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The litter tray

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Original poster

I don't think I can handle it much longer :(

32 replies

StillMedusa · 29/11/2018 23:23

Came home from a really rough day at school to find my house stinking of cat pee yet again.
Litter trays upstairs and down..completely changed(and washed) every other day, poos scooped immediately.
But Portia literally walked into the wet room earlier and peed just 3 feet away from the tray. The landing upstairs has been scrubbed, sprayed, you name it, but every day, more pee. I will bleach the wet room at the weekend (was out tonight with DS2 and have a fucking Xmas do with DH's cycle group tomorrow..can you tell I'm enthusiastic)
Portia simply no longer cares.
I mostly feel it's time she went (she's nearly 19) but she is still eating (thin as a rail and no longer grooms so tatty) still purring and wandering around the house yowling so the kids are very anti having her pts. I feel awful about it as she is simply a demented old lady but the peeing is making me very miserable..I'm out at work, as are the kids and DH and tonight my house smells :( I work hard to keep it clean and tidy.
Sorry for the long rant, but has anyone any suggestions? (she pees a lot as she is in slow kidney failure..no magic solutions there)

I don't want to have her PTS while she still has some quality of life, I really don't, but I cant handle the pools of pee everywhere much longer. As it is we will have to re carpet the landing and stairs when she goes as it is ruined :( I have every pee remover on the market!

OP posts:
Singlenotsingle · 29/11/2018 23:26

If you haven't got a cat flap, can't you just shut her in one room when you go out? One of our cats is 17 and we just shut him in the kitchen for the same reason

user1494670108 · 29/11/2018 23:29

Could you contain her somewhere at least while you're out? At that great age she won't be going far anyway, we had a heated pad in a cat bed for our old lady in the tiled utility room which is separate from the rest of the house by a lockable door ( her litter tray and catflap were in there too)

Perfectly1mperfect · 29/11/2018 23:32

We also have a 19 year old cat with kidney issues, no peeing round the house yet though.

Can you possibly only let her have access to a smaller area in the house, maybe a couple of rooms with easy to clean floors if you have them. At least then if she pees you will know where and it hopefully will be easier to clean.

Has she had any blood tests recently to show how bad her kidneys are ? Like you say, there's no magic solutions so maybe just try to lessen the work it causes you. I can imagine it's stressful after an already hard day. Flowers

Babdoc · 29/11/2018 23:39

If you’ve excluded urinary tract infection, and it’s definitely dementia, I’m afraid I’d be taking her to the vet to discuss euthanasia, OP. I had this with my 21 year old tom cat - he forgot how to groom, or to strop his claws until they grew into his pads, and he wandered around peeing and pooing in cupboards, until finally I just had to put him to sleep. 19 is quite an age for a cat - it’s like a human being in their late nineties, for comparison.
If you have one room with a tiled or easily wiped floor, I suppose you could trap your cat in there for a few more months, but it’s not much of a life for her. It’s a judgment call that only you can make, on her quality of life versus the smell, mess and incontinence of letting her roam, or putting her to sleep.

DramaAlpaca · 29/11/2018 23:40

Oh OP Sad Are you sure she still has quality of life? She's not grooming, she's wandering around the house yowling which can be a sign of a distressed kitty, and as a long time cat slave I'm sure you know cats can purr to hide pain. Maybe it's time...? Please put her first, not the kids' feelings. Sorry, I don't mean to be harsh I'm just being realistic. I've been there with an old cat & I know how hard it is Flowers

princesstiasmum · 29/11/2018 23:43

Oh poor baby,i had 2 like his, have you tried cleaning the area with biological soap powder,then spray surgical spirit on the area when dry and let dry,before cat goes near it, bit tricky on carpets but ok on any uncarpeted floors,
One of mine had terrible diarrhea, she haf colitis, and ha to let her go in the end as before she pooed she screamed out, she was 16, my other was 19 and had diabetes,which the vet missed, and by the time he realised it was far too late to do anything about it, she had kidney failure too
I hope you can find a solution.it is heartbreaking i know to have them pts

dubdurbs · 29/11/2018 23:50

Stop using bleach where she's peed, for a start-bleach attracts cats, and she will only pee in the same spot again and again! Try distilled vinegar, or buy scent killing spray from the pet store. Take her to the vet too, cats are extremely good at hiding pain. Her kidney issues may have advanced, but only the vet can answer that.

OhTheRoses · 29/11/2018 23:54

OP, I hope to get to dignitas long before I am doubly incontinent, grubby and demented.

Original poster
StillMedusa · 30/11/2018 00:00

We can't contain her for two reasons... the downstairs (where her food and water is) is quite open plan, but mostly, DS2 who is 21 and autistic but able to be left, is home with her for about 4 hours a day and he cannot bear her crying...he loves her, and every time she yowls he thinks she needs food..it's a separate problem as he constantly dishes up more food and I come home to huge heaped dishes of cat food going nasty which she only eats a spoonful of. (The other cats only eat when they are hungry so it gets put outside for strays/foxes)
If she can't get into a room she REALLY yells ... but often she wanders and yowls in a 'I'm not sure what I'm doing ' kind of a way.
She is stiff in the mornings..has metacam when I can get her to take it, but she is still feisty so daily meds are an absolute no no..she gets too distressed. I thought she was going to die last November so to be fair to her she has done well.

