Cat Problems at Home - Help?

[qwertyuiop123]

Hey, I adopted a cat from an adoption agency about a month ago. She's a white cat, and she's turning 1 year old at the end of April. She's a real sweet kitty most of the time, but she's been peeing on our beds too. It has happened about 6-8 times already, and its not only in one bed, but in two. At first we had no problem with her, and her previous foster parents said she enjoyed sleeping on the bed. So we've let her sleep on our beds with us at night, and one night in my room she ended up peeing there too! At first I thought it was because I kept the door closed so she couldn't access her kitty litter. And then a few nights later she does it again. And whenever I leave my room door open, she walks in just to pee. I tried keeping the door closed, but then one night we left her out of the two rooms she normally sleeps in. The next morning we open the door, and then she walks in to pee - this time on the OTHER bed. I've been thinking that maybe she's doing this because she's unhappy? It seems like "revenge" for not letting her sleep in rooms. But also, after she pees in a room, she goes to the next room the next night to pee. I think that's because she's also mad that we've been mad at her and hissed at her. We've been having this problem at home since, but sometimes she sleeps without peeing just fine.

Other notes:
Also, we have lots of pets at home including a collie, a guinea pig, and a budgie.
She knows where everything is; and normally spends the whole day upstairs where her kitty litter and food is.
I know disciplining her like a dog won't work because cats have different personalities. However, I have taken her to where she peed and grabbed her gruff (neck fur). I hissed a bit and gave her a hard pat on her butt. The next night she pees in the other room.
She is also neutered, and this was done when she was 6 months old, a few months before she arrived at my home.

I'm not any experienced cat owner, only a dog owner. Can I have some advice to fix this problem? I'm not so sure we can keep her if she's continuing to do this, but I also don't want her to be sent back.

[blazesong]

hmm maybe try to catch her in the act, my kitten peed in the (unused in 5 years) bath tub and i taped her on her nose (not hard but not to light) and said she was a bad kitten and she hasnt done it, cats respond more to nose taps then butt hits

has she been sprayed? it may be that ,i couldnt say since all my cats are desexed/sprayed befor the age of 8 months(most 6 but one was 8 cause of her size)

[MoonfallTheFox]

Keep her litterbox spotless, it sometimes helps, and a visit to the vet may be a good idea. Sometime, uti's can cause urination in unwanted areas. Also, if she did it once, she may smell the urine and do it again in the same place.

[qwertyuiop123]

Thanks guys for your tips :)

Yes, she has been neutered, so maybe she does have bladder problems. I'll try the nose tapping :)

Once she peed on the bed probably because her litter was quite icky, but now we change it very often and it is normally spotless all the time. :) So I guess its the smell. We sent one blanket to dry clean (the smell would have most likely disappeared), but she peed at the same spot again. As for my room, we just wash the blankets so it might be the smell.

However, will my cat have any sense of "revenge" on us?

[blazesong]

what are the blackets like? it may be them i know my cats love my blackets

it may just be you have to train her out of it

[qwertyuiop123]

The blankets you mean?

Mine are covered in colorful sheets and inside is just a huge pillow-like duvet (stuffing) of cotton. As for the other room, the duvet is made of feathers, but she pees in my room more than the other.

[bruises]

I know disciplining her like a dog won't work because cats have different personalities. However, I have taken her to where she peed and grabbed her gruff (neck fur). I hissed a bit and gave her a hard pat on her butt.

I don't understand why people believe it's still a good idea to rub the pets' noses into their accidents.

Your cat does not comprehend things the way a human does. You can not bring her to where she peed, long after she did so, and punish her for it then. What she understands out of that entire thing is that her human randomly smacks her. DO NOT TAP HER NOSE EITHER. Seriously. Physically punishing your cat (especially when it's totally out of the blue and random, as far as they experience things) is only likely to cause your cat to become anxious, fearful, and perhaps even aggressive. They won't make the connection "oh, I peed her two hours ago, that must be why I'm getting smacked".

In fact, your cat might be urinating in inappropriate places because she is anxious (cats do not deal well with changes, and getting rehomed can make them anxious), so any kind of physical punishment could worsen things.

What you need to make sure is to wash wherever she has peed extremely thoroughly. Use vinegar. You can even use vinegar when doing laundry (check some online sources for tips there). Vinegar is great for getting rid of even the slightest cat urine scent (because if it smells like cat urine, they will be more tempted to go there again).

You also need to make sure her litter box is always clean, and that it has a litter that she is comfortable using. There is also a rule of thumb concerning the number of litterboxes you should have; for every cat in the household, you should have one litterbox, plus one more. With one cat, you should preferably have two boxes. Both cleaned out daily, both placed in calm areas where she will be happy to go to.

As Moonfall mentioned, UTIs (urinary tract infections) can cause cats to pee in inappropriate places, so a vet visit could definitely be in order, and get her urine checked for crystals.

