Progessing!

Hello everybody!

Here are some updates on Lee’s progress.

It’s been now 2 weeks that Lee is completely in the Amber stage without any cardboard to partially cover the hole. I have to say that it’s been hard.

To pee, she was very naggy in the beginning, meowing a lot and complaining about the LK, but after 2 days she was fine with it and we would let her go alone without worrying about an accident. Number 2 however was much harder…

She pooped on the floor once, but mostly we have avoided that by putting her up whenever she starts digging on the floor. During these past two weeks Lee has basically held her poop for as long as she could (which means 48h). When she finally decides to poop we had to put her up in the litter kwitter 9 times (in the first time), 5-7 times in the subsequence 3 times, but only twice 3 days ago. This means she is getting better and more comfortable with it.

But something very nice happened yesterday. As usual, she was meowing a lot (which means she needs to go) and going back and forth to the bathroom. I went there to help her. When I arrived she was digging on the floor. I talked to her, saying it was wrong and that she should do up the toilet. She actually jumped up to the LK and pooped without me even touching her! I was so happy! She got extra snacks for her good job! I’m not sure if she will do the same today or tomorrow, but that’s already a start.

Therefore, if you have a cat that is struggling with the amber stage, don’t give up! Put them up the LK and be with them until they are done. Pet them and give them rewards once they do it right! It may take time, but it eventually works. It’s just a matter of making them confident enough to use the LK and not fall inside the hole.

Good luck for us all!

Full Amber Stage

Hello!

Updates from Lee in the amber stage.

Yesterday I came home and, as usual, Lee was waiting for me to get home to use the toilet. She hopped up, smelled the LK and went down, meowing and complaining about something.

I came close to the LK and felt a strong smell of urine. It was coming from her cardboard (as usual). I tried to clean it with hot water, but the cardboard was somehow soaked in urine. I removed the cardboard and cleaned the LK with hot water. Since I did not have more cardboard at home and because I am a bit tired of changing and cleaning these cardboards (it's been 2-3 weeks already!), I've decided not to put it back on and leave Lee in full amber mode.

First thing Lee did was to put her head and half of her body through the hole of the LK and drink water from the toilet. She loves doing this. Sometimes I think she has difficulty to pee in the toilet because she thinks it's her water bowl...

I had to put her up once or twice and then she decided to pee. She meowed and complained, but that's just how life is. She did not want to poop though.

This morning she woke us up at 6.30 AM with a very ugly meow (typical of when she wants to use the toilet). I got up twice, opened the door of the bathroom (we keep it closed because otherwise she poops on the floor when we are not watching her), and put her up the LK several times. She always starts to dig on the floor, I put her up, she smells and goes down to dig on the floor again. And this goes on for a long time, until she gives up, goes out of the toilet and I go back to bed. 5 min later she starts meowing again. I got up and repeated the process. Went back to bed. 5 min later, meows again. My boyfriend got up, open the bathroom, put her up twice until she realized there was no other way and pooped on the LK! Victory!!!

 

It's important that everyone in the household follows the same procedure to train the cat on the LK. If the cat realizes that one person does not mind if she/he does it on the floor, in the bathtub or i the rug, or is a bit slower to force him/her to use the LK, that is the person the cat will look for when it wants to pee/poop. It's obvious. Make sure everyone in on the same page in your house when training your cat! Lee often does that. She tries to make me open the door and let her poop on the floor. When it doesn't work, she goes to my boyfriend, but he does the same thing as me. So she gives up and poops in the LK.

Let's see how it evolves. Now I just want her to be comfortable enough to do her business alone in the LK. After that, I'll slowly move to the green stage.

Amber Stage - Poop on the floor

Hi there!
I've made this special post on "Poop on the floor" because that is the most common problem with amber stage which seems very hard to solve. Some peple try blocking all the floor area with stuff so that their cats don't have space to do it there. This was not practical for me, so I had to come up with something else...

Ok, so you have seen how to use the cardboard method. If you need more details, click here.

In our first day with the cardboard method, we made a very tiny hole, almost not enough for your thumb to go through.

Lee was just fine with that.

Next day we cut a bigger whole (twice the size). Lee was still fine with that.

Next weekend we had to go away from home and we left her with this ring without further increasing the hole. We had a friend coming over to check on her and we did not want Lee to leave him any bad surprises. So we decided to play it safe.

She did number 1 and 2 on the LK in the first day, no problems. However, in the second day (with even more pee) the cardboard started to get soaked with pee (we had not sealed completely the sides of the hole with tape and there was even litter stuck between the ring and the cardboard - that's when we realized how important it is to seal everything!). With the bad smell (for us it was not so bad, but for a cat it certainly was) Lee refused to go there and pooped on the floor, in front of the toilet!

Ok, we came back and cleaned everything. We put a new cardboard with a bigger hole. Lee had some hesitation to go at first.  Soon she was peeing there without problems, but number 2 is always problematic. We had to put her up in the LK a few times so she wouldn’t do it on the floor. She would go up and down the toilet until she felt confident to go in the LK, but we had to be with her every single time. I thought she would never learn to do it alone. After around 1 very frustrated week, she decided to poop in the right place alone all by herself!!! We were very glad, and she received extra treats (oh, yeah, we always give her some yummy snacks after she pee or poops n the LK).

After a few days, we used a cardboard that covered only half of the hole in the LK. That was an even bigger step for her, and difficulties appeared everyday. In the first day she didn’t poop, but peed on the LK. In the second day, she pooped on the floor and right after she also peed on the floor (that was her only pee accident so far). That was really hard on me. I thought I had done everything wrong, but apparently it was only her way of saying she is not happy with the change in the cardboard.

In the next morning, I stayed with her in the bathroom and she peed in the LK. From that day on she continued to follow her to the bathroom, but after 3 days we were confident enough to let her go alone to pee and we had no more accidents. 

But the pooping was hard. There would be poop on the floor everyday. 

This is what I did to solve the problem: put her up the toilet once or twice. She would go down immediately and start digging on the floor. I would then wait for her to "sit", ready to poop, and then put her up the toilet. Of course this works, because cats don't move after they've started to evacuate. But like that she was not learning anything at all. She would learn that she could still start on the floor and then she would suddenly appear in the LK. WRONG!

After one week using this method, which completely failed to teach her anything, I've decided to do it differently. I decided to put her up in the LK immediately after she came down from it. Without stopping until she would finally decide to start digging the litter in the LK. In the first day I put her up 7 times until she started to smell and dig her litter. She then turned around a few times, dug some more and pooped! 

In day 2 I had to put her up 5 times. 
In day 3 I put her up twice only.
From day 4 I would just go with her to the toilet and she would poop in the right place.   

Now she knows where she has to poop. However, that doesn't mean she is comfortable with it: there is still some balancing problems, small space for standing and pooping, not a lot of litter and so on.

Because of that, every single time that she had the chance to poop on the floor in front of the toilet, she would do it. The only way to avoid that is to be with her, giving her some encouraging words and eventually putting her up the toilet. We then keep the door of the bathroom closed until she wants to poop (she just stands in front of the door) and then we support her. Once she has already pooped (she does it only once a day), we leave the door open. Fairly simple, no? Not at all. We forgot the door open 3 times this week and we got 3 poops on the floor. Our fault there. 

So this is where we stand right now. Lee can pee without problems in the LK (amber stage with half of the hole covered by a cardboard), but can only poop there if we help her. If you are in the same stage, with similar problems, don't give up! Leave a comment and let's go through it together!