Expert: Ali - 2/24/2010

Question
Hi,
We got a cat two weeks ago from a rescue center where she got spayed, got all her shots and a vet checked so I can say that she is pretty healthy. They informed us that she is 7 months old and was a feral when she was found. When we brought her home-we have no other pets- she seemed relaxed but she would not let us go close to her except in the mornings when she needs food. As soon as she gets her food she runs and hides under the chair. She hissed and scratched us a few times either trying to give her food or play with her. I try to talk to her a lot and play with her at least an hour everyday. My question is  why does she lets us sit beside her and pet her at night and run away every time we walk by her at other times? Will she ever get used to us or stop hissing at us? And what can we do to expedite this process?

Thank you very much for your time!

Answer
Isil,

The short answer to your question is that there really isn't a way to expedite the process of getting this kitty (or any other cat/kitten for that matter regardless of whether they're stray, feral or well socialized owned kitties changing homes.) to fully trust you and be completely comfortable with you. There is a possibility that your kitten was stray rather than feral, all too often people use the two terms interchangeably when they in fact mean two very different things. A stray cat is a cat who was born into a home, socialized and cared for at some point by people while feral cats are generally the result of people tossing owned cats out to fend for themselves. Kittens that result have not been socialized with people so they are naturally afraid of us - after all as far as they're concerned we're just big, loud predators that might hurt them, they haven't had a reason to trust us.

Normally the socialization process for kittens is quite complex, it begins shortly after kittens come into this world and lasts until the kittens are 12-16 weeks of age. Initially kittens born into a home environment start their lives with very few senses to learn about their environment because they are born blind, deaf and unable to move around much beyond crawling short distances. Kittens that are properly socialized from birth by their human caregivers begin their socialization process by smelling their human caregivers on their mother's coat and being handled very gently by their human guardians a few times for short periods of time each day. As kittens get older their other senses start to function gradually, first they begin to hear our voices and shortly after that their eyes open and they get their first blurry glimpses of the world around them which includes seeing their human caregivers interact with their mother and siblings as well as being able to feel our touch and smell our unique scents. As kittens grow bigger, stronger and a bit more mobile they begin to explore their world through playing with their mother, siblings and their human caregivers. It's important to understand that a kitten's temperament and the way they interact with the world around them is also influenced by the genes passed along by both of their parents, for example, if this kitten's mother was very nervous around people it's possible that the kitten learned to be fearful and anxious around people by watching her mother's behavior.

Just like people some cats need the time to get to know you before they trust you completely. For a kitten who was born feral and socialized to live with people there's a good chance that she will take longer to trust you than your average house cat simply because there are way too many people out there who are inadvertantly cruel to stray/feral cats just because they don't want to take responsibility for their care, unfortunately there are also many people out there who derive some sort of pleasure from hurting animals and an abused kitty is much more likely to strike out defensively when s/he's afraid. When a cat's early life has taught them to be wary around people it can sometimes take them a bit more time to warm up to human caregivers, especially those that a particular cat doesn't know well. With a fearful kitty like you've described there are a few things that you can do to make her feel more comfortable and safe in your home. You can try a homeopathic remedy called Bach's Rescue Remedy which is a blend of 5 flower essences designed to calm and reassure. In your case the best way to administer this remedy would be to add 7-10 drops of the remedy to a clean bowl filled with fresh water each morning until you begin to see some improvement in her anxiety levels. Rescue Remedy can be purchased at most health food stores and you can also buy it online as far as I know.

Beyond the use of Rescue Remedy the first major step you need to take to help this kitty is to provide her with a small, safe room of her own where she can be isolated physically from the household's people and pets by a closed door. With a fearful kitty it's a good idea to provide him/her with a few places to hide - in my experience cardboard boxes that can be closed on all four sides are great, all you have to do is cut a door into them, line the bottom with a small towel and place them in different areas in your kitty's safe room. Many fearful cats aren't above hiding under or even inside of furniture (tears in box springs or sofa beds top the list in my experience) so don't panic if you can't find your kitty. Everything that your kitty needs should be provided in her safe room - she should have at least two good sized litter boxes that are scooped a minimum of once daily, scratch pads and posts, a cozy place to sleep outside of her hiding places, plenty of fresh water and you can feed this kitty meals a few times a day just to get her comfortable with one or two people coming into and out of her room without demanding anything from her on a fairly regular basis. If you have children it's best to let this kitty get her bearings and get comfortable with quiet, non-confrontational adults before introducing them to the cat.

