Feeling guilty over hormones

[macaronish]

I know hormones are, to an extent, normal in companion parrots. But seeing my girl hormonal is making me feel pretty guilty as a parront... since she clearly desires something she can never have as a household pet. Being hormonal doesn't make her at all aggressive or loud, she hasn't been biting or aggressive or territorial, but she's spending all her time preening and isn't responding to training or toys as distractions. I've increased her hours of darkness and am not allowing shoulder time, plus I rearranged her cage and am taking her on outings in a travel cage, but I can just tell she's unhappy. I ignore her when she makes mating displays (alone in her cage, never when we are interacting thankfully) but I'm super worried about egg binding since she came to me on a poor diet and no exercise

 

[Tara81]

Why aren't you allowing her on your shoulder? What is her diet like? Have you tried foraging toys, or simply wrapping up a millet spray stick in some paper, making some holes so she can see what is inside, then using a millet clip to clip the paper and millet to the cage? you can also stuff millet spray inside a palm finger trap. You can also make a foraging food dish, put some dry food inside a big food dish, then cover it with some paper strips, vine, balsa wood pieces, or any bird-safe materials. If it is any consolation, my cockatiel is 5 1/2 years old and since she was only 5 months old she gets hormonal often. By often I mean every 3-4 days she will stick her butt in the air and start doing her hormonal chirps. I usually try to distract her when this happens. I also try rearranging the cage every week and if it's possible you can even move the cage to a new area for a week as well. My cockatiel never shows any signs of unhappiness, unless I cannot let her out of the cage in the morning, then she screams at me. When she is moody it is usually from molting, she just sleeps more often and interacts less.