Husband or cat

[Wedonttalkaboutboris]

Any help or advice urgently needed please! We rescued our cats a couple of years ago from a guy who hadn’t spayed his cats and was overwhelmed by kittens. They came unable to use the litter tray. We had a newborn baby and a three year old and, in hindsight, it was a really silly decision to take them on. However, the guy was struggling to even give them away for free and we’d just lost our much loved cat and had a free, large house. I was on maternity leave so thought I could tackle it.

The last 2 years have been a struggle in terms of using the litter tray but they mostly seemed to be getting it right- until this summer. We went away for 10 days and had a cat sitter visit each day. When we got back we realised that the cats had started urinating on the bathroom floor. One cat in particular is weeing outside of the tray and then I think occasionally the other is following suit. This has now sporadically continued. Every week or so I now have to mop up wee, disinfect and steam the floor. my husband began shutting the bathroom door in an attempt to stop this, which at first seemed to work. However, we realised last week that he had weed on the carpet outside of the door.

In the last couple of weeks, this now seems to have ramped up and he is weeing in completely random places. He does seem to be choosing tiled/laminated places for the most part- for example, he weed on the lid of a plastic box in my daughters room and in several of the fireplaces- on the tiles. However, previously he has also weed on our children’s bed sheets, towels and my eldest ds’ book bag.

They have 3 trays at the very end of our double garage- our house is large so we are very far away from them in general. We do try to clean them every other day but if I’m being honest- with 2 very young kids- it can sometimes go a bit longer. However, he has weed in inappropriate places even when the trays are clean. It’s very cold in the garage in winter and they are far away from the rest of the house so I do also wonder if he is just being lazy!

I’ve just come home today and he has weed in the main fireplace. My husband is literally at his wits end. He didn’t really want them in the first place as he was still very much grieving the loss of our first cat. He is very seriously talking about rehoming them if something doesn’t change. I just can’t live with the idea of our cats being in a cage in some shelter somewhere, abandoned. I couldn’t live with myself. The boy who is weeing everywhere is surely unlikely to find a home if they know he isn’t litter trained? He is such a cuddly, lovely cat and amazing with the kids otherwise.

Please any advice would be so appreciated. This is causing so much division in my marriage and is honestly coming between me and my husband. I’ve just booked a vet appointment for tomorrow afternoon- but in the meantime has anyone got any advice? I’ve just cleaned and put out 4 trays for them. We did use felliway plug ins while we were away (when they started weeing on the bathroom floor!)

If the trays are dirty at all they will wee elsewhere.

I've had small kids and cats and unfortunately that just is the case. So if the litter trays aren't kept clean they will go elsewhere.

The peeing next to the little tray is telling you that - they "want" to use the spot but the tray is unacceptable.

Do they have free access to outside/are they used to "going" outside?

Once they have started peeing somewhere it does become established as a toilet spot. As you have found if they will try to use it again but if blocked they will choose another (random) place and that gets added to the list.

When you had the cat sitter were the cats able to go outside and use their usual spot outside?

With my cats by keeping a very close eye on the litter trays and changing them very very regularly we managed to break it.

Thank you!

they do go outside and when it got bad a couple of weeks ago we started kicking them out a lot more. I have no idea if the boy who keeps weeing in the house realises that outside is in fact a giant litter tray. I’ve never seen him go outside. He does seem a bit dense, he took weeks to figure out the cat flap.

When we went away the cat sitter didn’t let them out- which we now realise was also a bad idea.

It sounds like they have been stressed by your being away/having a cat sitter? Especially as it ramped up from there on in.

I also think the litter trays are too far away from them. Could you put at least one somewhere they're using to pee?

I had one that peed everywhere. I used to clean it up and not tell my husband! It was the weirdest thing - we moved house and it just stopped instantly! (I don't imagine you will go to those lengths!) There must have been something around our old house that was stressing him (he was indoors when we were at work).

Maybe the vet will have some useful advice.

I think this is fixable.
I can also understand why it's really annoying and spoiling your enjoyment of your cats.
You've already pinpointed the main problem. The location and cleanliness of their litter trays. Cats are clean animals. They don't choose to pee in inappropriate places, but will do if their trays are dirty or if they're unwell. Unfortunately once a scent is established in the wrong place they will pee there again.
Step up keeping their trays clean and maybe have at least one indoors somewhere quiet - I have covered trays which do minimise smell plus it's easy to keep them clean. You really have to remove poops asap and change a used tray maybe every other day. Two of my cats (sisters) happily share a litter tray but my other cat prefers to go outside and if she has to use a tray will not use it if another cat has. My sibling cats regularly pee in the laundry bin if they're upstairs rather than go down two flights of stairs to use their tray.
Get an enzyme cleaner for the areas your cat has marked indoors.
Cats also pee in the wrong place when ill or stressed.

