How do I help my adopted traumatized cat?

Question

6 months old, adopted from shelter, cat hides all the time and comes out at night to eat. have had her for a month. she is starting to creep out and jumps on my bed but always goes back and hides under furniture..can i help this cat? I love her but am I being fair to this cat, maybe she needs more than I can give her. should I be patient or try something else? I have always helped care for older abused cats but this one is a real mystery..help! send to [e-mail]. thanks

Answer 1

I think you are doing just fine. Just let her keep building trust in you. If she is starting to jump on your bed then she is testing her boundaries and seeing if she can trust you. Just keep showing her love and be patient with her. She will come around.

Answer 2

Prefer to answer here. Truthfully? You let her into the rest of the house too quickly. I just finished fostering a semi-wild 6 mo old who is now incredibly social and in a wonderful new home. You need to isolate her in a room. Get a nylon cat cube (from Walmart) that she can hide in with a really soft blanket at the bottom. Put the food and water as far from the litter in the room as you can. Lots and lots of toys and a scratching post. Go into see her as many times a day as you want, but start by just being there without approaching her. Let her come to you. You can entice them with Three Dog Bakery's We Pitty the Kitties freeze-dried Alaskan Salmon. Once you have her eating out of your hand you are half way home. I would do this for 1-2 weeks, depending on how she responds. Once she is comfortable, start holding her and petting her as often as you can to socialize her. Once she feels secure with you, carry her around and introduce her to things througout the house while you hold her (she can explore, but still be safe). If you do not try this and let it continue the way it is, she may always have issues. The fact that she is jumping on your bed and curious about your scent is a VERY good sign. You may want to put a shirt you have worn a couple of times in the room as well so she has something with your scent on it.

Answer 3

Don't stress. Cats are all mysterie. It's still a new place to her and who knows what kind of life she had before and what happened to her. The last thing that she needs though is for a person that she is finally growing to trust to abandon her. Just stick it out. Cats are solitary creatures. I know people who've had their cats for longer and the cat's just not the type to cuddle. When she is hiding, she is watching your movements and checking to make sure you are good. What you can do is go to walmart and get a treat called katty shack and shake it a few times a day and after each time, put a treat where she is hiding. She will love the treat and associate it with the noice and sooner or later she will come running to you when that box is shaken. It never fails. But I does take time. Good luck

Answer 4

Just give ur cat some more time. Cat's that have been in a bad sitution are sometimes scared. That might mean scared of people. That cat will come to you in due time. It accually might mean that soemday that cat will be glued onto you. Just wait, you will see the cats just needs to know that they can trust you. Maybe giving her treats, shaking the treat bag once she knows that is where the treats come from. That way she comes to you and knows that is how she will get the treats.
Putting her in a new home will only make it worse for her. She is learning to trust you and you dont want her to have to go thro it all over again.
Jumping in bed with you is a good sign of her finally starting to trust you.
Hang tight, in due time she will come to you.

Answer 5

Often cat's who are traumatized are never really the same again. I found my cat when she was just a kitten abandoned at a school like 6 summers ago. She was so frail. She was shy around people, but eventually I earned her trust. She didn't trust others, might I add. Your cat might never be as socialable as others (I have an orange tabby that'll hop in your car if you pull into my driveway), but eventually it'll most likely come to trust you.

You should give her a chance, if you find in a few months that you would rather someone else give it a try.. then find someone who would take her in. But I suggest you keep her, you might find that she has an amazing personality underneath it all.

Answer 6

I had the exact same problem I got this cat form a coworker he did warn me that he was shy....... I had him for 3 months and he never warmed up to me ... always under the bed he only ate in the night and that's it ..... I decided to give the cat to a woman that knows how to handle cats with problems but the day I tried putting the cat in the cage oh forget he was so angry I never saw something like that he almost bit my Friend . I called the shelter and they had to take him away cause he was just not controlling him self it was to much.... I cried this world and the other.... I felt like **** when the shelter took him but I just couldn't take that stress any more

Answer 7

You need to keep her in a safe room at first that does not have a bed or something she can hide under. It takes alot of patience to work with a abused/traumatized cat. Just give her alot of TLC and she will come around.
Keep her contained in a pen if you have to it will help her learn that no harm will come to her and that she is safe. Also use Feliway to keep her calm, it is a great product and works. It will help speed up the process.

Answer 8

cats needs time to adjust when moving to a new home. Some come around in a couple weeks and others take awhile longer. Have a lot of patience and leave plenty of toys around to play together.

Try some Feliway pheromone plug in. It's calming for cats and might help speed up the process of helping kitty not be so scared.

Answer 9

First, kudos to you for adopting.

I know how you feel, you want to just hug her and pet her and love her but you can't. We also adopted a cat who was abused and she sounds a lot like you describe. Her name is Shadow because for the first year we never really saw her. Oh we knew she was there because she ate the food in the bowl, used her litter box. But we couldn't get anywhere near her.

We just decided that since we couldn't do any of the normal things we would have to show her we loved her in other ways. So we started to talk to her, not the sweet baby talk though. We would just sort of talk to her about what we were doing in the room we knew she was in. When we set food down we would announce it out loud so she would associate us with the food.

After awhile, well if you can call a year awhile, she started to approach us. Scared us half to death because she would only approach us at night when we were in bed. She could see us but we couldn't see her and she knew it. But we would feel little whiskers on our toes or soft licks on our arms. We would softly thank her for her kisses but never reach out for her or make any other moves.

It is going on three years now. We still can't pick her up and hold her, but we can now rub her tummy or groom her with a cat brush. She runs to us when we come in from outside and greets us with soft meows. She will often now come and lay on the back of the sofa or chair we are sitting in and fall asleep. She will still run and hide with any loud noise but more and more she runs to us to protect her and not away from us.

Just keep giving her love, and let her make the moves and decisions about what is allowed and when.

Answer 10

Get down on the floor with the cat. Talk to the cat.
While you are on the floor have some cat treats on the other side of the room. Do it often and be patient. Eventually the treats get closer to you. The cat will get to like eating treats from your hand.

When on the floor, play with cat toys.
Leave a comfy shirt that you have worn where the cat can sleep on it. The cat will get used to your scent.

When you have it in your hands, groom the cat.

Answer 11

It has taken 3 years for one of our traumatized rescue cats to come near me accept in bed (he now hops up on the arm of my chair). Be patient. Finding a treat the cat likes can help a lot too. Reward him for coming near you and talk to him gently. It has also be suggested to me, that if there is a quiet room where the cat likes to hide, to sit quietly in there and read for awhile. When you get up, leave treats where you were sitting. The goal is the get the cat to associate your scent with the treat. You can also leave treats out on a towel you have been using before you throw it in the wash (put it someplace the cat likes to go) with the same objective.