Introductions are harder than I thought…

JocelynJ

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Hi everyone, I’m new to TCS. I have a 13 year old Linden, and a new furball named Lucy. Earlier this year, my 21 year old Missy passed away. Linden was bonded to her. We went through the grieving process and our vet felt it was a good time to try a new addition. Linden was demonstrating loneliness when I went out (I have a security camera inside and he’d wait on the stairs by the front door, not typical behaviour for him).

So 10 days ago I adopted Lucy. It’s not going well. I’ve followed the steps for introduction (separate rooms, exchanging scented linen, limited viewing) but Linden still can’t handle the sight of her (hissing and moaning). He hides and decreased appetite, he’s had some messy pooping accidents (he’s a very clean cat normally). He’s usually very clingy to me but now not so much. I try to expose Lucy to Linden in small amounts (behind baby gate or new cat in kennel), they’ve not had direct contact yet. I’ve tried treats or playful activity around the new cat/near her door but he’s not engaging, he retreats, hisses and hides. We have Feliway. He gets lots of attention and I’ve kept his routine. I’m trying to keep his stress down. If he hides, I let him, and try to coax him out later with food or toy. I know this can be a long process. 💔 I miss my Linden and his wonderful personality (kind, talkative, cuddly). Any advice or words of encouragement would be welcomed. Thank you.
 

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Xena44

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Hello! They truly are. This is a great site for folks with your issue. I’m think you need to slow down a bit. I know it’s already been 10 days but in cat time, it’s not that long. There are some real experienced folks at this site. I’m so so sorry about the loss of your precious Missy. Hang in there sister. 💔❤
 

ArtNJ

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Sometimes with a cat that seems particularly stressed by full visual through a baby gate, folks put a towel over the baby gate and slowly raise the towel over several days. I'd recommend doing that, and stopping the crate in the middle of the room stuff. You can stop focused scent exchange as well, and just let the scent of the kitten from being in the same house naturally waft everywhere.

Its going worse than normal right now, no denying that, but not so unusual. If you go slow before getting to face-to-face free roaming interaction, I'm sure you'll end up in the usual kind of situation, with the senior cat being a bit stressed for a while, but not severe enough to have problems eating or using the litterbox, and slowly improving over weeks to months. Which may not be great, but its not such a big deal either. But you want to go very slow and get off the more stressed than normal track if you can, since in rare cases an older cat can definitely get stressed enough to cause itself problems over a kitten.
 
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JocelynJ

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Sometimes with a cat that seems particularly stressed by full visual through a baby gate, folks put a towel over the baby gate and slowly raise the towel over several days. I'd recommend doing that, and stopping the crate in the middle of the room stuff. You can stop focused scent exchange as well, and just let the scent of the kitten from being in the same house naturally waft everywhere.

Its going worse than normal right now, no denying that, but not so unusual. If you go slow before getting to face-to-face free roaming interaction, I'm sure you'll end up in the usual kind of situation, with the senior cat being a bit stressed for a while, but not severe enough to have problems eating or using the litterbox, and slowly improving over weeks to months. Which may not be great, but its not such a big deal either. But you want to go very slow and get off the more stressed than normal track if you can, since in rare cases an older cat can definitely get stressed enough to cause itself problems over a kitten.
Thank you for the feedback. Going to reset… back to separate rooms for a few days, no contact, then will try the gate with the towel. Linden does go check to see where she is at, but in his own time, such as sniff at the door. So there is some interest
 
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