I love her..she is beautiful (or was) feisty, argumentative, but faithful. She was an ace hunter, could steal food off your plate like a ninja , and the hardest thing of all is that though she has never been a lap cat, when she's on my bed and I sit near she purrs and purrs, she still loves a head scratch and back rub over her painfully thin little body.

I feel like I am sentencing my grandmother :( I know that I will grieve horribly when she is gone, but also feel relief...and that makes me feel like a killer :(

OP posts:
user1468942365 · 30/11/2018 00:02

Flowers I coped with 18 months of that with my boy. He looked after me single for years, he slept on my feet, he met DH and adored him, he met both DS's and introduced us to a stray new boy then gave up his pride. We knew it was time. That wasn't him. He hated the medication. He hated messing. I really felt he felt he'd done what he needed to do to make us happy! I still cry now, years later, but I know letting him live with no dignity would have been more cruel. His work was done. I miss that quirky old boy every day.

user1468942365 · 30/11/2018 00:03

OP Elliot yelled too at the end. When he was confused. I'm so sorry. Xx

princesstiasmum · 30/11/2018 00:17

They do cry a lot when they are getting near the end , mine did, and was so thin,she was like a bag of bones,i couldnt let her go on like that, it broke my heart, but was the kindest thing for her,[and the other cat]
By the way Metacam is terrible for damaging kidneys, even though its a pain killer, and as the pp said bleach attracts them, so no good using bleach, maybe clean the litter tray out with it, diluted of course,it might attract her to that
If i were you i would take her to the vet and see how she is

Original poster
StillMedusa · 30/11/2018 07:08

Thank you all for your replies. I'm going to make a vet appointment for next week as see what they say. I on't make any hasty decisions, but I need some sort of a plan :/

OP posts:
Loopytiles · 30/11/2018 07:10

PTS. The situation sounds intolerable for you.

abbsisspartacus · 30/11/2018 07:12

If she is not tolerating daily meds she might be too stiff or sore to get into her tray?

Fluffycloudland77 · 30/11/2018 07:25

You can get cat nappies.

Windgate · 30/11/2018 07:29

Yowling in the older cat can be sign of illness and should be taken seriously. Good luck with the vet. Sadly it may time to let her go.

fenneltea · 30/11/2018 07:35

I'd be letting her go OP; I'm sorry but when they get to the stage that they are weeing everywhere and not grooming then I think that their quality of life isn't that great. Purring can be a sgn of distress or pain too, so don't judge by that as they use it to self soothe. They are also good at hiding pain and illness.

She's a good age, unwell and only likely to deteriorate, you have nothing to feel guilty for by letting her go.

BluthsFrozenBananas · 30/11/2018 07:35

For the time being you could get a pack of puppy pads and put them down in the areas she’s most likely to pee. It’s so horrible when a pet get old and you don’t know what to do for the best. Flowers

crimsonlake · 30/11/2018 07:43

It is a terribly sad time and I am going through exactly the same thing with my elderly cat. A few months ago I also had to put his mum down who was only 12 months older than him. She deteriorated slowly and for a few years peed all over the house, including god knows why up the curtains. She ruined a lot of things and it drove me to despair, but as she was my son's beloved cat I could not have her put down and so put up with it for years. Her son has declined hugely since her death, a few months ago he was a strong , big , vibrant cat. Now he has gone deaf, is confused, yowls, eats little and you can feel his ribs. He has started to pee in the house despite having a litter tray, luckily I have wooden floors now. It is so sad to see him a shadow of his former self, but I am putting off that trip to the vets as I do not think he would be coming back. He seems happy in himself when he is with us and sat on someones knee, but I know it is only a matter of time now.

Butteredghost · 30/11/2018 07:45

Sounds like it might be time. She has clearly lived a very long and happy life.

After you take her to the vet, maybe tell your kids the vet said you must pts. It might be a white lie but would help them accept it. The vet might actually say that anyway.

Toddlerteaplease · 30/11/2018 10:01

For all those with cats nearing the end. Make a plan of how you want it to be and what you want to happen. So you don't have to think about it on the day. I found it really helped when Fatty was PTS. And she had a lovely peaceful and dignified death.

TheLongRider · 30/11/2018 10:56

Flowers Hand hold from over here.

It's not an easy decision to make but you'll do what's best for her and your family.

Vinorosso74 · 30/11/2018 11:22

It's so hard. I would have some videos of her on your phone so the vet can see how she is. Poor old girl.
Biological laundry liquid is good on pee. The enzymes in it break down the smell.

Original poster
StillMedusa · 30/11/2018 18:56

Cat nappies..just no. I would never do that to her..the distress that would cause is unthinkable.
I have made an appointment for next Wed with the vet I like best (she specialises in elderly animals :) ) to discuss how close we are to the end. If she can perk her up with steroids until Xmas is over, I shall try ad contain the pee until then, but I think after that I shall have her PTS, at home, where she dozes on a little blanket on the dining table.

I told DS1 my vague plan of action on our way home from work today (he's 25 and works at my special school) and he just had tears down his face as he drove :( It's so hard because she has been there pretty much all of their lives and they can't see how much her quality of life has deteriorated because it has been slow and they love her.

But everyone I have spoken to has tried to reassure me that it's not wrong to give her a gentle end rather than waiting til it's totally grim . I hope I make the right decision...

OP posts:
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