procrastinated on spaying, cat in heat

[Llyra]

Okay, so I got lazy and neglected to take my 8-month old female kitten in for spaying, and I'm pretty sure she's in her first heat. She's hanging around rubbing on anything alive, yowling at the top of her lungs, and presenting her rear end, and licking at her genitals a LOT. She's also been driving my two older neutered male cats CRAZY trying to rub her butt in their faces. So that sounds like being in heat, right? This is our first cat who was allowed to go so long without desexing. I was trying to save up the money to have it done, and then other stuff happened, and I never got to it.

I realize I need to keep her from getting outside. I don't want kittens, no way, and I don't want her tangling with strays. She doesn't usually go out, but all day she's been hanging around the doors and windows looking for her main chance.

But I have three other questions:
1. I heard female cats in heat can spray. Is this true? Yikes! I don't want that.

so

2. How long will this last?

and

3. Is there anything a vet can do to calm her, so that she won't spray?

I know she needs to be spayed as soon as she calms down again we'll take her in. I'll put it on a credit card if I have to.

[LeahBoo]

Ugh, that's tough. I have known 2 people in this exact situation. Both finally relented and let the cat out. I know you won't do this, neither of these people were terribly responsible when it came to pets. But it will get super annoying to the point where you will consider it, even just for a split second. I don't know about spraying.

[springbride]

I ready somewhere that peppermint extract will calm a cat down. When our cat was in heat I gave her a couple of drops on her tongue and it seemed to help. I believed she was in heat for about a week.
Also, at night we would put her in a travel kennel and put towels over it so she would sleep, otherwise she yowled outside our door all-night!
GL!

[Llyra]

Thanks! I think she's done now, and I'm gonna have her spayed next week, so this should be our last episode of this. I found, actually, that if I kept all the doors and windows closed all the time, that she settled down a bit, enough that she managed to get some sleep. There are a lot of strays around here-- my neighbor is a "cat lady"-- and I think my cat was attracting every male for miles around. Once she was sealed off from the outdoors, she seemed to calm a lot.

Thank heaven, because I was getting so tired of hearing the YOWLING.