Cat Mystery

Do you remember a few months ago when I mentioned that one of our cats started hating the other one?  They had lived with one another peacefully for close to 4 years until Bella decided one day that she despised Monty.  It was bad.  As soon as she would see him, she would attack.  Not play attack, but "I want to cut your ear and rip out all your fur and make you scream like you are being murdered" kind of attack.  I realize that if you are not a cat person, this story will certainly not convince you of ever liking cats and you should stop reading now, but for those of you that are intrigued and might be able to provide some insight, keep reading.

All this is so strange because Bella, the younger of the two, is truly the sweetest cat I have ever owned.  She loves love.  This behavior has not changed towards humans, however she no longer wants love from Monty.  Poor Monty.

When this started 6 months ago, we immediately took Bella to Elmbrook Veterinary to have Dr. Sue examine her.  She did discover that there was blood in her urine and we treated her for a bladder infection.  I didn't blame Bella at all for lashing out when we discovered this, I'd be "pissy" too.  After 3 weeks of taking antibiotics we brought her back to get re-examined and there was still blood in her urine.  At that point we had xrays taken of her bladder and we truly thought she had bladder stones.  So, we did bladder surgery to remove the stones, but to our surprise there were no bladder stones.  Sue had run test after test and sent away numerous blood samples to try to figure out what was going on.  Of course, nothing solved our mystery and we reached a point where we didn't want to keep making Bella go through all this.  So, we put up a screened door in our hallway to separate the two cats.  One cat has the back of the house, the other has the front and our companionship.  To make things fair, we trade them out every 24 hours.

As you can imagine, a locked screened door in the hallway does not lead to good feng shui or the desire for my husband to once and for all finish that hallway.  At night, the cat that's in the back of the house makes it known around 2 am, that it does not like being the cat on the other side.  Every couple days when Drew and I are home together at night and things seem peaceful we get a toy out and play with the cats or we give them wet food together.  During those situations, they are fine together, no attacks, no puffy tail and no immediate chasing.  The other night we had the two of them actually sitting on my lap together, this was rare.  Could it be that Bella finally decided she was going to start playing nice again?

Not wanting to take any chances in the middle of the night, we separated them.  The next day, we tried to get them together again and Bella didn't want to have anything to do with him and began to attack.
After 6 months of dealing with this arrangement, it's become a part of our living situation, but honestly, I don't want to do this for another 6 months.  I have sent in my information for a casting call to the Animal Planet's show, My Cat From Hell to have Jackson Galaxy, their cat behaviorist come help us.  In their casting call, they ask: Is your cat's behavior driving you or others crazy?  YES!  Are you at your wit's end?  YES!  Do you need help getting your cat to behave? YES!

I understand how hard it is to break into Hollywood, so if you have any suggestions, please let us know.  However, don't suggest we get rid of one of the cats, I'm not that person.