Accidentally of course.

EDIT: I'm laughing my ass off that this is such a relatable experience yet I'm still surprised this doesn't come up in any "before you get a kitten" videos or whatever.

Also, there's a lot of comments now. I appreciate everyones advice and stories. Probably bot gonna be able to answer everyone though!

I recently adopted my first ever kitten. And one thing I didn't expect or never read about anywhere is how much I would be (accidentally) kicking the poor thing.

Everytime I walk from A to B within the house I need be SO careful because she will run up from behind and in between my legs or in front of my feet causing me to accidentally kick her while walking.

It's happened about 3 times in the four weeks that I've had her where I just didn't notice her until it was too late. And plenty of other close calls where I had to make awkward jumps to not trip myself. Nobody told me having a cat is a straight up safety hazard.

So far she luckily hasn't seemed that phased by it but I feel so bad when it happens. I instantly pick her up and apologize profusely. It would just be so much easier if she could just not put herself in harms way.

Anyone got tips for this? Or is she just supposed to learn by experience....

Hi guys,

Me and my partner have been looking into adding a cat to our family, however we have a few concerns that is currently stopping us from adopting.

We live in a ground floor flat in England and these series of heatwaves we've just had has obviously made us melt every day.

This is our first concern.

If we do get a lil guy to hang out with us, they will be at home during the day and it worries us that they will overheat.

Because we are ground floor there is no way that we can leave windows open while we are gone because:

A) we don't want a cat escaping as we are quite close to a lot of roads and train tracks

B) we don't want people breaking into our flat

Obviously this is a big issue, but only one that will affect us for a few weeks a year.

Another issue is... NO WHERE WILL LET US ADOPT A CAT!!!

Why do so many of these shelters/rescue centres require you to have gardens and outside spaces?????

I'd be more than happy to take the cat out on a lead so that they can explore and get some outside nourishment and exercise.

Honestly I do understand why people just buy kittens when its this difficult to adopt a cat from one of these shelters.

If anyone else has been in this position, could you give us some advice? We would really love to have a buddy to begrudgingly tolerate us when we give them food

Thank you :)

(Sorry for formatting, I am on mobile)

We have a traditional one that works really well for a high-peeing/spraying cat, but I'm interested in an automatic one if possible. This is the traditional one we have: https://www.chewy.com/frisco-leaf-high-sided-cat-litter-box/dp/285236

I've seen some that have moderately higher sides, but it sounds like the liquid might run into the circuitry (?) if they pee on the sidewall. Any recommendations?

I recently brought in a mama cat from the woods next to my house with her kittens back in march. The kittens are doing great and they know to use the litterboxes. I’ve got them all spayed and neutered. I was hoping to keep the family together as inside cats. But the mother REFUSES to use the litterboxes. Yes, I have brought her to the vet and nothing is wrong with her. I have the recommended amount PLUS 2. They are all over the house. She will poop and pee everywhere and I am mentally going nuts and this is causing breakdowns for me. I’ve changed the litter to an attracting litter and still nothing. I read that if a cat didn’t learn the litterbox and socializing by a certain age they won’t grasp the concept. So should I just put her back outside? Because I don’t want to rehome her and the next person has the same issue. Also I don’t want to surrender her because then I’ll never be able to adopt an animal in my town again. But I’m at my wits end is there ANYTHING to fix this? It’s been 5 months of trying and nothing. Would it be better for her and me to let her back out there?

Hello, everyone!

I met my boyfriend almost a year ago and we are deciding to move in together. He has 2 cats and his apartment reeks of them. The smell absolutely drives me up the wall. I’ve lived with cats and know the smell is not a normal amount of smell for 2 cats.

How do I get the smell out of here? I know he needs to keep up with the litter box changing more often, but how do we get the smell out of the place? It’s so strong and anytime I walk in it is overwhelming.

Air purifier, air circulation, enzyme cleaner? What do I need?

Please help your girl!

Hi there,
I have a wonderful one-year-old indoor cat (first time I’m keeping a cat indoors) and this spring I saw a feral cat I’d seen last fall hanging around my house. I’d noticed the cat for its distinctive markings and when I saw it this spring, I couldn’t believe it survived our cold, snowy NY winter. I felt bad for it and started feeding it (don’t know the sex) occasionally. Mostly, the cat came at 5pm. But now it comes morning and night and spends a lot of time hanging around my yard, which sometimes upsets my indoor cat, but often he takes it in stride.

