Hi,

I'm hoping to get some advice from more experienced cat owners here. I realize I may be oversensitive and freaking out :)
I brought my two bengal sisters home from the vet for their spay surgery. Ever since, these two cats, who were inseparable, cannot be together.
My own cat Kobe recognizes her sister, but her sister hisses/hits, etc. upon site.
We've separated the two are are trying to reintroduce, but her sister is still freaking out....almost like she's possessed. I'm sensitive because I can see that Kobe is visibly upset that her sister hates her. If I leave Kobe alone for even 1 minute to go to the restroom, she's meowing uncontrollably and claws at the door until I come back.

Will this stop with time? I'm scared that these two sisters will never be able to be together!
I called the vet and she wasn't much help....basically said if they are still not able to be together after 14 days, let them know....fine, but really? they are sisters...could this even be an option? Help :)

When cats have surgery it can make them smell medical and other cats won't like it, basically they smell different and injured. Often when reintroducing cats after being in the vets it's an idea to wipe them down if they smell very medical.

If you have any blankets that they slept on previously you can use that to rub them down also my breeder told me you can put some Feliway (travel spray) on your hands and rub it onto their coat so they smell more like a cat and less like a vet surgery. I also recommend actually using a Feliway plug in within your home as well just to calm them down.

I would think that the time at the vets was stressful for them and being reminded could upset her, also did anything happen at the vets prior to you picking them up? Where they being kept in the same holding cage/kennel? If so maybe something happened at the vets between them?

Try and treat it like you are reintroducing cats, have them sleep on separate blankets in separate rooms and then swap the blankets over, start reintroducing them during play time get a toy like the da bird out and play with them both and get them to play with each other with you, they may then start seeing each other as fun again and then very gradually if this works and they are acting friendlier start allowing them to spend more and more time together and just reintegrate them.

To me it sounds like stress and anxiety due to smelling different but I would take them back to the vets for a check up as the other reason why cats attack is if something hurts still. How do their wound sites look? Are they ok in themselves besides this with eating? Are they using litter trays properly etc.

Only other thing you could do if they are healthy and no medical concerns is put the stressed out girl on a short course of Zylkene which works wonders for extreme anxiety issues, it's just a natural milk protein and you put it in their food daily for a couple of weeks and it calms them down.

Good luck and I hope it gets better and this is just a short blip.

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- Sarah
Arya 24/04/16 - Seal Lynx Point Rosetted Bengal
Griffith 16/04/16 - Silver Seal Lynx Point Rosetted Bengal
Mina (in my avatar)- 1999-2016 - Seal Mink Spotted Bengal (Snow) - run free at rainbow bridge

Sarah gave you great advice. It could definitely be the smell from the vet office. Plus, the spay surgery is not fun for the kitty and it takes time for the anesthesia to wear off. You need to attempt to re-introduce them as if they were new kitties at your house. Swap scents. I do believe this is just temporary, so just give it time and have patience. They are siblings who have spent their entire lives together and I'm sure they will be back to being great siblings soon.

Hi Ladies,

The spay surgery was last Friday and it's Wednesday and still no luck. I've tried everything...blankets, switching rooms where they've slept, sprays, plugs, reintroducing during meal/play time, and still no luck.
One sister is so excited to see the other one, and the other is having nothing of it - growling like maniac, and at times jumping at her like she will attack.
I'm scared now that they will always be like this!

They don't seem like they are in pain. When they are separated, they purr like crazy on us and want to cuddle. They both want to be with us all the time. One cat, Kobe, never used to sleep with us, and now she's always on the bed, purring and rolling around.
They seem great, just not with each other.

I do know when they were at the vet, they were put in the same cage, but one cat (apparently the one who is a sweetheart right now) had an anxiety attack and did kick her sister (the one who is freaking out right now). They where then separated. It's hard for me to believe it was Kobe given she's so sweet now. When her sister is misbehaving and we have to separate them, she runs to the door and tries to meow at the door just to be close to her.

Will they be back to normal? I'm counting the days and it seems to be dragging out..... it's horrible, more for me than the cats!

I just checked her incision and it looks like today it's not healing as nicely.... I'm thinking to monitor it over the next day before I traumatize her again by taking her to the vet. I see some redness and it's not closed up like the other cat, who's incision is completely healed.

