Cat Drama

We've been having some issues with our cat, Belle. She has been urinating outside of her litter box off and on for awhile now on our new couches (!) and especially on our papasan chair. It got so bad, that we seriously considered throwing the chair away and getting a new one that has wipeable upholstery, like leather. Up until recently I thought she was peeing on things because she was upset about something because it seemed to happen right after clipping her nails or being away for the entire day. Yes, she is THAT kind of cat. However, in the past week or so the peeing got so frequent that Anthony and I decided that there must be something wrong. I happened to have a UTI test strip from the pharmacy, made for humans of course, and we actually got her to pee on it. It tested positive, so I quickly made an appointment with the vet. (It turns out the cat urine will always make the test strip positive, but hey, we tried :)

So, today was her appointment and man was it an experience! It turns out that cats rarely get urinary problems related to bacteria, or actual infections. Usually their problems stem from inflammation and Ph imbalances in their urine. Dr. Bob (our vet) diagnosed her with Feline Idiopathic Cystitis, which believe it or not is mainly associated with psychological stress! Apparently, our rambunctious puppy has stressed her out to the point of physical illness! Our vet gave us a list of strategies to help her reduce her stress and encourage her to take in more fluids. I guess it makes sense considering she has to go through a puppy gauntlet to get to her food and litter box and she has to share the water bowl with the dogs who take every chance they can get to attack her. The kicker of all of this is that our vet also wrote Belle a prescription for Valium!!!! My dogs stressed out my cat so much that now she has to be on a sedative!!