Where there's Smoke(y), there's fire...

I thought I would update everyone on how things are going with our new addition to the family. To sum it up in two words: not great. We had initially kept Smoky separate from Mira and Chaya for about a day and a half and found that Smoky was using the litter with no problem and there wasn't any serious hissing or anything going on so we decided to bring them together when we were at home (we have always kept them separated when we are at work). There has never been any actual fighting but we noticed right away that Chaya was showing a bit too much interest in Smoky. Chaya would just sit and watch her every move and when Smoky would get up and go somewhere else Chaya was not far behind. And when I say not far behind what I mean is that Chaya's nose would be around two inches from Smoky's butt. Smoky has a tendency to randomly break into a dead sprint and this simply induced Chaya to chase, which not surprisingly freaked Smoky out. With Chaya on her tail constantly Smoky has found it difficult to be comfortable enough to use the litter and she started urinating wherever she could. After a couple of days Chaya began to take swipes at Smoky whenever she managed to get close enough. After a couple of swipes and in combination with the litter problem that Smoky was having we decided that we probably needed to separate them again and try to acclimate them to each other more slowly. I have tried to read up on-line on how to address inter-cat aggression and we are trying a method that brings the cats together slowly during feeding and play times in order to try to form positive associations between the warring factions. We now have Smoky completely isolated from Mira and Chaya and we feed them on opposite sides of the same door so that they can hear each other eating. When Eric is at home during the day he lets Smoky have the run of the house and keeps the other girls sequestered in a couple of rooms and then at night we switch them. This is supposed to slowly reduce territoriality. The problems that we have had with this arrangement is that when Smoky has the run of the house she generally does okay with using the litter but she is still having accidents and you have to watch her like a hawk, which is hard to do. Secondly, when Mira and Chaya are out during the night they are constantly scratching and banging at the door to the room that Smoky is in which is irritating as hell to us and is probably very intimidating to poor Smoky. This behavior has been hard to stop as we are trying to sleep and nothing that we have tried seems to work (spraying with a water bottle and scruffing). Last night we shut them in our bedroom and then I had to put up with listening to them scratch and bang at my door trying to get out. Lastly, since we are feeding them at the door we have had to switch from free feeding to scheduled feedings twice a day. Mira and Chaya are not accustomed to this arrangement and I think some of their more recent bad behavior (all of the door banging) may be a result of this. Another problem that this has caused is that Chaya anyway has a tendency to eat too fast and not chew, and with the scheduled feedings she just overdoes it and then ends up puking. Oh, and did I mention that Mira has had horrible diarrhea for about a week and a half? If began two days after we brought Smoky home and we have been having to give her antibiotics twice a day (another fun task) which have not helped a bit. I need to call the vet again and ask what else we can do I but I really feel that she is just making herself sick with all of the stress of Smoky's arrival. I have also been very stressed as a result of all of the discord at home, I was able to fight off one cold sore, but this morning I woke up with another one and I don't have any more of my medicine so I have a feeling I am stuck with this one. We are just about at our wit's end and don't know what to do. I would feel better if I thought that anyone was comfortable with the new living arrangements but I know Eric and I are stressed, Chaya is aggressive, Mira has diarrhea, and Smoky is having daily accidents. So right now things are not good at our house and to make matters even worse it has been raining a lot which of course means that we are having very frequent power outages. Right now I just feel totally overwhelmed, helpless and hopeless. I hope it gets better, I love all three of the girls but the situation as it is right now is unsustainable. We have discussed giving it until late November/early December to improve but if this keeps up I won't be able to make it that long. If anyone has advice or suggestions, we are willing to try about anything at this point. I knew that it could be difficult but I was hoping it wouldn't be and I never imagined that it would be so bad that it would result in physical illness. I just miss the peace and quiet and harmony that we were living in just two weeks ago...