Should be an only cat?

[joanne511]

Thanks jcat, you're right. Here is her response:

I think that if Chloe has trouble getting along with others and is unaccustomed to others, the last thing she needs is a super-playful little kitten jumping on her all the time. I think that a better match would be a cat who would be happy to play with her, or happy not to. Also, if Chloe is mean to the little kitten, the little kitten will have no one to play with, and will also grow up unsocialized to other cats, while having a pretty miserable "childhood".

So, in my view, a cat that is not used to playing with other cats should not be subjected to a little kitten that is incessantly playful (and annoying).

I can readily picture her with a friendly adult cat. The adult cat will deal with it whether Chloe wants to be friends or not.

I don't know what to do!

The thing is, the foster mom said she only had trouble with the other cats because the aggression level in the house was kind of high at the time due to another cat. I don't know that Chloe would necessarily have trouble with all cats. Chloe's still pretty playful herself since she's 6 months old. But Nancy has more experience than I do. It's tough when you get two different answers from people that know better than you do.

Oy!

 

[jcat]

It's almost impossible to predict what will happen. I've always suspected that Jamie was hurt or terribly frightened by one of the adult cats in the home where he was fostered as a kitten, which is why I thought he might be okay with another kitten. Sadly, that wasn't the case. He's really an "extreme case", however; the only other experience we've had with this type of behavior was with a Boxer that was severely injured by another dog at the age of 8. Prior to the attack, he was wonderful with other dogs, but afterwards we couldn't let him near any other dogs.
The big question is, should cats be "only fur kids"? The norm here is to insist that people take two litter mates. That can work out wonderfully, but there are also cases where the adopters report back later, when the cats are 1 to 3, that they've become absolute enemies. My sister has a 7 1/2-year-old castrated male who used to be the neighborhood terror, beating up on other cats, but getting along fine with her three dogs. Three years ago, one of my nephews brought home a 12-week-old kitten. Nobody thought it would work out, but Trey accepted her immediately, and is still "mothering" her, and now stays home.
I'm sorry I can't be helpful here. I can only say that there are cats who prefer to be "only children", and others who value a playmate/companion.

 

[joanne511]

Thank you so much for all the help that has been offered. We are going to meet a 1 year old male tomorrow, who we are told is very good with other cats. Ideally I'd like to find a cat closer to 6 months, but we'll see how it goes. Yesterday Chloe was being very playful with her stuffed kitten, which gave us some hope that she would be good with a younger kitten as well. (It's kind of hard to find a 5-7 month old right now...they all seem to be 2-3 months old or 1 year old.)

I'll update as needed, but if anyone else has a comment I'd love to hear it in the meantime.

TCS is such an awesome resource!