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The litter tray

Join our community of cat lovers on the Mumsnet Cat forum for kitten advice and help with cat behaviour.

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Original poster

Son suddenly scared of our kitten

10 replies

Mimi1980 · 01/10/2022 18:28

As the title says, we got our beautiful little kitten around 8 days ago. My son was so happy and excited, fast forward to 3 days ago, and he has suddenly developed a fear, to the point of not being in the same room. He will scream and run if the kitten comes by him..

As anyone got any ideas what i can do?.

Thank you

OP posts:

Fluffycloudland77 · 01/10/2022 19:29

How old is your son?

Hellocatshome · 01/10/2022 19:31

Age would help. Anything other than a toddler it seems an over reaction and surely you could just ask him what the problem is. If they are non verbal for whatever reason I would probably have to go with the kitten has bitten or scratched him high is not unusual as tiny kittens haven't learnt to play nicely yet.

Wolfiefan · 01/10/2022 19:32

Yes how old? I’m guessing very young and kitten has scratched or bitten.

Pixiedust1234 · 01/10/2022 19:44

I'm guessing your son hurt the kitten and it defended itself.

How old is your son and how rough is he with it?

Original poster

Mimi1980 · 02/10/2022 08:50

My son is 7 years old, his never been rough with the kitten, and the kitten has never clawed or bite him.

This is a genuine fear he has, it like he woke up and decided he was afraid.

OP posts:

Original poster

Mimi1980 · 02/10/2022 08:52

I've also asked what has happened to make him scared , he reply is " I'm just scared of it".

If something had happened i could understand.

OP posts:

TheLongRider · 02/10/2022 09:03

That's tough for you and the kitten.

What helped with my DD at a similar was having toys that kept the kitten away and teaching her how to read kitten body language.

When the kitten is asleep try and get him in the same room as her so that he can see she's not a threat. If she's walking towards him, he can throw a small toy for her to get her to chase it away from him, so mouse, ball, crumpled paper.

String toys, fishing line toys are all good to teach him that he can play with the kitten from a distance.

Reassure him that she doesn't want to be scary and she doesn't understand. If her tail is up she's probably interested in talking to him. If you can get him to crouch down to her level and let her sniff him that will help.

It'll take a bit of time but if you're patient it will pass. Let him see you playing with and talking/ cuddling the kitten. Talk through what you're doing so he can understand.

Fluffycloudland77 · 02/10/2022 13:01

Is he an only child and not used to something else needing attention

Justfortherandomquestions · 02/10/2022 20:56

We got kittens a few weeks ago and our 5 year old was a bit like this. @TheLongRider 's advice is great, and is what we tried to do. If it's any consolation it settled down after a couple of weeks. Her big thing was eating and she didn't like the attention that the kittens gave to her food, which is understandable, so we had to work around that. But it's calmed down now.

Longdarkcloud · 05/10/2022 10:47

Has your DS come into contact with any material that shows cats in a threatening light? The old Disney films and cartoons pictured cats as evil, spiteful characters and in stories featuring mice etc cats are the enemies and Halloween cats are intrinsically evil. Something like that can be magnified in dreams or imagination and be projected onto your harmless kitty.
Give your d kitty timeout in another room while your DS watches tv etc so their interaction is limited. When the cat gets older it will probable pretty much ignore him .

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