I should add- we have used a urine destroyer solution to clean areas they’ve weed on since they were kittens which seemed to have helped stop areas become repeat places to go. They did used to wee in one spot in the hallway as kittens- luckily we were renovating at the time and when new flooring was put in they stopped. I’m genuinely thinking about getting new bathroom flooring?

Thank you @Beamur - that’s really reassuring. I’m honestly so upset. The last thing I’d want is for them to be re-homed, but I also can’t let my children live like this! I’m really on top of the cleaning and we do have a cleaner, but started to get paranoid that the place stinks of cat piss!

I’ve had lots of conversations with my husband about the litter tray and that we need to keep on top of them, but I think I perhaps need to accept that it’s my priority and I need to stay on top of them. He works from home but will happily forget about them!

They do also seem to need feeding about 4 x a day to be kept happy! They’re certainly very different to our old cats who were so low maintenance compared to this.

I’m going to go round with the enzyme cleaner tonight and re-clean any repeat spots/all fireplaces. Hopefully the vet will help.

@Canthave2manycats if I put a tray somewhere they’re using to pee- won’t that encourage them? How will I then get them to stop weeing there? I have a 2 year old so I don’t really want litter trays around the house but I guess I could get an enclosed one? Just don’t really want it in the bathroom!

So first step is probably encouraging them to be outside as much as possible. It's not really the weather for it but it will help,

Then spend a few days obsessively checking the litter trays. Set an alarm and check every couple of hours if you can (not at night).
Scoop any poo immediately and if the litter gets too wet change it immediately,

Basically you are trying to re-establish the litter trays as a place where they want to pee and poo. If you can do that the other places will fade anyway.

I'm a bit confused - @Wedonttalkaboutboris how many cats do you have?

This might easily be a stress/territorial thing as much as a litter tray issue.

I am not sure why having a two year old means you can’t put a litter tray in the bathroom. We have had cats with two litter trays easily accessible since our son was a baby. You have to teach them not to touch and that shouldn’t be hard in the bathroom

We got a cat pen with catio area.

We put them outside overnight. They go free roaming in daylight hours as and when they want to.

Keep on top of the litter trays both in the pen and the house.

So far 4 incidents all reactions to stress.

Drastic put worth it.

If you have more than one cat, it's advised to have more than one tray. It also helps to avoid them getting gross.

I've got 2 cats. 1 tray has always been enough. Gets cleaned every 3 days

@Beamur we have 3 trays, changed every other day. We’ve got 4 out at the moment- but I’ll move the enclosed one into the bathroom.
@pinneddownbytabbies we have two, from the same litter- we used to have two but the last one died a few months before we took in these two

@RandomMess i might just start letting them out overnight- although worry about them in this cold and worry that not being able to come back in overnight will stress them out?! We do lock them in the kitchen- attached to the garage most nights as the serial wee’er tries to sleep on the toddler and wakes her up! He’s a big cat.

Thanks for the advice @Octavia64 - going to try this approach. Previously we’ve just been leaving the trays and changing the litter all in one go.

Well it mightn't stop them weeing in that location but at least it would be in the litter tray?

@Canthave2manycats true! I guess I just didn’t like having a tray in the bathroom with guests round. My mum will be horrified!

Oh god don't shut them out! My cats are indoors now but when I had indoor/outdoor ones they were always in at night. More likelihood of RTAs and getting attacked in darkness. Plus it is far too cold.

@Canthave2manycats but better to deal with that than having wee on the bathroom floor!

Mine don't free roam overnight 😱 they are shut in an insulated outside pen with a hot water slab and duck & down blanket.

Tell the guests not come then 😆

I have a tray in the dining room... one of my cats sleeps in it at night! I had one in the kitchen for my old boy. He had always gone outside but he'd been to the vet for something so we gave him a tray 'for a couple of nights'!! Anyway when I disposed of the tray the wee shit peed on the floor where the tray had been.... didn't feel like he left me much of a choice!!

Miladdo once peed on our fabric sofa. We didn't know. SIL called with her new boyfriend... you can guess the rest.

I didn't admit it was cat pee!!

I always think a bathroom is a great place for a litter tray because it's already a toilet. Much better than a kitchen! I'd not worry at all about guests, better to see an enclosed litter tray than a wee on the floor. You can always splash out on a nice looking enclosed one if you want it to look smart.

We have an elderly cat who needs to go when she needs to go so we have ended up putting a few extra trays out in spots so she doesn't have to go far. It does really help. With younger cats you could always get them established and then slowly move the tray to a place you prefer. See if that works.

@RandomMess @Canthave2manycats I’ll be sure to keep getting them in then (apart from the occasion they don’t come back/stop out, which does happen!) they might not have as luxurious amenities as yours @RandomMess 😅but they have a radiator and aga in the kitchen and they seem to like exploring the garage at night/keeping away any creepy crawlies!