Introducting & Separating A New Kitten

[SmileForMe]

Hello, I have one 6 year old male cat (Oliver) and am planning to take in a new kitten within the next week. The new kitten is a rescue in need of a loving home & family. I have been planning on taking her in for a few weeks now. However, we just decided in the past week that we will be moving within the next couple months. We are trying to find a multi-family home in which the two cats would still be able to co-mingle, but if that ends up not being the case, Oliver would go with my mom, and the new kitten with me. I am worried that introducing the two cats to each other and then separating them just a couple months later may be too stressful on both of them. The introduction isn't the big concern so much as the possible separation. Have any of you ever fostered kittens with cats already in your home? How did they react once the fostered kitten was gone? Will they become too attached in that amount of time to be separated? Will it cause too much stress on my Oliver to have a new friend introduced and then taken away a few months later? Any help or advice is greatly appreciated. Thank you!

 

[Furballsmom]

Hi! and a big WELCOME!!
I'm sorry you haven't gotten a reply yet - so, granting that every cat is different, I personally think that the possible separation won't be an issue. For all you know, Oliver might not even like the new kitten.

Of more concern to me is the stress that's going to be piled on Oliver, with a new cat into his territory, then the pre-move and post-move upending of his world with total loss of his territory and known routines, with the possible addition of having to deal with strange people if it's a multi-family situation, their smells, sounds, pets etc.

Try and be sure to have some calming products on hand, and be very sure to have a vet's number/clinic readily available in your new location. If there's ANY change in Oliver's eating, drinking or litter habits, don't wait to get him in.
Are you sure you still want to adopt the kitten?
It just seems to me like life might have gotten in the way, which it does sometimes.

 

[ThreeCatsAreBetterThanTwo]

Kittens are resilient since they have only had a few months of life experience. But for your older cat, moving will definitely be stressful. Let me tell you what happened to me. I had a cat for about two years (rescue) and throughout that time I fostered a couple of kittens and a few dogs as well. Since my cat was the boss of the house, he got used to them pretty quickly and adapted his behavior to their presence in the house very easily. He is a friendly cat. However, I had to move out of my house and ended up renting for a few months and buying a house at the same time. My mother took my cat in during the meantime so he wouldn't be moving twice. So I moved into my new house and my friend had found two stray kittens and I offered to take them in. They were living in the new house for about two months when I decided to take my old cat back. He was a completely different cat. Never left the basement except to come upstairs and eat. Even though the kittens were only 4-5 months old at the time, he ran away from them. He was no longer the boss of the house, but they were, and he didn't know where his place was anymore. I ended up giving him back to my mom, since he became the boss of that house in the 6 months he was there. Moral of the story, there will not be any separation issues, but your old cat will need time to adjust to the new apartment before any other animal is introduced.