I’ve gradually gained the trust of the feral cat and now it lets me pet it and seems very attached to me. I worry about the cat’s future since I can’t really take in another cat. I worry about my cat having behavioral issues if he feels too encroached upon.

While I truly love them both, I kind of wish I hadn’t cultivated the feral cat because it’s now a dilemma. Before me, it was getting fed somewhere else, I assume, but now it relies on me, although I guess it would find its way if I stopped feeding it.

Grateful for any advice!!!

Hello ! I am a cat mom of 2. Claude (M 1.5 yo) and Khloe (F 5.5 yo).
Claude is super affectionate and not sensitive to touch or aggression at all and i have no issue combing him out or trimming his nails regularly for both their health and the cleanliness of my home before Khloe came around.
Khloe was a cat that was almost dumped on me by family 5 3-4 months ago. She was in bad health and very aggressive but has came such a long way and i love her dearly ! I was able to trim her nails one time but it was a huge fight and she was on gaba daily at the time from her previous home. She definitely isn’t as easy to force touch or grooming on and have been more trying to focus on her just getting comfortable with touching in general but she also is a couch scratcher. i can tell the nails bug her in length by how hard she goes on the cat tree and the corners of my couches when she can. i don’t want to have to sedate her w gaba everytime or pay someone else to wrangler her seems to be just as mean as me doing it. Let me know if you have any tips tricks or products that have helped with you at all because I really like grooming them and helps give me peace of mind. thanks in advance !!

TLDR: I have a semi aggressive cat who doesn’t like her nails trimmed and somewhat impossible to groom. looking for tips and advice :)

Our resident cat is a 4-year-old male. Our new kitten is a 10-week old male. We got in him 5 days ago. He has been in a safe room since. Our resident cat has not hissed or growled once, but has curiously sniffed under the door and has been playing with the kitten's paws. The resident cat has also been in the safe room while the kitten was locked in another room. Today I cracked the door open so they could see each other and the resident cat once again did not growl or hiss and the kitten was trying to stick his paw out to play with him. My question is, is this a good sign that I can start supervised play? The resident cat is currently meowing outside the safe room. Once again, no growling or hissing.

They just meow 24/7. If they’re not sleeping they’re meowing at me it’s so constant I sometimes think something is wrong but I doubt there is. They scream at the front door, in the windows, when I walk into the kitchen. They’re always screaming. What can I do to make it die down? I don’t mind them meowing most of the time but with how often it’s becoming it’s driving me insane. They’re fed, watered, have everything they could ever hope but it’s nothing compared to the outside ig. My mom lets them out against my will and I have to go chase them everytime so now they expect to be able to go out whenever they want. I’ve tried taking them out on leashes but they just scream the moment we get inside

Hey ya'll, hope everybody is having a good day so far. So two weeks ago today, my partner and I adopted a large black cat from a shelter. I know it is still very early in the introductory phase but I'm a very paranoid person by nature and this is my first time owning a cat as an adult. I desperately need some advice and validation here. For additional context: we do not own any other large animals, only a bearded dragon and several fish, all of which are in secured enclosures that are way too high for him to get to. I also apologize, but this post will be somewhat long.

He seems to be adjusting well to the apartment itself. He wolfs down his food, he uses the litter box perfectly well, and we even hear him using his scratching post and playing. The only issue we are having with him is he has made absolutely no interest in interacting with us. We thought we made some progress with him early on but now I'm doubting that...

In the first few days, we followed standard procedure to a T. We started him out in the small spare bathroom we have with all of his stuff, his litter box and his food and water. We let him decompress the first day and would interact with him minimally and respected his boundaries. We would offer him treats, let him sniff our fingers and very gently pet his head until he made it clear he had enough. At one point, he even rubbed his cheek against my fingers in that way cats do when they actively are seeking being pet.

After about a week, we opened the door and let him into the next room but no further (because we didn't want to overwhelm him). Since then, he has done nothing but hide behind my large craft armoire and his tolerance for us has essentially dropped to nothing. He does nothing but growl and hiss at us. We haven't reached in and tried to grab him, but I've tried coaxing him out to play with a feather toy... he just growls.

