Ask the Vet With Dr. Kris: Dr. Kris Answers March’s questions
In February, we launched our new “Ask the Vet With Dr. Kris” segment. once a month, we’ll post a reminder for you to post your questions for Dr. Kris. He’ll answer as many of them as he can each month, and I’ll publish his answers in a subsequent post.
Dr. Kristopher Chandroo is a veterinarian, scientist, photographer, animal welfare advocate, and creator of stress to Success (STS): The vital guide to Medicating Your Feisty, Grumpy or Reluctant Cat. Dr. Kris wants your cats to be twenty years old. and counting! and he wants to provide medication and therapy to them in a way that respects the bond between cat and human.
Here are Dr. Kris’ answers to some of your questions asked in March. If your question didn’t get answered here, Dr. Kris will answer them on his own website, in the future. subscribe to his updates so you’ll be notified when the answers are published.
Cat defecating outside the litter box
My fiance wants to get rid of my 17 year old male cat Ruford because he has resorted to defecating by the door of his “man cave.” I have had Ruford for 12 years as I adjusted to life alone. The vet ran the whole gamut of tests when he had diarrhea, and everything was negative and normal. The conclusion was IBS, and he takes probiotics with his canned food treat at night. He drinks well and eats better now. He even plays more with the other 2 cats (female). He clings to me when I get home from work (especially if I am hurting), and stays with me. I love Ruford and am fighting to keep him despite his crapping at the man cave door. (He will sometimes use Bella’s puppy pads to poop, but he always only uses the litter box to pee.) Please help us! Ruford is special, and I want to keep him until it’s his time… (Julie Blaskie)
Dr. Kris:
Hi Julie!
Let’s talk about your cat. then about your fiancé.
We have 3 things to fix.
Many times our cats hide what is happening on the inside. They hide their problems.
They do things we don’t understand, and hide things all the time.
But not Ruford. He’s telling you what the problem is. He’s speaking in clear terms, and saying it very loud.
He pee’s in the box, but poops outside of it. but he’ll poop on the puppy pads.
How a cat pee’s in the box is different than how they poop in the box. The pressure on their back, hips, legs and feet are all different when they poop.
When you have a 17 years old cat, that pee’s in the box, but not poop, it’s typically because it hurts when they poop in the box. They are arthritic, and they avoid the litter box.
They don’t have to limp. They don’t have to howl or cry in pain. It doesn’t matter if they pooped in the box just fine before and now they don’t. It doesn’t matter if their X-rays look normal. They will still eat and drink and be arthritic. They can still have their normal personality and be arthritic or in pain. They can still poop in the box on their better days, but look to poop elsewhere on their bad days.
You didn’t mention what type of pain you have Julie, but you don’t have to. maybe it’s physical, maybe it’s something else. I don’t need to know which one.
But you know those days when you hurt?
Anyone with chronic pain knows what it’s like.
Other people might not have a clue based on how you look on the outside. but you know what you feel on the inside. and they have no idea what it takes just to keep going. just to stay functioning on the outside. When your inside is on fire.
So you gotta look into 3 things.
A) assess your cat for arthritis and treat it.
B) Reversing Litter Box Aversion (it’s what happens when they don’t like the box anymore).
C) help the fiancé.
What did we say about cats earlier? many times our cats hide what is happening on the inside. They hide their problems. They do things we don’t understand.
Well, us guys are the same.
“Get rid of the cat” could mean:
“I’m feeling disrespected that the cat is @#$# next to my favorite place in the house”.
“I always tell you that there is poop here but you don’t do anything about it”.
“I think he’s doing it for spite – the cat doesn’t like me and it’s my house too”
“I had a cat that did that once, and he had a bad disease or I couldn’t fix it myself so I don’t want to even go there”.
There isn’t anything wrong about feeling this way.
But these are emotional responses, and not technical responses.
So you could tell him that Ruford is arthritic and he has litter box aversion, but he might not respond to that. Those are just the technical reasons of why he is pooping outside the man cave.
But you could tell him about the people that don’t understand you when you are hurting. The world can be very unkind to people with chronic pain. “Why don’t you just get over it” people can say. “Just pull up your bootstraps and if you just try and have willpower you will get better”.
Doesn’t work that way, does it?
Ruford is the same. He can’t just pull up his bootstraps and make it better.nullnull