Odd cat question

[stephanier.1765]

So we brought a feral cat into our home in October and his transformation into a pet has been slow but progressively better. When he does let me pet him, he no longer keeps me at the full length my arm can reach and will come within a foot or so of me, except when I go the bathroom. For some reason while I'm using the bathroom, he is super lovey dovey. He can't get enough of it and has even rubbed up against my legs. I've often sat there long after I'm done just so I can keep enjoying the love. DH says the same thing happens when he's in the bathroom. Does anyone have a guess why he let's down his barriers while we are sitting on the toilet? If I'm sitting in a chair and make any move, towards him or not, he will run. This extra love solely happens in our bathrooms.

[knitgrl]

He apparently understands how very vulnerable you are.

[Scarlett]

32 minutes ago, stephanier.1765 said:

So we brought a feral cat into our home in October and his transformation into a pet has been slow but progressively better. When he does let me pet him, he no longer keeps me at the full length my arm can reach and will come within a foot or so of me, except when I go the bathroom. For some reason while I'm using the bathroom, he is super lovey dovey. He can't get enough of it and has even rubbed up against my legs. I've often sat there long after I'm done just so I can keep enjoying the love. DH says the same thing happens when he's in the bathroom. Does anyone have a guess why he let's down his barriers while we are sitting on the toilet? If I'm sitting in a chair and make any move, towards him or not, he will run. This extra love solely happens in our bathrooms.

My cat who was a stray but never really feral is the same way.  She isn’t super affectionate any other time.  Weird.  She does like to be with me though.  Since I have been sick in bed with a closed door the last 5 days I have really noticed it.  She cries to come in with the dog and me.  Then she curls up at the end of the bed on a cedar chest and sleeps like a rock.

[Indigo Blue]

Maybe he had one good experience in that spot with you, and he now thinks every experience in that spot will be safe and positive? My cat was very hard to win over, but, even now, if she has a positive experience in one place she will run to me if she sees me in that safe/good experience place. For example, I was once standing right in front of our TV, and she stretched up on my legs wanting me to pick her up. I stood, holding her while watching TV and loving her. 
 

Now, I can’t stand in that same spot without her trying to recreate that experience. I could take 5 steps back and she wouldn’t care. In that magic spot, she meows loudly for me to pick her up. Every time. And…she also does this when I’m in the bathroom, because she’s also had lots of positive experiences there. I guess it just gets, unbeknownst to us, reinforced. 

[Indigo Blue]

And my son’s cat, who is normally very sweet, will hiss for the first 24 hours of being at my house. It’s because of my cat. They do not like each other. She does this because she is stressed. All of the close encounters/bad experiences have happened in the living room/kitchen, but never in my son’s room. That is her safe place. So, if you try to love her, she will stand and hiss at you. But she will gladly follow you into her safe room, where all hissing ceases and she is her normal, sweet self. She’s never had a bad experience there. 
 

We do keep them separate, but there have been a few under the door fights and accidents where one escapes and there is a quick shuffle to contain them. But it has never happened in her safe room. After she’s been there for a day, she stops hissing completely. She just needs time to de-stress herself. 

[Pawz4me]

My guess is that he feels safer to let down his guard in the smaller confines of the bathroom. Plus cats and dogs are super, super good observers of humans. He knows when a human sits on the toilet they're likely to be still for a little while.

[livetoread]

Our very traumatized foster cat had a petting spot on one end of a specific sofa for several months when he first came to us. If we sat in that spot, he would jump on our laps and settle in, but no where else, even further down the sofa. He'd cry for us until we went and sat in that spot. We gradually got him accustomed to petting him in other areas of the house, but he's still skittish until it has happened a lot. 

[Tenaj]

My cat was similar because she knew I was going to flush and there was going to fresh water in the bowl for a nice cold drink 😂. She refused to drink water from her bowl, only the toilet or by dipping her paws into one of our water glasses.

[stephanier.1765]

I wish I could get into the psyche of cats. The examples and ideas you guys have just reinforces my thought that cats are weird but also so very interesting. Each of my five are so completely unique from one another, that while I find them both fascinating and utterly amusing, I know I will never truly understand them. But I try. I keep thinking if I just could understand this new guy's quirks and idiosyncrasies, I could help him realize we are the good guys.

44 minutes ago, Tenaj said:

My cat was similar because she knew I was going to flush and there was going to fresh water in the bowl for a nice cold drink 😂. She refused to drink water from her bowl, only the toilet or by dipping her paws into one of our water glasses.

We have to keep the lid down on the toilets because we have one cat that will drop her toys into them. 😸 But yes to the paws in water glasses. Yuck! We finally caved and now leave one on an end table just for their use in hopes they'll leave ours alone. Our one that is the biggest paw dipper even drinks that way from their water bowls. It's the oddest thing to watch.