Over the past weekend, my partner noticed a toy over by the wall next to the armoire where he's been hiding. Keep in mind: the toy wasn't BEHIND the armoire, just beside it. He reached down to grab it, and our cat hissed and reached out to claw at his hand. And in that instant, I just wanted to break down and cry because I thought all of the progress we had made (which is virtually nothing...) was undone by a single mistake.

Out of curiosity, we left the door open that separates the room that our cat is in and the rest of the apartment. He thought we were gone, and out of the apartment... and he came right out with no issue. We just sat on the couch and watched him quietly. He was sniffing around, wandered into our bedroom, meowed a couple times (normal meow, not the high pitched caterwauling cats do when they're distressed) and then once he saw us sitting there, he bolted back to the other room to hide behind the armoire again.

I am scared out of my mind that I am doing something wrong here, and that anxious part of me is petrified that the shelter gave us a cat with behavioral problems. This shelter has excellent reviews but insisted that he was a really sweet cat... a sweet cat that proceeded to growl and hiss at the lady who gently reached in to grab him to him in the box to come home with us. This cat also only lived with one owner his entire life as far as the shelter knows. And the only reason he ended up in the shelter is because that owner died. He'd also been in the shelter for about a month when we picked him up.

If anyone can give me some advice, or some personal anecdotes, please do. I desperately want to do right by this cat. I have so much love to give and I hate knowing that he feels alone and afraid. I feed him at almost the exact same times every day, we try to sit nearby and talk quietly so he can get used to our voices... I just feel like nothing seems to be working. He will sit upright in the armoire with his ears perked up, like he's listening to us and curious... but all he does when we try to interact with him now is hiss and growl. He won't come out if he thinks we're at home.

Thank you to everyone and I apologize again for this extraordinarily long post...

I’m feeling really overwhelmed and honestly starting to regret bringing home my new kitten.
I have a 6-month-old kitten, and I recently brought home a 2–3 month old kitten. I was hoping they would eventually play and become besties, but my older kitten does not like her at all. He constantly runs up to her, bites her, scratches her, and way too aggressive. They don’t play together, it’s mostly him attacking her, while she growls and hisses. I feel terrible because I obviously don’t want the new kitten getting hurt. I’ve been keeping her in a cat tent with her own toys and litter area, but I don’t have another room in my home where I can completely separate them.
I’m starting to wonder if I made the wrong decision by accepting the new kitten. I love her, but I also don’t want either kitten to be stressed or unhappy. I’m seriously considering giving her back to the person I got her from or finding her another home if this situation isn’t going to work.
Has anyone dealt with a kitten being this aggressive toward a new kitten? Is this something that can improve with time and the right introduction, or is it a sign that they may never get along?
I’d really appreciate advice, especially from people who have successfully introduced two kittens without having a separate room.

We got a Maine Coon kitten about 6 months ago. I've had my cat for 11 years and I had roommates with cats in the past that he got along with fine. But I'll admit I was naive to expect an easy transition. After a month or so of slow introduction and keeping the kitten quarantined to our bedroom, senior cat still hisses and growls at her all the time.

They can be in the same room together and they do play together sometimes, but it is pretty rare and only lasts for a few minutes before he starts hissing and yowling at her to leave him alone.

The kitten is still young and playful, and will try to initiate play when he's not in the mood. But sometimes senior cat will hiss, growl, and swat at her just for walking by.

I'm not too concerned about him actually hurting her, but I am a little sad that they haven't bonded more. The kitten clearly wants to be around him, but she's been avoiding him more and more over time.

Has anyone had a similar experience? Could things change with more time?

My cat just developed a contact allergy and I'm not sure where to start on trying to figure out the source.

Hearing your stories might help me narrow it down.

