this didn’t fix the problem.

Then we tried Prozac (Fluoxidine), which is meant to settle down skitty cats. After about 2 weeks on this - so far fingers crossed! - we’ve had no episodes, and we’re starting to relax that we might have the problem sorted.

All in good time - the baby’s due in 8 weeks, and the constant peeing (from a cat who was otherwise lovable, friendly and fun to have around) was driving me crazy and I was beginning to wonder how I would cope.

Hope this helps!

13

Cat’s been to the vet – it was mentioned twice in the OP and again in post #6.

What did the vet say today, except that your cat still has his manhood?

14

Oh this is true-when I disclosed my cat’s peeing issues on my blog a couple of people wrote to me to say that even after they cleared up/confirmed lack of any urinary tract issues that the only thing that worked was prozac. However, I’d take the Feliway route first. Not sure if it’s all hoodoo, but they have several highly rated “tinctures” as well. I never had to go so far.

AuntiePam, I thought I was smoking crack with everyone being like “take him to a vet.” The OP got a second opinion. The testicles are still there so the inference is “non-neutered spraying issues”. The OP then asks whether the tom will continue to spray after neutering, implying he’s concerned it’s an immutable habit.

15

Oh. Good question! I searched “spraying after neutering” and found lots of comments from cat owners who neutered late (after it had become a habit), and the cats were still spraying. One comment was that this might happen if there were other cats in the home who were also spraying.

It sounds like neutering isn’t a cure-all for an adult cat, but it’s worth a try. That, and the prozac, and the Feliway.

If those things don’t work and Alex is still pissing all over everything and everyone, I’d confine him to an easy-to-clean space, or re-home him. We all love our cats but there are limits to what we should have to put up with.

16

So, the vet said that he ran a urinalysis and found no crystals in his urine but did see a higher amount of protein.

He said that neutering him wouldn’t change this behavior, but said to use an enzyme based product to clean up the areas.

The vet suggested that it could be behavior based and stated that we should put the cat in a room with litter box, food, and water for long stretches of time and that might “re-train” him to use the box. So, we’re gonna try that next.

We got Feliway and that didn’t work unfortunately.

One thing I didn’t mention was that there’s an outdoor cat in our neighborhood and Alex had an encountered with him last night (separated by a screen window).

17

The outdoor cat and your cat spraying are directly related, especially with your guy being intact. The peeing and pooping on the beds sounds like a comfort issue, cats don’t get “mad” at their people, but when the people do things like leave for extended periods of time, cats self-comfort by spreading their scent in places where their people usually are - chairs, couches and beds.

It sounds like your guy’s got more than one issue going on. Being intact is first, and the shelter should do the neuter for you. I’m mystified how a doctor could miss a couple of big ol’ grapes dangling back there. (and how can you stand the smell? Intact toms STINK!)

The other cat hanging around outside is not helping one bit. Do you know who he belongs too? If no one, trap him and off to the shelter. If someone, tell them if you catch him on your property you’ll trap him and take him to the shelter. If he’s not neutered, the shelter will make sure he is before releasing him to the owner.

There may be some ongoing, intermittent cystitis going on with his bladder, which could be related to history of crystals. Make sure he’s on a straightforward diet, consistently, all the time. Canned food is best for a guy like this, the more moisture and encouragement to drink the better.

Finally, he may not like how the litterboxes are arranged, he may not like the litter (have you changed it at all? Has it been the same type and brand the whole time?) Have you changed the actual boxes at all? Maybe he doesn’t like the new ones. Are they uncovered? Even cats that initially use covered boxes can become reluctant to use them.

That’s all I can come up with for now. The neutering actually may alleviate the problem, it depends on who you talk to. It will take at least 6 weeks for all hormone to dissipate from his body, don’t expect any changes for a couple of months. But the godawful SMELL will certainly make him a more compatible house pet.

Seriously, how can you stand the SMELL??

18

I thought the Human Society had a “neuter immediately” policy for all their adoptees.

Neuter him now, whether or not it will help his problem.

19

Just to give you some hope-- a lot of male cats come to our shelter as unneutered toms, and mos, if not all, of them stop spraying and settle down to use the litter box just fine, even after many years of being intact. I have adopted several male street cats and found that the majority of them did not spray. Have him neutered immediately, and when he comes home, be sure that you’ve removed every trace of the pee odor that you can. Cover the areas with aluminum foil if you have to, since cats apparently don’t like peeing on that for some reason. The chances are good that your cat will lose the urge to mark territory with urine once he’s neutered.

Good luck!

20

Urine is everything to a cat; the smell speaks volumes to them. We have multiple cats and have spraying problems, and it is the most difficult thing about cats in my experience.

I have been sprayed by several cats. Most of them have done it at times when they appeared to be the happiest, for example when we were being affectionate and everything I could think of was OK. The cat who has done it the most is a special favorite of mine (in spite of, not because of).

I did, though, have a cat spray my head in bed during his decline with chronic renal failure. This was a long decline that the vet failed to diagnose for the first several months, and he also exhibited odd urinary behavior where he would empty his bladder while I was holding him. Usually he would be on my shoulder or high on my chest, and his stream would go outward and wherever I aimed it by which way I faced, though a couple of times he was lower on me and the stream went on my clothes. He did this to a veterinary assistant, too.

Sometimes urinary behavior problems resolve when a vet finds an illness to fix, or when some other problem (such as a frightening dog becoming part of the cat’s world) gets resolved. But, if it’s always possible to fix this, it’s news to me.

Good luck!