I have had my cat for almost 5 years now. She was an abandoned kitten that had to be bottle fed from a week old. She was great the first year, but she always had some habits that we thought odd.

At first, it was cute to watch her chase her tail, but as she got older it progressively more violent. She will hiss and spit at it and act like she is trying to kill it and it has gotten to the point where I have to reach for the spray bottle to stop her when she does it because it puts up such a racket and a fuss that basically knocks the whole house on its side...

Next up, after about a year and a half of having her, she started getting more progressively violent. It has gotten to the point that I can be just laying her watching TV or something and she will just randomly attach me. She has a habit now of biting me rather hard (to the point of drawing blood) immediately after loving on me.

I have tried all sorts of different remedies for these issues, and she is in perfect health so says her vet. I just don't know how much more I can take of this violent behavior. She can be perfectly sweet and then change the very next second into a violent creature with no regard for anybody. I am currently typing this with four puncture wounds in my arm and several scratches from her attack a few minutes ago after her coming to ME and expecting attention that I gave. The second I stopped petting her because she seemed like she was feeling threatened, she bit me very hard and then just ran off.

I am very close to taking her in to have her put down since I can't take this pain anymore... As much as it hurts me to do that, I don't understand why she has always been so violent and why it has just seemed to steadily escalate as she has gotten older.

Any help or advice you can give would be greatly appreciated. I have enough scars from her and frankly I would rather avoid anymore.

I believe when a kitten is weaned to early from it's mother this can happen. The mother teaches the kittens lessons through suckling and weaning that we as human do not know how to teach them. Also consider the fact that your cat had no playmates to get rough back with her and that doubles the problem. Then you take into account that people put cats in the house and they have no interaction with other animals. They can hear them on the outside, moving around on their territory and can't defend it. This is why I think sometimes indoor cats are provoked to bite and scratch. We may not be ale to hear, see or smell the outside cats but you can count on it their sense's are strong enough to.
I have known 4 people to own cats that they bottle feed.
1. katie a beautiful siamese mix with blue eyes. She would attack anyone strange that came in the house. She was indoor only not spayed. This family's (my neighbors) solution was to let her have kittens. They let her out she became pregnant and had 3 kittens. Then they continued to keep her in all of the time again. After the kittens where severa months old she started attacking them. The family took her to a park close to some homes and let her out.
2. My niece took in a tiger striped male in when he was a little over a week old. He was an indoor cat. He really started getting aggressive at about 6 months. She finally had him neutered and it hewped him, but he was always feisty. She moved to the country and allowed him on the outside as they had a large place in the country. She said his behavior improved, afetr about a year he ended up missing and has never been found.
3. The lady across the street from me has a 16 year old cat that was bottle feed she is a handfull, she was initially kept in the house, but now they let her roam and she is so tiny but I see her bossing and slapping at the cats in her yard... she has 4 other cats that live with her, sometimes she will come to my yard and try to beat up my cats. (but not to often).
4. My husbands aunt has a cat indoor only, that if she hears or senses another cat outside she will attack the first thing that moves. She attacked my husbands mother and really did some damage to her leg and attacked his grandmother and tore up her hand pretty badly. The granny was in a hospital bed almost paralyzed,she had very little movement. So we wonder why she attacked her.
I have no concrete answers for you, but to let you know your not alone a lot of cats do this. I personaly let my cats be indoor/outdoor cats and make them come in at night or when I am going to be gone for more than a hour. We have cats galore on our street and most of them are indoor/outdoor and they manage to get along and stay off each others turff. Btw did the vet suggest any type of med for your cat to calm her, the aunt in my husbands family has her cat on something(she calls it kitty prozac) as well as he medicine for diabetes. Whatever route you choose to go remember you are only human and can only do so much. Good luck

I'm glad to know that I am not alone in this. I truly had a feeling that it was a bottle feeding thing...

Unfortunately I do have another cat in the home as well and he is absolutely loving so if she leaves, yes, it will hurt for a while, but he helps to heal all wounds fairly quickly.

I am also of the ilk that doesn't let their cats outside. I previously had a cat that was in indoor and outdoor cat and she contracted FIV which esclated to what the vet called "feline aids" and went downhill in a matter of about two weeks that left me with no option but to put her down. It truly killed me to have to watch this and after learning that it could have been contracted from stray cats (of which there are many around here), I have never let another cat outside...

I am going to have to weigh my options here. I have kind of felt this coming for a long while now and frankly I know it is going to make me sad but the detachment has been steadily growing with the violence getting worse and worse.

Thank you for at least letting me know that I'm not alone.