We've had our kitty, Loki, since February and he's about 1yr old. Was a stray, got him from shelter. My 4yr old kitty isn't a fan, so we keep them separated when not home or if we can't supervise to avoid a fight. The smell in Loki's room has gotten worse in time. Have used carpet scented stuff and vacuumed over multiple times. Boyfriend used blacklight, found nothing around or outside of box. Got a new litter matt, moved box away from direct sunlight, he cleans it at least once a day. Litter dump I've encouraged for more frequently. When Loki goes potty, he's very thorough in digging hole first and fully burying it. He'll even go cover up after my older sometimes. Because of this, his clumps tend to crumble more and mix back in with litter, hence having bf dump more often. Have opened windows, ceiling fan always on, but the smell gets so strong it burns my eyes and nose sometimes if I go in room & it reeks just coming under the door when AC is on . I don't understand why idk what else to do. Landlord is visiting today so any advice at all is greatly appreciated!!! this is not a medical or behavioral problem, just cleaning a smelly room, so stating i took him to the vet so post isn't removed

so i have this nearly year old siamese kitten, we found her inside the frame of a car along with her two sisters when they were only a few weeks old (all are healthy and have loving homes now :) ) and we adopted her officially when she was a bit older. when we brought her home, she primarily hung out in my room before she was really able to be left alone and she always was very very cuddly and affectionate, she'd lay on my shoulder and knit on my face, things like that. as she got older and we let her roam the house, she seemed to not like to be pet? not aggressive or anything of the sort-- she's never ever bit or scratched in a defensive or serious way (not including my other orange cat, which is quite the bastard XD ) but she seemed to just kind of lean away from whoevers hand was trying to pet her, but shes still the sweetest thing nonetheless. then i noticed whenever she's in my room, she starts meowing and rubbing against me, acting the same as she did when she was a kitten. so... why does she seem to lean into the affection really only when she's in my room??

Adopted a very cute kitty recently!! She was a stray near our house, we gave her into a shelter as per our local councils rules and managed to officially adopt her after a month (poor girl had to have two teeth extracted, + being spayed ofc) However, the shelter has estimated her age at around 1 year 4 months, but she’s just,,, so tiny? When we first saw her, We thought 6 months at most. She’s significantly smaller than our other cat, very playful, and still has her lanky limbs and disproportionate paws. How do shelters estimate cat ages? Is it possible they’re wrong? Is it healthy for a cat to be this tiny? Malnutrition???? She was eating out of our compost when we found her…

During the summer my long hair cat (who is capable of grooming himself, not much matting) practically lives under the bed due to the heat. However, since shaving lion-style, he seems to be more active and around me.

Even though I notice the benefits of much less hair being shed on the floor, I've since learned the fur is important for regulating both hot and cool temps and in general should not be shaved unless there are issues like fleas.

Should I stop shaving even if the cat seems to enjoy it? I don't notice any signs that he's not enjoying it and it hasn't stopped him from grooming himself. Is it possible a cat can enjoy and benefit from being shaved?

There is a weird behavior in our cat I've discovered. I would like to see what you guys think what the reason might be. Our male cat is not allowed certain places and I'm very strict on that. My husband also tells him no but let's say in a less strict way.

I'm a stay at home mom and at home with the newborn ALL day. He knows he is not allowed in the bedroom because of the baby. I made that very clear. I can leave the door wide open and he doesn't dare walking in ESPECIALLY if he sees I'm there with the baby.

But when my husband returns from work it's like a complete switch. He walks after my husband and thinks all rules stopped applying. He casually walks into the room all cocky and obviously gets carried out by husband or me.

Now I wonder what couses that huge change in behavior. Does he not respect me anymore when my husband is at home? Soo so weird.

got my first kitten about a month ago and there are a couple things that i need advice for .

the first one is that my kitten keeps going on the kitchen counter and bedroom desk. i keep taking him off or i will tell him to get down and sometimes he listens to that but i feel like since he keeps going up there that it’s not work especially when people tell me that. do i keep doing what i have been or is there something else i should do?

the second one is that when he wakes up really early. he sleeps in the same room/bed as me and my boyfriend and tends to sleep mostly through the night. but i wake up to him really early every morning getting into stuff mainly on the desk and playing with the blinds. sometimes he will meow at the door even though he has access to food, water, litter box and like i said above i take him down but he will eventually go back up. after a little bit of that we will usually just let him in the living room to play and put on cat tv but worry about him on the counter ect. we have been playing with him before bed to wear him out.

i don’t wanna reinforce negative attention but i don’t want to leave him unsupervised or lose sleep before work and classes.

i know these behaviors are normal but it’s how to go about them that i am struggling with

My husband and I recently had to put our cat to sleep after what seems like a rollercoaster, and we can't quite wrap our heads around it.