Most of all you need to take a step back, and chill out. They will be fine again together but you are trying way too hard and you are probably doing more harm than good with you efforts to get them back together. They will be friends again, but they have to get well and get over what was clearly a traumatic experience. There is a whole bunch of stuff going on here imo.

1. When a cat isn't feeling well they want to stay away from competition, other predators etc. So you should be more focused on getting them well and less worried about their social issues. Just keep them apart. No more introductions or scent swapping or anything else. And by all means take your sick kitty back to the vet to get the wound sorted out.

2. I think your stress is probably affecting them negatively. Just chill, everything is going to be fine.

3. So much of a cats behavior is about positive and negative associations. They just had a bad experience and the fact that they shared that probably has them thinking "last time I was with that other cat something really bad happened... Was that the other cats doing? Is that going to happen again if I hang out with her"? And then every time they come back together and have hissing or growling or worse it just cements those bad associations.

My guess is the best way to break that is to just keep them apart for a while. And stop looking at the calendar and worrying about whether it's been too long etc. If it takes a few weeks then it takes a few weeks. When they are feeling well and secure in their home, and both smell like their home and not the vet, then you can start worrying about building up those positive associations again.

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The little monsters 3

As Brian says above, relax. They will pick up on your anxiety.

It will be okay. I have two brothers and I get this every single time they go to the vet, separately or together. If I take Hendrix (who is the usual one to end up at the vet), jagger won't talk to him for at least a week. Growling and hissing, looks like he will attack. Even when I take them together, I get the same reaction from Jagger towards Hendrix as he seems to blame Hendrix for the fact he's there! And it will still take a week for him to forgive hendrix! He has even jumped down from the vets examination table and had a good hiss at hendrix in his carrier.

When I get chance, if they've gone separately, I will give the one who's been to the vet a good wipe down with a grooming wipe and try to get as much vet smell off as I can before the other sees him. I do the same with the carrier as jagger will be aggressive towards that as well.

If you are worried about one of their incisions, give the vet a call and they will let you know if you need to take her in to be looked at. To be honest, they're not getting on right now anyway, so you may as well get her checked out if you're worried.

The other thing you could do to help things along, is just keep stroking one, and then go straight to the other, stroke her and wipe their scents all over each other. I do this quite often after a vet visit to help things along.

But don't worry or fret, they'll get there in the end!

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Clare
Hendrix and Jagger, Brown Marble Boys (born 18 August 2013)
Hampshire, UK

Thanks everyone. I took her to the vet today and she did have an infection and slight opening of the stitches, so they glued it back and just letting her rest. She was likely in a lot of pain still, which was why she was not happy. I'm sure she will be back to normal soon.

Happy to hear you took her back to the vet. When you notice something is not right -- such as the redness, it indicates an infection as you found out. Hang in there. You were given excellent advice, so just follow it. Time and patience are needed -- lots of it. We'd love an update when things are back to normal.

UPDATE:

So I took her to the vet Thursday morning as mentioned on the Board due to a slight opening of the incision and I noticed an infection. The vet looked at it, gave me some antibiotics and glued it back together. Later on the evening, my husband and I were sitting down to watch a movie and we noticed a smell, we opened up her onesie and noticed the WHOLE incision was completely opened and the infection was much worse - we ran to the emergency and got it cleaned out and brought her to the vet yesterday morning.

Apparently our family vet wasn't able to see the full infection before he closed it (according to the emergency vet it can be hard to see), and the pressure of it opened up the full incision.

He put her under surgery, cleaned out the infection, removed the dead tissue and stitched her back up (with actual stitches vs glue).
Ever since we brought her home now, she seems MUCH happier and calm.

I'm so happy she's feeling better and pray that she'll have a speedy recovery.

Oh my gosh. How terrifying for all of you, especially the little girl. Happily things are improving. The infection must have been horrible for it to burst open the incision and thankfully, there are emergency vets in your area to deal with this. A happy kitty makes for a happy life. Hopefully, she can now recover.

yes what an improvement since the second surgery!
I think something happened right from the beginning....but she's much calmer now.
Yes, she still hisses at her sister, but this morning, they even ate from the same bowl..... I'm happy with that
Priority now is just getting her to rest and recover.