Your cat may have a health issue that is causing this change of behavior.Diabetes and kidney disease is common in cats,and it will cause a cats personality to change.Perhaps a blood screening should be the next thing you try,before having her put down.She may have a UTI which is easily treated and her attitude will be as good as new.Cats that start with a nice attitude usually will not regress unless there is an underlying problem.My cat had kidney disease and was quite freaky till we started her on a new diet and antibiotics.I saw a new cat when she began to feel better.

Well I have had her repeatedly seen and tested for a multitude of things by the vet and we haven't found a single thing wrong with her. She has also been getting progressively worse for literally YEARS now...

Try some catnip and Feliway spray and see if these products help adjust her attitude.Most cats act sweet and playful when these products are used in their environment.I hope it works.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by LdySaturn

I have had my cat for almost 5 years now. She was an abandoned kitten that had to be bottle fed from a week old. She was great the first year, but she always had some habits that we thought odd.

At first, it was cute to watch her chase her tail, but as she got older it progressively more violent. She will hiss and spit at it and act like she is trying to kill it and it has gotten to the point where I have to reach for the spray bottle to stop her when she does it because it puts up such a racket and a fuss that basically knocks the whole house on its side...

Next up, after about a year and a half of having her, she started getting more progressively violent. It has gotten to the point that I can be just laying her watching TV or something and she will just randomly attach me. She has a habit now of biting me rather hard (to the point of drawing blood) immediately after loving on me.

I have tried all sorts of different remedies for these issues, and she is in perfect health so says her vet. I just don't know how much more I can take of this violent behavior. She can be perfectly sweet and then change the very next second into a violent creature with no regard for anybody. I am currently typing this with four puncture wounds in my arm and several scratches from her attack a few minutes ago after her coming to ME and expecting attention that I gave. The second I stopped petting her because she seemed like she was feeling threatened, she bit me very hard and then just ran off.

I am very close to taking her in to have her put down since I can't take this pain anymore.... As much as it hurts me to do that, I don't understand why she has always been so violent and why it has just seemed to steadily escalate as she has gotten older.

Any help or advice you can give would be greatly appreciated. I have enough scars from her and frankly I would rather avoid anymore.

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This is really weird that I even CAME UPON THIS QUESTION because I am currently experiencing THE VERY SAME THING!

First off, after reading the other posts, "putting a cat down" for such a thing is not an option.

My cat has just turned 6 yrs old and is a short haired tan and white male cat who was also bottle fed by me since his C-section birth. He is the only survivor of 6 kittens. His mother Beltane could not deliver the kittens naturally as she was a rather small cat and has 6 kittens inside her! I did not realize there was a problem until the time came that she was ready to deliver and she was not delivering. I got her to the vet and after they took the kittens out, she died on the operating table. They brought her back to life with a shot of stimulant into her chest. She made a total recovery from being a very skinny cat, as it turned out to be after the kittens were out, to a nice full look. Eventually she ran away.

9 days after the c-section on the kitttens though, they all began to die. They appeared to be getting colds even though they were all well protected in their box. I separated the cat I felt the most closest to and intuitively knew only one would live. In fact, I heard "there will only be one" very faintly in my mind. An intuitive message. That's when I took him and separated him from the others.

One after another began to gasp for air and then died, and I quickly brought my cat Guide to the vet and the doctor checked him. The vet said he had "no water in his lungs but to be on the safe side I will give him an injection of antibiotics". The next day, he caught a cold! But he survived. What I remembered about him was that he was the BEST EATER out of all of them.

Unlike you, I have other cats and there's one cat (the cockiest and biggest one but also rather cowardly) that he despises and I have had to separate them.

He has always shown aggression to that cat, but never to me.

Until recently.. only recently he has begun to hiss and scratch me if I pet him too long. Many times he will be very loving and come to me and want to be petted and praised, then later when I reach out of my own accord, he's threatened and begins hissing and tries to bite me!

When I pass by and try to pet him while he's lying in his pet bed, he will try to bite me. Once I touched him as he lay sleeping, and he woke with a start, as though he has anxiety, and acted as though he was "on guard" against me! :(

This is very disturbing to me. I am hoping to get an appt tomorrow at the vet if I can.

I too would like to know what happened to my sweet, bottle fed kitten who was my "baby" and still is. He has always been such a good and loving cat to me, and now he's turning against me.

One rude male friend of mine only said this after I told him the story "thats why I like dogs better". I told him it had nothing to do w/ that and a dog would bite harder anyway!

Well I do hope to find out what it is, but I have found out based on some research that it can be a tooth problem or ear infection that would cause such a change in personality.

He's not lost his loving side, he's just had this ugly side added to his personality.

