my cat has been showing a lot of changes in her behaviour since her brother had to be put to sleep a few months ago. she used to be very timid and skittish, would run away from visitors in the house and wouldnt allow anyone to pet her except myself and my mother.

since she has been on her own she has become much more social and 'talks' a lot, will happily sit with the family and even follow us around wanting attention. while some of these new behaviour traits are nice im slightly concerned about how much attention she seems to want, we are a normal busy family and cant often spend hours at a time just sitting petting her and playing with her like she wants.

she also put on a lot of weight i believe this may be because spike had quite a dominant personality and she wouldnt eat until he had finished so now he's gone she eats more. we are now monitering her food amounts and have put her on diet cat biscuit mix as recomended by the vet; but i think the other reason is that she has become very afraid of going outside and will not leave the house except to go to the toilet and even then she will stay as close to the house as possible.

the number of other cats that come into our garden has increased dramatically since spike died and she seems very frightened of them and even when they're not around will only sit at the door and look out over the garden instead of going outside. im worried that as she was previously mainly an outdoors cat being so sedentary could have a serious effect on her health.

the vet said her new behaviours arent unusual for a cat who has previously had a companion and then lost them and suggested perhaps getting a new kitten may calm her, however because of her previous behaviour traits im not sure if she could cope with the stress as she is six years old and has only just gained a reasonably calm temperment and my mother is worried that in particular a male kitten would just boss her around like spike used to and she would regress.

if anyone has any advice or suggestions for anything i could do to help her please let me know, it would be much appreciated!

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