Recently my partner and I got a wonderful little kitten named Burnie. He’s a long haired black cat who loves to play and roam around the house. I had an older senior cat who is about fifteen years old and is not super interested in the younger cat, but that’s okay. We’ve been socializing them and over the past few months they have learned to got together and coexist peacefully. Originally our kitten was a little aggressive and wanted to play fight and wrestle all of the time, but after we got him fixed and have been working on training and no biting with him he’s calmed down and is very lovey towards the family.
Where the conflict begins is that the cat has been bonding with me more than my partner even though we originally intended for the cat to be for my partner. The main reason I think that it has happened the way it has is because my partner’s work schedules requires them to be gone for twelve hours of the day for four days of the week. The other side of that is that I am the one who is at home. My schedule is relatively normal. Five days a week 8 to 5 schedule. I have been giving him attention when he asks for it, but I’m not going overboard to cater to him. I only give him attention when he comes to me. We have both been spending time playing with the cats to make sire they know they are treated fairly and have proper exercise and stimulation. My older cat has been fine with it and has even been cleaning the kitten. I will be laying on the couch and the two of them will come to lay on my chest together. They still fight sometimes and will bap at each other and wrestle, but are easily separated whenever it happens.
My partner has discussed that they are upset with how the kitten has bonded with me more than them and I want to be understanding because we did this kitten for them. It is difficult because while these discussions happen the kitten will actively meow at me for attention and I have a hard time trying to make my piece. The reason I made this post though was because of a comment that was made the other day that has been echoing in my head. During some time at home, I had gotten home and was resting on the couch and the two cats start coming to me, but they started to wrestle when they got close. My partner looked at me and said, "You know you’re the reason they hate each other, right?" I responded asking for an explanation. They had told me that because the two of them were bonded to me that they now both had to fight for my approval and affection and if I had let the kitten bond to my partner we wouldn’t be having these issues. I told them that that shouldn’t be a problem and that they are both loved just like our literal child.
AITA? I don’t want to feel like I’m overstepping anything, but I want unbiased and fair analysis, please.
NTA cats will pick who they bond with no matter what you do. The older cat probably had more influence than anything else over who the kitten looks to because cats do follow a hierarchy of sorts and they learn from their elders.
In my experience the gender of the cat can also play a small role in who they prefer but I am not a cat expert.
As someone who was designated the spare human at one point, I do understand the hurt your partner is feeling but animals have free will too.
Yeah, I mean. I’ve had pets or had partners with pets where I wasn’t particularly engaged with, and that’s ok.
Ffs, we’re supposed to be sophisticated enough to have pets, not be all weirdly butthurt about stuff like cats themselves lol
NTA. Cats are cats.
My partner frequently complains that the cats love me more. And while I deny it every time it is true. It is especially hard for us because we had a beautiful cat who was firmly hers but lost him a few years ago.
Cats choose their humans. We got a pair of cats, one chose me, one chose her. Same environment, same stimulus, different decisions. You can’t control what a cat is going to do, you can influence it but they make up their own minds.
I also doubt your cats hate each other. Cats get jealous and play rough but they bond like siblings. We had two cats that fought constantly, never damaging the other but constant battles for dominance. One day the larger boy was outside and cried out in pain (fight with another cat, his own fault). As I opened the door the other one shot outside and went to assist him, while they fought each other they unquestioningly backed each other up against an outside threat, like siblings do.