It also might be worms, have you thought of this? Let me know what you find out.

I find the our cats share similarities of having been bottle fed, and born near the same time. Mine was born right before the 911 event.

Hope to hear updates on your situation!! Thanks :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by LdySaturn

I have had my cat for almost 5 years now. She was an abandoned kitten that had to be bottle fed from a week old. She was great the first year, but she always had some habits that we thought odd.

At first, it was cute to watch her chase her tail, but as she got older it progressively more violent. She will hiss and spit at it and act like she is trying to kill it and it has gotten to the point where I have to reach for the spray bottle to stop her when she does it because it puts up such a racket and a fuss that basically knocks the whole house on its side...

Next up, after about a year and a half of having her, she started getting more progressively violent. It has gotten to the point that I can be just laying her watching TV or something and she will just randomly attach me. She has a habit now of biting me rather hard (to the point of drawing blood) immediately after loving on me.

I have tried all sorts of different remedies for these issues, and she is in perfect health so says her vet. I just don't know how much more I can take of this violent behavior. She can be perfectly sweet and then change the very next second into a violent creature with no regard for anybody. I am currently typing this with four puncture wounds in my arm and several scratches from her attack a few minutes ago after her coming to ME and expecting attention that I gave. The second I stopped petting her because she seemed like she was feeling threatened, she bit me very hard and then just ran off.

I am very close to taking her in to have her put down since I can't take this pain anymore.... As much as it hurts me to do that, I don't understand why she has always been so violent and why it has just seemed to steadily escalate as she has gotten older.

Any help or advice you can give would be greatly appreciated. I have enough scars from her and frankly I would rather avoid anymore.

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I had a cat like that once ( many years back) the only thing we did was to keep him well up to date on shots and give him plenty of outdoor time... that seemed to tire him out a bit and he was 'a little' less aggressive when he came back into the gouse.
I had a friend who adopted a cat like yours and she had to return him to the shelter because he was constantly attacking her legs.
You don't have to put your kitty down. Have you checked into surrendering him to a shelter?. just be sure to let the shelter know about his "lovely" personality' :)
Ann

I have already given my cat over to a shelter service for cats that are similar. I had no other option when she bit my daughter the next day and then a second time. I love my animals but my own offspring come first and I will be damned if I leave a cat in this house that is going to attack me let alone my daughter who was doing nothing at all to her but petting her.

The shelter I sent her to has a vet on call and they checked her out and indeed found nothing wrong with her. She agreed that it is most likely a neurological problem and that this is common in cats that are bottlefed. She informed me "mother cats don't abandon their litter for no reason, it is usually because they sense something wrong". She also agreed with me that the tail chases which she witnessed was most likely a nerve problem with nerves that may have never fully formed and are keeping my cat in pain. She has put her on some pain medication and "kitty prozac". I know in my heart that Sabbat is going to a better placed. Our other cat even seems even more loving now that she is gone since he senses that I have been sad.

Oh my, I had to give my cat up too! It was the hardest thing I ever had to do. My little guy also came to me as a young baby. So, I understand everything you guys are going through. I made this decision after he attacked my mother. My mother was attacked very badly around her face, legs and hands. She was sitting at the time, so he jumped right on her neck and began clawing. I love him, but what could I do? It was a very hard decision.

God Bless! Every last 1 of you!

WOW! IM HAVING TO SAME PROBLEM. THIS CAT OF OUrs is attaching me time and time again. If it wasn't for my blue jeans on I would have gotten it just like I got it the other day. I just gave this cat a nice gentle pet on the neck and head and he attacked me very hard on my leg and gave me one big puncture wound on the knee and three smaller ones. I had to go to the emergency room and get a shot and then get on something for the infection that started occurring the following couple of days later. I am reall why angry with the aniaml. This cat is my daughters and my husband and it has caused a split between our family. I want he gone and they want him to stay. He has ran at my older daughter before as he has me. I would say that you need to get something done about this animal right away. I'm hoping that my husband and smaller daughter will decide the right thing and have to taken off or put down one. He has been a bad kitty to my neighbors and over the years has put a bad taste in their mouth, cause of the times he has
Walked on their cars and put prints on them. They would love to see him go, I would say.

My dad is particularlly mad and my mother in law also says that the cat must go. He has also been urinating on my furniture everywhere for years and I just now have found out. I haven't seen him do it but caught him the other day and since then I've not let him in the house anymore.
He is 8 years old . He catches animals and eats them all the time. He flicks his tail at me and only me.
He acts like he hates me. This thing is causing severe problems in our marriage and has to be dealed with soon. Char