Experience of Felliway for stressed cat ...?

[lovelychops]

My youngest cat (female, age 5) had a trip to the vets today after I noticed some blood in the litter tray and her very frequent trips to it trying to urinate. The vet thinks she's stressed and it's effecting her bladder. The reasons she suggested are our new baby (7 months) and possibly her older sibling bullying her!

I feel terrible for my poor cat, especially if she's been stressed for a while and I've been too pre-occupied to notice.

Anyway, the vet suggested getting a Felliway plug in for the house. I'm planning on getting one but wondered if anyone else had positive results from using them? I supposed I'm slightly sceptical about how they work.

All experiences or suggestions much appreciated.

hmmm, I think I'm sceptical too.

We recently moved house and my cat has been peeing all over the place which the vet reckons is also stress related. The thing is, we used a felliway plug-in and she's obviously still stressed whether we use it or not, so how can we know if it works? Maybe she would be loads worse without it, but TBH, there's still cat piss all over the house so it's still pretty bad!

The vet also offered us something to put in her food to make her calmer

The thing is I'll fork out for this stuff because I'm sick of cat pee (oh and it's not nice for the cat obv) but...we'll see.

I used a feliway plug in with my cat when ds1 arrived, it worked very well, i got it from the internet though, it was a lot cheaper than anywhere else...

Our vet suggested this for one of our cats. The vets don't actually sell it themselves, so he did genuinely think it could be a solution, he wasn't trying to sell anything on top of the already vast bill we had to pay
He said that in 50% of cases they really do work, 50% no effect at all.
See if you can borrow one from a friend and see if it helps before forking out? They are bloody expensive...

I was very sceptical of this clear liquid that didn't smell of anything but was supposedly a magical cat calmer! However, I have used it on several occasions when we have had upheavals at home and they do seem chilled out very soon after I start using it.

It hasn't worked for us and I am a bit desperate too. I would actually take your cat for a second opinion as it does sound like a physical problem to me.

Lowlevelwhinging did that thing in your cat's food work? What is it called? I am really desperate.

As a vet, even I was sceptical when feliway (and adaptil, the dog equivalent) came out, but I have to admit I have had some good results with them that have changed my mind. We started using the wipes on our hands before dealing with stressy cats, and the effect was noticeable in many cases. I'd say it's worth a shot. It's not cheap but it does have a chance of working.

It made no visible difference at all to my cat.

I have experience of Feliway and a cat with flutd(go to fabcats website to look up flutd as it was recommended by the out of hours vet i had to rush my cat to when he got a blocked urethra due to stress) you need to do several things: get the feliway, provide 2 litter trays, one downstairs one upstairs(mine is under a bed, i use crystal litter. Or worlds best cat litter which both last about a month before needing changing, buy herbal stress treatment to put in the food or syringe into the mouth called sereneum from pets at home, also i buy online something called furinaid which helps prevent further attacks as it works direct on the bladder, its cheap, lastly make sure the cat has somewhere quiet to escape to and somewhere to jump up to get out of way, like a cat tree. All of these things have meant my cat only ever had the one episode and is now much calmer. Any questions, just ask!

I used the Feliway spray when we were moving to Guernsey and the poor cat (who doesn't travel well) had an 8 hour car journey followed by a boat trip.

We also used some stuff called Zylkene which is a powder you put on their food. Apparently it is a milk protein which is calming. The combination of these things really worked for our cat.

The Zylkene has really good reports.
I found it expensive from my vets so opted for the 'Serene-um' from PAH, but have since found out Zylkene is cheaper online.

We bought it online and it isn't amazingly cheap but only used it for a few days and that seemed to be enough.

Well it didn't work for mine, but then it turned out she actually was ill and it wasn't stress anyway, so that'd be one reason why, lol.

I was a bit sceptical as well and my vet couldn't even explain how they work exactly ( I wanted to know why it didn't smell like a different cat, which surely would cause more stress) but in the end I decided that it wasn't really that expensive if you figured it as a weekly cost, it wasn't going to do any harm and I might as well try it at least.

It seems to work v well for my cats, who've moved back to the uk from overseas. They've had a lot of upheaval, with all the packing and unpacking of two houses, their flights, complete change of climate and location, but seem to have coped remarkably well. I bought the spray, and a small bottle has lasted ages. One cat in particular behaves as if he's drugged by it, and becomes totally floppy and relaxed, v sweet to watch!

One of my cats ended up a nervous wreck after a traumatic year when we moved house and his brother was ill then had to be put down. The vet recommended trying Felliway and the result was amazing and fast, he calmed down almost the minute we plugged it in!

Five years later, the same cat is coming to realise his mum has been put down (last week) and is starting to get a bit skittish again, I will use Felliway again.

My vet said that they use Felliway as a matter of course in their surgery, and the dog version, according to my vet the cat version works, the dog version far less so.

Flowery, for your boy missing his mum.

didn't seem to work on my cats at all