[eirath]

I have 3 beautiful kitties, 1 girl and 2 boys all of which were rescue cats and all neutered/spayed. I have only ever had the problem of them urinating on clothing/bedding/furniture once and that was when we had been on holiday to somewhere that had other pets and when we brought our washing home my cat could smell the scent of another animal and urinated to mark it's territory. We put it down to the scent of another animal and the fact that we had been gone from home for 7 days (although they had someone staying here with them) apart from that the only other time was when my furbaby boy had crystals in his urinary tract and he was more "dribbling" than peeing he had very little control over it, a visit to the vet sorted that out. Crystals can often occur in cats that do not drink enough and have more dry food than wet. It may be a territory thing, but if it continues after following the advice above regarding cleaning with vinegar etc I would definitely seek advice from a vet. Taking a cat back to a rehoming centre because it does not behave as you expect is really unfair the poor thing has probably been pushed from pillar to post enough as it is. My furbaby girl was taken back to the rehoming centre twice before we adopted her because she used to eat scraps from the bin, she had lived on the streets and brought up two litters of kittens and was used to foraging for food, it soon stopped when she realised that she was getting food regularly and we stopped putting kitchen scraps in the bin inside the house for a while. Perseverance is the key along with lots of love and attention

[MoonfallTheFox]

Yes, definitly wash with vinegar. Another idea, which is a pain in the butt, but may help, is to strip the beds down every day and cover the beds with plastic matriss covers. I doubt she will pee on the, but if she does you will have a sample of her urine for the vet and to check for crystals, and it will be simple to clean.

You could try, in your second box, changing the type of litter used. She may not like the texture, and your bed may have a better texture in her opinion, to pee on.

I'm not sure what you mean by revenge, what reason would she have? My cat will sulk and be angry at me for two or so days after I come home from vacations, she will sulk and hide if we move houses (scaring us to death! We thought she'd gotten outside!), and she knows how to make her opinions known. She's really funny about how dirty her litterbox is and if it's too dirty, she'll leave a little poo pile right in front of it.

[qwertyuiop123]

I know disciplining her like a dog won't work because cats have different personalities. However, I have taken her to where she peed and grabbed her gruff (neck fur). I hissed a bit and gave her a hard pat on her butt.

I don't understand why people believe it's still a good idea to rub the pets' noses into their accidents.

Your cat does not comprehend things the way a human does. You can not bring her to where she peed, long after she did so, and punish her for it then. What she understands out of that entire thing is that her human randomly smacks her. DO NOT TAP HER NOSE EITHER. Seriously. Physically punishing your cat (especially when it's totally out of the blue and random, as far as they experience things) is only likely to cause your cat to become anxious, fearful, and perhaps even aggressive. They won't make the connection "oh, I peed her two hours ago, that must be why I'm getting smacked".

In fact, your cat might be urinating in inappropriate places because she is anxious (cats do not deal well with changes, and getting rehomed can make them anxious), so any kind of physical punishment could worsen things.

What you need to make sure is to wash wherever she has peed extremely thoroughly. Use vinegar. You can even use vinegar when doing laundry (check some online sources for tips there). Vinegar is great for getting rid of even the slightest cat urine scent (because if it smells like cat urine, they will be more tempted to go there again).

With one cat, you should preferably have two boxes. Both cleaned out daily, both placed in calm areas where she will be happy to go to.

As Moonfall mentioned, UTIs (urinary tract infections) can cause cats to pee in inappropriate places, so a vet visit could definitely be in order, and get her urine checked for crystals.

For my experience with training dogs, potty-training them by letting them sniff their own pee puddle sort of helps. All my previous dogs were trained that way, and it didn't take ver long. However, we also fed them treats whenever they peed outside d:

Well I didn't slap her hours after. It was like a few minutes after and I had just realized. Anyway, when I make her smell the blankets her ears do slant/fold down like when a cat's scared. Is that saying something, no? Alright, she hasn't peed in any of the rooms for about 2 days now, so I haven't done anything physical or any nose-tapping either. And for the litter boxes, I'm sure that can be done easily, so I'll be on my way to get another soon :) I've mailed her previous foster parents to see if she had this problem before :) And yes, we should take her to the vet for a check-up. Thanks so much !

Crystals can often occur in cats that do not drink enough and have more dry food than wet. It may be a territory thing, but if it continues after following the advice above regarding cleaning with vinegar etc I would definitely seek advice from a vet. Taking a cat back to a rehoming centre because it does not behave as you expect is really unfair the poor thing has probably been pushed from pillar to post enough as it is. Perseverance is the key along with lots of love and attention :)

Thanks for your tips too! And about the vinegar, will there be a smell left on the blanket? And yes, I will be sure to give my little kitty lots of love :)

Yes, definitly wash with vinegar. Another idea, which is a pain in the butt, but may help, is to strip the beds down every day and cover the beds with plastic matriss covers. I doubt she will pee on the, but if she does you will have a sample of her urine for the vet and to check for crystals, and it will be simple to clean.

You could try, in your second box, changing the type of litter used. She may not like the texture, and your bed may have a better texture in her opinion, to pee on.

I'm not sure what you mean by revenge, what reason would she have? My cat will sulk and be angry at me for two or so days after I come home from vacations, she will sulk and hide if we move houses (scaring us to death! We thought she'd gotten outside!), and she knows how to make her opinions known. She's really funny about how dirty her litterbox is and if it's too dirty, she'll leave a little poo pile right in front of it.

Yeah, the plastic covering seems like a hassle! But the vet thing is a must I see. I'll be sure to take her down there.

I don't know, she's a very strange kitty. She enjoys sleeping on the bed at night, but she doesn't like to be cuddled. She meows really loud outside the bedroom door if we don't let her in. So maybe she's mad at us for not letting us in..? Or for "punishing" her from the last time she peed. I'm more of a dog person, but my mum enjoys cats as she had one when she was little.

Yeah, my cat is quite picky about litter boxes too. But however, her previous home used the same kitty litter as us, so that doesn't seem to be the problem. We scoop out the poo once or twice a day, so I'm sure its clean. Thank you so much !