uh oh Mom Milla can't recognize her boy Casper and hisses at him now?

[Joe_Danger]

Everything has been fantastic since I last posted here, Kala got back to wet food a month later and now is addicted to Whiskas salmon I believe.
Everyone has been doing great, I don't mind self isolating one bit, working form home, gaming, taking a break from all the downright insane people I am/was friends with and honestly life has been amazing even amid the pandemic.

Well all three cats got some sort of a cold last week and everyone's right eye has been very runny, we started them on antibiotics 3 days ago as per our vet's advice. They are happy, eat a lot, play a lot so other than their noses being stuffed up and everyone's right eye being very runny they've been fine....well something happened tho

Casper and Kala have NEVER had runny eyes this bad, especially not Casper.
So he has a big brown/reddish splodge on his face despite being regularly cleaned.
Milla all of a sudden doesn't recognize her own son, she hisses at him the moment he approaches his mom, Casper is scared and confused and doesn't know what to do.

I tried swapping scents and everything, feeding them next to one another and all, but it's as if she has no idea who he is and he is fine with her as always.
They haven't been apart, he hasn't gotten himself into anything that could make him smell different, Kala has stains around her eyes too but Milla is ok with her, guess due to her fur not being pure white it's not as dreastic of a change.

Should I be worried?
I'm worried about this escalating, you know how cats can get especially with litter box issues, mine have been perfect but still. Casper and Kala had a squabble once and he did poop out of the litter box a couple times during those days but that ended well.

Milla tho? She's never acted this way towards her kittens before, it's as if she has no idea who he is
She's also been very agitated and constantly mewoing at me for two nights in a row asking for something...is she looking for Casper whom she can't recognize?

I'm sure this is going to sort itself out but I wanted to share it with someone who understands cats if that's ok

[Joe_Danger]

This is the only photo I have that shows his stain, could Milla really be freaking out over this?
He's never had something like that before tho

it's not infected, just the normal rust color for persians

[Ruth B]

Glad to hear you are doing okay and not suffering during lockdown.

My thought would be that Milla might have lost some of her sense of smell due to having a cold herself, or that the antibiotics have changed Casper's scent a bit. It could also be that she is feeling a bit under the weather and wants to be left alone or finds Casper's attention a little too intense at the moment. Try with the normal treats and toys when they are close together so she keeps associating being near him with something good happening.

If it carries on or gets worse then it might be worth getting her vet checked when you can just to make sure there is no other problem that could be making her feel out of sorts.

I'm sure others will be on with their ideas as well.

[Joe_Danger]

yeah I think it's definitely a smell issue
There's probably the smell of anti biotics too tho that's never bothered her before, but Casper has never had this happen to him before and the longer the fur stays wet the more it starts to smell of like wet cloth or something, I've smelled it on Anastasia , my beautiful persian before these guys as well as on Milla a few times, so even tho we can't sense it, Milla probably does and it bothers her as her boy never smelled like that before.

[Joe_Danger]

I can confirm with 90% certinaty that it is indeed the stain and maybe the smell it has if it has any that bothers her because she is fine with him as long as she doesn't see his face lol
Like she was grooming him from behind the other night and everything was normal, but when poor Casper turned towards her she got confused, a bit startled and hissed at him.

Cats are weird
but this reminds me of an incident when Casper was very little and peed inside a food bowl, she beat him up real good then, she did the same with the other kitten Medo.
Also whenever Casper's butt isn't clean as embarrassing as it sounds Milla gets upset tho it hasn't happened in a while so I kinda forgot about that.

I guess at least now we know it's the stain that bothers her
hopefully she gets used to it.

sorry if im a bother but i wanted to post closure to the situation because i feel it could help someone in the future.

[fjm]

It does sound as if she is worried by the stain, rather than a change of smell. Can you speed up getting his face back to normal by clipping away the stained hair? When my papillon had bad stains from teething I found keeping the area clean and dry was the most effective treatment, bathing and drying thoroughly several times a day. Chicken helped to make it acceptable!

[Joe_Danger]

Milla definitely has some kind of psychological issues, not something that can be sorted out in my country tho.
Ever since this whole thing started, she's been crying in her sleep and wakes up frightened, she just did it again, has been doing it for almost two weeks now.

She is clearly terrified of this stain, it's not something that can be clipped out or anything, it's going to have to go away on its own, I'm just afraid of how this is starting to affect her.
The cats have zero stress in this house, I can't explain why she is being like this.

[Mollycat]

Just because humans can't understand the source of a cat's stress doesn't mean it doesn't exist. The key I believe is to try our best to see their sense of their world and work with them ourselves - no vet or animal behaviourist can see what we see or understand the pets in our charge like we can, living with them day to day.

As for bad dreams, my girl went through a phase of waking up crying and distressed and it seemed to help her process her past traumas as she came out of that phase much calmer, less nervous and more loving. This has completely convinced me that they do as we do and process traumas through dreams and most likely in every other way we do too, except of course talking it over.

You might think it's crazy but would you consider trying a communication session with her? With a little practice you can do this yourself. I have used this one successfully half a dozen times with different animals https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnEJGjwomxI&t=341s

[Joe_Danger]

Happy to report that it was indeed the stain, since my last post the stain has been fading away and with that Milla's normal behavior toward Casper resumed, no hissing, no avoiding, she also doesn't seem to have night terrors anymore.
It specifically stopped when we managed to whiten the stain up as much as possible, now it just looks like a light gray spot which doesn't seem to be a problem for his mom anymore.

What a strange thing to get stressed out over