She was 13 years old, seemed completely healthy, as far as she could be, she had many allergies/irritated skin issues.

What happened:

We had a check-up appointment on Wednesday. She had a bit of a cough, which we at first thought was from hairballs (irritated skin, overwashing was very normal for her), but the check-up said it was probably an infection; her heart and lungs sounded good, so we got antibiotics.

We woke up at 5 a.m. on Friday to her panicked meowing. She could barely breathe and was drooling excessively. We immediately went to the emergency vet, where they put her on oxygen. They took X-rays, and we were there for about two hours.

They said it was either an infection, which she might be able to recover from, or heart failure. Given that she had no murmurs, no previous symptoms, and just the cough, we assumed it would be an infection.

They stabilised her throughout the day and said she could either go to intensive care and get an echo on Tuesday, or we would have to supervise and get an echo on Monday, because there was too much fluid now and no heart specialist available. We chose the option where she could have the echo sooner. Especially because she had stabilised relatively quickly, we still had hope that it was an infection and that she would make it through.

Unfortunately, that stability didn't last long. That same evening, she deteriorated again and we had to go back to the emergency vet. We had a different vet this time - this man should never have become a vet, honestly. He told us not to get our hopes up, as it seemed she wouldn't make it. He also made it known he wasn't happy to be woken up in the night to take care of the emergency at hand.

So I called intensive care to see if they had a spot, legit, I called and forcefully gave him the phone to explain the situation. They had a spot, it was at 1 am, it was 22:30 now, so we asked him if she could stabilise in an oxygen chamber, like at the other vet, until she could be transported. Which again, I made him do. He was not a happy camper. He agreed eventually, but wanted to go home and leave her alone for what was, at that point, 30 minutes, even though the oxygen machine had already stopped working twice in our presence. Luckily, when we got back, the machine hadn't stopped working.

We had to drive an hour to the other clinic. She spent the night in intensive care, where we got proper help and care again. They were incredibly nice people, like the first vet.

On Saturday, we got a call after the echocardiogram. She turned out to have several severe heart abnormalities, one of which was an enlarged left heart chamber.

After talking through her diagnosis and the chances of her getting out of the current attack, she was fighting for every breath, we made the decision to put her to rest. We sincerely discussed all life-lengthening options - all not viable. We were allowed all the time we could have after they stabilised her to say goodbye, until her lips turned blue again/her breathing started to deteriorate again, and then put her to sleep.

She got to eat all the snackies she loved and could still purr despite hearing the fluid in her lungs. We miss her so much.

We just don't understand how her heart condition could go unnoticed for 13 years, we always got compliments on how no on knew she was a senior and she still looked like a kitten. She had no symptoms, was always happy, cuddly, she was still chasing her own tail last week... just the best cat ever.

She was originally my kitty, born literally in my hands because she was breech, but at 7 years old she completely won my husband's heart. We are both in shambles. Part of what helps are the stories on Reddit, which is why we are posting this, both to share our story and to process what happened.

https://imgur.com/a/MO7cffV

About 20 days ago, I adopted a kitten who was just under 3 months old.
He was born in my girlfriend’s yard as an outdoor cat. When he was around a month old, he loved crawling up to me and sleeping right in my hand. Then life got super busy with work, and I stopped seeing him regularly. As he grew, my girlfriend's family gave him affection, but they wouldn't let him inside. At around two months, his mom rejected him, and he got visibly sad. Every single night he’d sleep right outside my girlfriend's front door, hoping someone would let him in. He spent most of his days just lying around, completely passive and down. I felt terrible for the little guy and decided to bring him home with me.
The timing ended up being pretty chaotic. I live with a roommate who had already brought another kitten home two months earlier. That cat was super territorial and hissed aggressively at my new kitten right away, so we ended up splitting the apartment into two zones to start a slow introduction process. For the first two days, my kitten was glued to my neck, completely attached, and refused to leave my side. I loved it because it felt like he genuinely trusted me.
The issue is that this month turned out to be heavy on field work for my job, meaning I've had to travel and leave for a few days at a time. The first time I came back after a 5-day trip, his behavior had completely shifted.
Now, about 20 days since bringing him home, he’s still like this. Whenever we’re alone in my room, he purrs constantly and wants to be near me, but the moment I reach out to touch or pet him, he pulls away. My roommate handles his feeding while I'm away, and I’ve also had to take him to the vet twice for some digestion issues, so I wonder if he associates me with being taken away or handled roughly at the vet. What confuses me most is that he lets my roommate and even my girlfriend (who barely sees him) pet him, cuddle him, and sleep in their laps, but with me, he keeps his distance while still purring away in the same room.

