I can deal with Roxy stalking Ajax.  Ajax has problems with that, but I can probably live with it.  What I can’t live with is a cat who does not always without fail use the litter box for litter box things (barring some reasonable, rare exceptions).

She’s had a problem with soft stools, dare I say diarrhea, since we brought her into the house.  With a confirmed pregnancy, we can’t give her any medication to solve the problem.  The soft stools are not what I cannot tolerate, but the going on the rug — usually by one of the doors, but more recently on the upstairs bathroom rug — is intolerable to me.  (I can just hear the bellows from hubby if his bare feet found one of those treasures in the middle of the night!)

I’d tried all the litter box tricks I knew.  She knows to use the litter box.  I took the lids off.  I scoop them several times a day (not a bad idea no matter what).  I added a third box with a different type of litter — Natasha likes that litter better, it seems, but neither Ajax nor Roxy seemed to care, and Natasha will use either litter.  In fact, Roxy seemed to take great delight in using all three litter boxes — and the rugs (I’m not sure she takes delight in that — she does it when I’m not looking).  She knows not to go on the rugs, I believe I intercepted her once in the front hall before she could get too far into it, and she stalked off to the kitchen and used the box.  It didn’t seem to be stress from potential ambush in the box.  At night, the other two cats spend most of their time upstairs with us.  During the day, nobody seemed to bother anyone near the litter box (except Roxy who inexplicably stalked Natasha one day).

I began to wonder if this was either a territorial thing or, perhaps, given the diarrhea, a partial medical matter.  Either way, it’s unacceptable to me.  The only solution I can think of for now is to set up the big crate and give Roxy her private boudoir.  It keeps her close to the litter box, so if it’s a medical issue, she has a box handy.  It protects her from being jumped by the other cats — even though she’s the one doing all the jumping, the cage bars keep her separate from both Ajax and Natasha, so her stress should be reduced.  She has her own territory.  It also keeps the going outside the box habit from being reinforced, because she’s not in a position to do it.

Other than my discomfort at crating my cat inside the house, it seemed to be the only solution.  I can’t imagine anyone (other than dumb ole me) being willing to adopt a pregnant cat, so if we decide we must find her another home, that won’t be likely to happen until after she has the kittens and they are weaned.  The crate will also provide a safe place for her to have her kittens.

Day before yesterday, I went out to the garage and gathered the crate parts.  Remember, this crate is large enough to comfortably hold a full grown St. Bernard — four feet long by two and a half feet wide, by three feet tall.  She has a litter box, a large bed box with her food and water, and a rubber mat for laying on or scratching her claws.  She doesn’t play much, but I’ve hung a jingle ball from the top in case she wants to play tether ball.  This is where Roxy stays now when I’m not in the house to keep an eye on her or overnight.  When I’m here on the computer or in the kitchen, I let her out and limit her access to the kitchen and parlor.  She’s out now relaxing.  She willingly gets into and out of the crate (so does Ajax when the door is open — I sometimes think he wants one for himself).  I still need to hang a blanket over it to give her a darker, more isolated space which I hope will provide her a place where she’ll be comfortable having the kittens.

Ajax is still a little jumpy, and when he asks, I let him go upstairs to get away from Roxy — they both are more relaxed when I do this.

At some point, I’ll probably install another litter box upstairs.  I’d been thinking about doing that anyway.  I appreciate upstairs and downstairs bathrooms.  Why wouldn’t the cats?  But I don’t believe Roxy’s problem is inaccessible litter boxes.  For now, I’m not obsessively checking rugs before I walk on them.

I’m washing the washable rugs and spot cleaning the rest.  That way, when we get Roxy’s soft stool problem resolved and we’re ready to see if she’s trustworthy, we’ll have done what we reasonably could to set her up for success. I hope she is — I don’t really want to have to find her another home, but I’m not comfortable making her an outside kitty, either.