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Tidus
Tedious,- Tenacious,- Tyrannical- Tidus. |
 | | Purred: Sun Oct 25, '09 8:18pm PST | |  | |  | | Thanks much for the invite Mr D.
So, the basics:
Tidus, neutered male. 7 years old.
Past food: Indoor formula dry
Current food: Friskies Special Diet ph balance canned & raw diet chicken
Litter box: XL Hooded
Litter Brand: Feline Pine Clumping
Cleaning Solution: Nature's Miracle
First a bit of backstory: Tidus was neutered at around 4-5 months old. Never had ANY issues with him until he was 2-3 years old. He's been having litterbox issues since around 2004-2005 which was initially chalked up to territorial marking by my parents. Up until 2004, Tidus had been the only cat in the family for the first two years of his life. But then in 2004, my family had fostered some momma kitties and 2 litters of mostly male kittens (coming out to a total of 12 other cats over the course of two years). Three male kittens from the last foster litter of 2005 ended up with us for nearly a year before two of them were adopted, and my parents ended up letting my younger sister keep the remaining third, another male, who has grown up to be quite a bully and does NOT get along with Tidus whatsoever.
Up until this year, Tidus was totally under my parent's care for everything as I had been in college from 2006 until this past spring. He was indoor/outdoor for them, but ever since I graduated college and took over, he's been indoor only since about March of this year. I was moved out of the home for a short while, but now I'm back at home due to financial issues. Since being out of school and around him more often, I noticed he had seemed to be filling up the litter box frequently when he was using it, but was also going elsewhere and it smelled REALLY foul. And while I knew these were all red flags for something internal going wrong, my post-college unemployment was keeping me from seeking immediate vet consultation and I was slowly accumulating funds. In September, I was finally able to get him in, and they diagnosed him with a bladder infection. He was put on Clavamox for 10 days, I wasn't advised to change his diet (he had been strictly dry food at that point, because in 2003, he came down with feline acne and the vet told us back then that wet food's moisture would exacerbate it) but after researching online, I switched him to Friskies Special Diet for ph balance with extra water mixed in, as well as working toward switching to a raw food diet. He had one instance in September where they thought he might have become blocked (lots of straining in the box with little output for two days, one day with partial bloody urine), but what blockage there was eventually passed and he's had no issues since as far as straining goes. His urine is also not foul smelling anymore.
But now he just seems to be wanting to avoid his litterbox altogether when it comes to urinating. He'll defecate in it no problems. Never had an issue there. But it's a challenge to get him to pee in the right spot. He checked up fine at the follow up appointment and as far as we can tell, he's over the FLUTD, just peeing in improper spots as though he might be associating the box with the pain from straining, or painful urination. I bought him a brand new litter box to see if he'd be more open to it, but when he DOES use it, he'd squat, then goes to a standing position and it hits the walls around the box. OR, he'd just pee vertically on the outside of the box. So I switched him to a deeper, hooded litter box which combats this somewhat inside, but he still keeps going elsewhere around the house. His favorite spots? Closet doors in all bedrooms and our hallway, walls inside the closets, clothing on the floor, wooden bookshelves (specifically on the books), cabinets made of wood or with glass panels, plastic dvd and video game cases, my wooden dresser, the painted wood aquarium stand in my room, even kitchen cabinets and sliding glass doors. Recently it just seems like nothing is off limits to him anymore, so I've been keeping him confined to my bedroom where he can't pee on other things in the house and is separated from the other cat in the house incase it's stressing him out. But he's still peeing on stuff. And right in front of me. He just backed up to my wall a few minutes ago while I was typing this. I have noticed that he also does it when he's in a frisky mood and playing with me. He'll be running around and jumping all over stuff, diving at his scratching post and then darting away...then suddenly he stops at a wall, furniture, etc and just urinates on it and then resumes darting around. Other times he'll just be walking around the room, then I'll hear him kinda meow a few times before he backs up to something. Then sometimes I'll just see him walking around as though he's just being curious about things and then by the time I notice he's going to hit it, it's too late. I'm wondering if this means that it's still hurting him to urinate because he still has crystals, or is it something else?
Do you suppose this is still related to the FLUTD, marking, a combination of the two? Could my vet be wrong that he's over it and I need a second opinion? I'm just going crazy about it. Somebody told me I might have to look into keeping him confined to a large dog crate with his litterbox during the times I can't watch him closely to retrain him proper box manners. Or that I might end up needing anti-anxiety meds for him.
Whatever the case, the situation stinks. Quite literally. |  |  | |  |
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Odie- ♥- ♥
BEAR'S LADY!- FUREVER!
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 | | Purred: Wed Oct 28, '09 12:28pm PST | | | | | | My brother George is doing the same thing. He has cystitis, a bladder condition that is not treatable by antibiotics, so it may never go away. Before he had this, he never went outside the box, now it is daily.
I would get a urine sample in to the vet, for peace of mind, so that you know whether he has stones, crystals, cystitis, something else, or if he is just fine.
It sounds like you've done all of the right things; we wish you the best of luck as we know how frustrating this can be.
Oh - Nature's Miracle is the BEST cleaner for stinky kitty pee, too.  | | | | |
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Oreo
Wild man
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| | Purred: Sat Nov 7, '09 4:34pm PST | | | | | | well approx. $4000 later and we're in the same boat...except Oreo has come to like a few certain places he's peeing.....he never did this before..has PU surgery on Oct. 5th and now this...........we have suspected cystitis.....he's been on pain meds for that and even was isolated....thinking he was stressed and needed time away from the other kitties...
now what? uggh..............I wish I had some answers....I am lost too.. | | | | |
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But I do enjoy watching her scoot around the floor on her hands and knees sniffing everywhere. 
Hee hee it's a great time to go and head butt her and stick my bum in her face.