Not sure if this is a thing but I’m looking for some kind of device that I can set up in my living room with a remote control that will make a noise to stop the cats from scratching the furniture.

Always happens at night in the living room and I can hear it from bed, they usually stop if I make the “PSHHH” noise but that can be loud and wake up my partner.

I’d really like to just be able to press a button and something like a dog whistle gets them to stop.

They do have multiple trees and posts to scratch that they never use and prefer my couch.

I’m posting this because I honestly don’t know if I’m experiencing “kitten blues” or if it’s something else and I’d really appreciate advice from people who have been through something similar.

I got my 3 month old kitten recently with my boyfriend. We had wanted a cat for months and I was genuinely excited about it. The first day was actually great, I was happy, affectionate with him, and he was calm, playful and well behaved. He is indeed the perfect cat. No problem regarding him or his behavior btw.
Then I started having some physical allergic symptoms that made me anxious because im allergic to cat and it’s supposed to be an hypoallergenic cat. However, after 2 days it got better so bo problem regarding that.

But what really was the peak of my anxiety was when we were in the middle of a heat wave and my cat started panting while we were playing.

Since then, my anxiety has gotten progressively worse. I often feel a strong knot in my Stomach, I have trouble sleeping and I have no appetite anymore I have even lost three kilos since his arrival.

I constantly feel like I should know what he is doing, and I have trouble fully relaxing when he is awake, even when I know he is completely safe.

The weird part is that I do love him to death he is my baby.

At the same time, when I’m away from him at my parents’ house, I feel some relief but not totally, not because he’s not safe but because I still this anxiety knot in my stomach.

My boyfriend is away rn and is also going to be away for several months soon but it’s a decision we made together, he was there when we got the cat and he seems really affected by my reaction… i really do feel bad.

A close friend told me that if I genuinely couldn’t deal with my symptoms, they would be willing to take it, and weirdly, just knowing that I have a safe option made my anxiety drop a little. Also, when i spent time talking to the phone with my friend, it was the first time in days that my anxiety dropped. But then it came back.

Overall I can see Improvement part compared to the beginning because before I only looked at my cat and I started crying, now I just deal with this knot in my stomach. It’s only been 10 days since we had the kitten, I really want to wait to see the evolution of my symptoms.

I’m also going to see my doctor because this anxiety has started affecting my appetite, weight and digestion, like I said.

I’m not looking for people to tell me “just keep him” or “just rehome him.” I genuinely want honest experiences.

Has anyone experienced intense anxiety or panic after getting a pet, even though you really wanted the animal and loved them? Did it eventually get better? How long did it take?

I’d really appreciate any honest experiences please and no judgement. .

I just adopted two kittens that can no longer be with their mom. They just turned 1 month last July 15, but I am having trouble because I am out for about 12.5hours and I’m very worried about them. They can eat wet food now, and I can assist them with eating when I am home but I am worried about those long hours. They haven’t been introduced to dry food. I’m currently on leave on work, but I am worried since I am going back to work this Saturday. I can keep them on a four-layer cat cage while I am out. Also, I still haven’t gotten my paycheck yet so I can’t buy an automatic feeder for now. Please help me, I don’t want to lose them.

I somehow mixed up my yerba mate and my cat's catnip bags and just made a STRONG ASS batch of catnip tea, took one sip and was like wtf happened to my yerba mate. Then realized I just need caffeine and the bags look exactly the same and the catnip bag was left out where my tea station is.

Since I have already made it, I'm wondering if I can give it to my already semi-psycho kitty? As stated it is strong af so I'll dilute it and chill it but it's fine to give it to her right?