Peeing everywhere, even if I'm standing by her. Advise please

[4senuff]

Ella is seventeen months old and pees on everything from towels to piles of clothes.
She's rarely ever peed on the carpet. She prefers to go on whatever you have laying ON the carpet instead.

She also uses the litter-box. I'm not sure why she pees outside of it. I'll take her to the vet, but does anyone know of any little things that might cause this?

I've heard that lots of cats like to pee on laundry that's been dried with dryer sheets and I do use those. Maybe that's why she pees on clothes and towels but not carpet.

I was just standing by her in the kitchen, and she looked at me, squatted and peed on the folded-up towel being used in place of the carpet-mat.

Now she just finished happily using her litter.

 

[therese]

I would get her to the vet as soon as possible.  I have a feeling that she might have a Urinary Tract Infection or something like that....If you can rule out a health issue, then the doctor can work with you on behavioral stuff.  She may have a UTI or possibly cystitis, both of which are simple to fix, but require medical attention and sometimes special food.

 

[hwydave]

We had a cat that did that just because she didn't like the litter we bought. Changed the litter and problem solved.

 

[picklespepper]

Ugh.  My kittens do this too and I just had them at the vet and all checked out.  I know they will refuse to use scented litter so we've switched back to unscented but it's not the same brand.  I am thinking of going back to the brand we had the most success with.

My 1 yo daughter likes to pull all of her clothes out of the dresser and yesterday I found her freshly-washed clothes on the floor and soaked in cat pee.  I sprayed them with enzyme cleaner before tossing them in the wash so I hope that prevents repeat behaviour due to scent familiarity but I still don't get the attraction to peeing on clothes.  Dirty clothes I can kind of understand because they smell funny but clean?  And I DON'T use dryer sheets.  And my 4 yo son is always dumping his laundry hamper.  He still sometimes has accidents so I can't tell if the pee smell is him or the cats.  It could be both.

I could do a better job of cleaning their boxes (I used to do it twice a day but that's petered out to once every few days....bad, I know).  Just so irritated and embarrassed.  I know how most of my relatives and peers feel about indoor cats.  I don't want to hear "if that was my cat I'd break it's neck".  

 

[talkingpeanut]

How many litter boxes do you have and how many cats? Having the boxes not clean enough could be a lot of your problem.

 

[Willowy]

I find that most cats like to pee on heaps of clothes on the floor. I don't know why! Cats are weird. So I mostly advise not to leave clothes on the floor :tongue2:.

If she's looking right at you while she pees on something she knows she shouldn't pee on, I've found that this is usually the cat trying to tell you that something is wrong. You just have to find out what's wrong. Is it a dirty litterbox? An illness? She's trying to tell you something.

Is she spayed? Cats communicate with each other through urine, so if she's not spayed she might be trying to call the boys in.

 

[picklespepper]

My cats are sneaky with peeing on the clothes.  They'll do it in front of me but they use the litter box in front of me too.  I am cracking down on myself and am trying to keep on top of the litterboxes again.  I just am not sure how to control my kids with their dumping clothes on the floor.  They're still pretty small.  I can close off my daughter's room but my son goes in and out of his room all the time.  However, most of the accidents are in my daughter's room.  I'm thinking the diaper genie might be part of the problem as it can kind of smell at times.  It might be an attractant or the scent of my daughter's dirty diapers could be seen as a threat to their territory.  I don't know.