Not a pleasant story, but certainly ends pleasantly enough
I recall once joining my sister as she visited this one person who owned a field and like tons of animals, and at the time I wasn’t paying the sharpest attention, but I remember the owner of the cat she was buying was trying to brush this Persian cat’s fur; I remember the cat was shockingly wild and vicious, and thinking ‘Ah man, and I’m going to be in the same car as this damn thing’. My sister yelled at the guy to stop and to just hand her the cat, so he did; I didn’t know at the time why she was being so rude to the guy.
When we got in the car and drove off, with the cat in the backseat, I remember the cat calmly just hops between us and then sits in my lap with no fuss, or any kind of hissiness whatsoever. Absolutely calmest cat I’d ever seen.
My sister then told me the owner was extremely abusive towards this cat; for one thing he’d had the cat declawed (which at the time I didn’t see the issue with, but then I found out that claws are basically like fingers to cats), and he’d stuck the cat in a cage between two very angry dog cages, and that cage in that place was its life for who knows how long. My older sister is very friendly but she gets a visceral reaction towards animal abusers (I still remember when we went to a horse jumping show, she nearly jumped out of the stadium to throttle a jockey who got angry at his horse and slapped it).
The cat was shockingly calm at home, and didn’t seem to have any interest in hunting either; my other two siblings were very young at the time and were very heavyhanded/harsh/don’t know their own strength pet fans (tight hugs, very heavy petting, that kind of thing); they loved the cat to bits but the cat didn’t like them, but the cat never showed any aggression towards them in the slightest, only fleeing and hiding when it had the chance. I never saw the viciousness in that cat like I had when it was with its former owner. If I didn’t know what trauma in animals looks like, this cat was 100% the clearest show of it.
Ultimately its life at our home was obviously a much better situation for it; it eventually got dementia and died a fair number of years back but at least it was with a family that mostly liked it (I am not a pet person in the slightest; I like animals, but not in my own house).
It’s an old story but I thought I’d share it because I’ve always considered my older sister to be a really awesome person and I thought perhaps folks here might appreciate the story.
yeah don’t ever declaw cats, it’s like chopping off the tip of your finger, should be outlawed everywhere.
Even without the fact that it actually involves taking part of the bone with it, like, we use tearing people’s fingernails out as literal torture. But for some reason people think “oh you’re just removing the claws? cool”
A lot of abused pets require indefinite/substantial counseling and accommodations to function. Very lucky she got a cat that could tolerate a house full of children without refusing to eat or something.
I don’t know if my littlest cat was abused but she sure as shit seems to have gotten lifelong trauma from her life on the streets before i found her. She’s so skittish, has random very intense fears (i.e. the sound of plastic bags…). Sometimes she doesn’t eat unless I put my hand on her back and it’s like, girl, come on, I can’t do this all night 😭
I’ve taken care of a lot of stray cats, the trick is to do exactly what you are doing but to gently and steadily introduce changes. Lift your hand once she starts to chew a bite and put it back when she dips her head to get another bite. Get her to chew and swallow without your hand. That’s step one. You could try making a certain noise - a soothing chirp or meow or hum or whatever and do that as you start the touch so the touch never comes “unannounced.”
My brainstorm is a bit dry but those are a couple things that might help.
Oh thank you but it’s fine ive had her for like 7 years now lol
She still sometimes does the thing where she won’t eat for a bit but it’s more like she wants me to touch her more than she wants to eat so i either need to put my hand on her back until she starts eating or just like ignore her and she’ll usually start eating after a minute of staring at my hand
Haha yeah you’re good then, poor silly little critters, I love them but they can be such wingnuts at (especially feeding!) times
i took in a feral weirdo that had been squatting in a friends place. he ran into their basement area and wouldn’t leave. was also terrified of all humans. he was tiny and we all believe he had been mistreated by somebody. my friend already had 4 cats so he called me in desperation because my last cat had died of old age the previous year. “your cat died, come take this cat please”.
so i go get this cat and he wants nothing to do with me. scared as shit. i set him up in my house with all the stuff in a quiet room with lots of hiding places and then ignored him. i didn’t even see him for like 2 days. just food gone and new poops.
we’ve been together for nearly a decade now. he likes to sleep with his face nuzzled into the crook of my arm. he’s really pushy about it. he also likes to rub his face into my face, and likes when i rub my face into his belly, and is the most affectionate bozo i have ever seen. just comes up and boops my nose with his wet little nose. it’s like a game we play where i ignore him until he quietly makes it impossible to do so by being in my face with his face, eyeball to eyeball.
he doesn’t trust other humans though. hides always. people are like “you have a cat?” because they see the bowl. he’s also super chatty and trilly when we’re alone. he saves all his socializing for me, i guess.
Your sister sounds cool as hell! Everyone should be nice to animals. So many people if not outright abusive just dont respect them. My dad doesnt get why my cat doesnt like him. He wears shoes all the time and clomps around, talks to her super loud, towers over here and tries to pet the top of her head. Yeah, she doesnt like that and I raised her not to put up with anyone’s bullshit including mine. If im bugging her she is totally allowed to swat and hiss to let me know. Just an attempt at understanding them seems too much even to many that wanna have animals in their house.
When I got my current corgi, I was told that she isn’t good around young children. I kept her on a short leash around kids when walking outside for a while, but as more and more kids would ask to pet her, since she seemed very calm, I eventually realized why I was told that.
She came from a home with 3 small kids and a 4th on the way, and 2 bigger dogs, one of which bit her nose and left a permanent indent (not big, but there if you know where to look) on her nose.
She didn’t dislike kids, she just felt neglected and acted out. She’s been the sweetest darling angel for the past 5 years and has never misbehaved once.
My current dog was underweight when I got her, and I found out that she was basically really neglected at her original home, which explains the really bad anxiety and acting out she did when I first got her. She was so aggressive my mom’s retriever refused to be in the same room as her after a day, her separation anxiety was completely debilitating, she didn’t have any social skills and didn’t know any commands, but living with me she got the one on one attention she needed, a lot of social time in “neutral areas” like parks, and without any other dogs to compete with she was even able to move to grazing on food from a dispenser instead of having a strict feeding schedule.
Five years of good care later and she’s very chill, and can even spend a long time with the other dogs that were afraid of her before without problems - but I still have to be careful about feeding her around other dogs, cuz she’s still prone to resource guarding.
Your sister sounds like a great person.