Ideally I recommend that pet parents who have rescued a fearful or traumatized kitty make time for a couple of sessions where they go into kitty's room, sit down in a corner away from where she's hiding and studiously ignore her for at least half an hour per session. The reason I suggest this approach is because it's completely non-confrontational from the cat's perspective and it allows her to gradually come out of hiding and observe you in a way that she feels safest. You can speed the process of getting kitty comfortable with you up marginally if you'd like to bring an extra special smelly treat into the room with you during these sessions (sardines, salmon or tuna work well for this purpose) and set the plate down near you but just out of reach. Whatever you do DON'T make eye contact with the cat, touch her or speak to her - at the moment these are all distractions that serve to make her more fearful and she's already in fight/flight fear mode, you don't want to add to her anxiety.

It's nearly impossible for most pet lovers to go into a room where they know a frightened pet is and ignore them which is why I recommend that you bring along that book you've been wanting to read, the crossword puzzle you haven't had time for or the work that needs to be done on your laptop - anything goes as a distraction provided that it doesn't require you to move too much, it doesn't make noise and it will hold your focus while you're in the room. This kitty isn't temperamental, difficult or bad, she's very frightened and probably somewhat traumatized, unfortunately there's no way to find out much about her history before she was rescued so there's no way to pinpoint what's causing her fear, but I can tell you this - if you let her come to you in her own time, on her own terms and be patient enough to let her learn how to trust you she'll pay you back a hundredfold with love, loyalty and plenty of purring cuddles in the years to come. In all likelihood this kitty is trying to communicate her fear and uncertainty by hissing at you and scratching you because she hasn't learned whether it's okay for her to trust you or not - essentially it's the only way she has of asking you to back off and give her the space she needs to observe you and decide whether you are safe to trust or not. Rehabilitating a kitty like this may initially take some time, but in my experience these are the cats who are so grateful that you rescued them that they will do just about anything that you ask, all they need is for you to take your time and patience and invest it in them so that they can learn what it means to feel safe.

Another avenue you might want to consider pursuing is that of using alternative treatments to help this kitty become more relaxed. There are many options out there in terms of all natural, holistic and alternative therapies that you can try ranging from fairly non-invasive treatments such as T-Touch which is a gentle form of massage (you can often find courses on this technique in your community, online, etc) and light therapies where different wavelengths of healing lights are used to treat a variety of issues to treatments such as homeopathy administered by a veterinary homeopath or a holistic vet trained in homeopathy, massage therapy, veterinary chiropractic care, acupuncture, acupressure and herbal medicines. In my experience homeopathy has been a real godsend, in fact our family vet is a holistic vet who has received extensive training in homeopathy. I was most thankful for our Doc's training in homeopathy in 2007 when my eldest cat developed severe acute renal failure after eating melamine tainted cat food during the Menu Foods pet food recalls. We rushed our girl to the 24-hr vet only to have them make the diagnosis and recommend euthanasia. Clearly we didn't want to make such a permanent decision before we'd had a chance to discuss it with our vet so we left with copies of the blood test results and the x-ray for our vet. Our vet began with conventional treatment which included antibiotics and IV fluids to help flush MC's (short for Miracle Cat) system and attack any infection that might be present in her kidneys or bladder. We were stunned by MC's sudden health crisis since she'd seen our vet just a month or two before and was in perfect health. We waited for the conventional treatments to stabilize MC's condition and our vet treated some of MC's symptoms with homeopathic remedies (she was vomiting and had a pretty nasty headache when she was admitted to hospital), when it became clear that MC's condition wasn't improving with conventional medicine alone our vet tried some remedies geared towards improving MC's kidney function and they worked within 24 hours or so. MC was discharged from hospital the following day with the usual renal failure supplies and advice including a special prescription diet, IV fluids to administer under the skin when necessary and we were told at that time MC would need both for the remainder of her life. After a year of treatment with the supplemental fluids (our girl rejected her special diet immediately upon coming home and our vet decided that it was more important for MC to eat something than it was for her to eat the prescription diet) our vet stunned us by suggesting that we begin weaning MC off of her fluids - I'd done a fair bit of research pertaining to cats and kidney failure and the general opinion was that cats with renal failure would remain on their prescription food and supplemental fluids for the remainder of their lives. We trust our vet implicitly so we began weaning our girl off of her fluids, this year when she had her physical she'd been off of her fluids for a year and her kidney function was 100% normal. Conventional medicine alone has no explanation for this, in fact I think our vet sums it up best when she says that homeopathy doesn't just treat the symptoms, it goes right for the cure. I've seen homeopathy work on behavioral issues that are far less dramatic than MC's life and death struggle with kidney failure and I have to say that they work - you won't usually see instant results, but you will notice over time that if you keep a journal of symptoms/behaviors there will be a slow, steady pattern of improvement...Homeopathy is also much gentler and safer than most conventional drugs so I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to treat the root of the problem rather than suppress troublesome symptoms. If you have any further cat related questions or concerns please don't hesitate to contact me again - I'll be more than happy to help you out to the best of my ability.