We took in a stray male cat last summer, so we've had him just over a year. He is fixed and UTD on shots and vet care. For the first few months he was here, he was pretty quiet. After a few months of steady meals and a warm bed, he filled out (he gained five pounds and his ribs still stick out; that should tell you how skinny he was when we found him). Once he settled in, he seemed to be gaining confidence. He started playing with his "brothers" and even walking around with his tail in the air once in a while.
Since then, something has happened to make him act in a very odd manner. He has used the litter box from day one, but I suddenly caught him peeing on the living room floor. I can tell he's still doing it; it smells like pee when you walk past a certain spot, and if you touch that part of the carpet with your hand, your hand ends up smelling like cat urine.
When I saw him pee on the floor, I made a vet appointment and took him in. The vet didn't find anything wrong, but she gave him steroid and antibiotic shots in case he had a UTI. She also had me give him a bag of treats designed to promote bladder health in cats. If anything, the vet visit made him worse. He's very sensitive to sounds (afraid of aluminum foil, shopping bags rattling together, plastic wrap being pulled off the roll, etc.), and the vet's office has a set of sleigh bells on the door to alert staff members when someone walks in. Every time the door opened or closed, the sleigh bells would clang, and he'd freak out more and more each time. The visit ended with three techs, all wearing metal-reinforced gloves, kneeling over him and trying to give him the shots as he yowled and foamed at the mouth.
I think he's traumatized by the vet visit, and he's not snapping out of it. I also can't figure out what made him start peeing on the floor out of the blue. Any ideas? We haven't changed food or litter brands since he came to live with us, so he's not upset about that. He gets along well with three of the other four cats; they pal around and take naps together. The fourth cat doesn't really get along with anyone, but he's always just ignored/tolerated her. We've been adding Cat Attract to the litter boxes to entice him to use them.
I haven't added anything to the room. In fact, I purchased some votive candles and then got rid of them because they were too strong for me. But that was after he started acting weird.
Yes, the other cats were here prior to his arrival. He never had any problems with them. He's not fighting with anyone now, either. He seems to really like three of the four other cats. He likes to drink running water from the tub faucet (he actually refuses to drink from a bowl), and two of the cats get in the tub with him, and they all take turns batting water droplets around. He also takes naps with the other boys.
I was going to say I think the 4th of July fireworks scared him half to death, but we were finding poop on the floor well before the 4th of July (poop, but no pee). Now it's pee but no poop. Not sure what happened, but we're moving into a new (rental) house next month, so I really need to work on curbing the behavior. We can't have him peeing in someone else's house.
I scrubbed the carpet with Nature's Miracle so he wouldn't want to keep peeing in the same spot, but it didn't discourage him from doing it as I had hoped. You need to really soak the area and let it dry thoroughly. Get yourself a black light pee-finder, too, and look for the yellow stains with it There may be more than one area you need to treat. You may have to treat it more than once, too. But you have to SOAK the area, not spray it, not dampen it. SOAK. Then let it dry, and remember the smell isn't gone until it's really dry; as it's working the smell can seem intensified; it isn't dry yet. Maybe you'll need to re-treat if you can still detect the odor.
It has worked for us, and we have an incontinent mastiff and had an incontinent elderly cat. Buy it by the gallon at Drs. Foster and Smith online, much cheaper than Petco or Petsmart.
There's a very good cat pee removal recipe online, just google it. Dawn dish detergent (regular one), baking soda, hydrogen peroxide. This works really well, too. I've done it when my mastiff had an accident on brand new carpet. Really worked, and that was A LOT of pee. Google it, it's super easy, just follow the instructions.
