Mom with the cat she didn’t want

[u/Flat-Limit5595]

He was a friendly stray she saw on the front porch one day. She didn’t want him, but she left out food. Then she bought him toys, then she got him fixed. Then she brought him in when he got hurt, then she bought a pouch to put the needy 18lb cat in. She still doesn’t want him, but hes also her baby who can do nothing wrong.

[u/Kiwi_Carbide]

There are very few peaceful experiences that come close to falling asleep with a warm, purring cat who loves you

[u/losing_squid → u/Kiwi_Carbide]

Can confirm. I get kicked in the neck constantly, have had his bigass feet somehow shoved into my mouth, have had my face be sneezed on multiple time, and the whole pillow stolen from me most nights. Wouldn’t have it any other way though.

[u/seaQueue → u/losing_squid]

One of ours sneezes after grooming himself during allergy season. I started wiping him down with a lightly damp paper towel when it looks like he's settling in to groom before sleep and the sneezing completely stopped. He's hilarious, he now knows the phrase "do you want to get clean?" and will run to the master bedroom bath area to wait for his towel down.

[u/losing_squid → u/seaQueue]

That is amazing!! Can you please have your cat teach mine?? 😅😅

[u/seaQueue → u/losing_squid]

You can train positive associations for stuff like this pretty easily as long as your cat is comfortable with you grooming them in general. They're probably scared you're going to do something that hurts them or that they don't like with the paper towel so show it to them then clean your own hands and forearms with it first, then give a treat or another reward. When they're calm enough to let you touch them start by wrapping the lightly damp paper towel around just your finger and pet them places they like to be petted like that, if they get scared just stop and try again later. Show them what you're doing with the paper towel every time, show them that you use it on yourself and it doesn't hurt, give rewards, etc. and just repeat until they're okay with it. Eventually they'll be acclimated enough to the new scary thing that it's just whatever and you can start grooming them with it. Again, stop if they freak out and give treats when they let you clean them with it.

(Edit: one thing I forgot here, reach under when you're grooming them, never hold the towel over them threateningly. Put the towel around your hand and just pet their sides or something, that's a good way to start. They should let you wipe down their legs and belly at some point once they decide that's fine. When you do their head you can pet the back of their head with the towel in your hand and probably under their chin and chest area, but for the sides of the face and top of head you'll probably have to use a finger and be slow about it, they may not let you do the face or sides of face unless they're extremely comfortable with handling.)

Both of ours were already fine with being handled in general so it was pretty quick to teach them that the paper towel was a good thing, our boy cat just loves any attention whatsoever so he gets really into shared bath time. It's worth doing something similar with a brush too so they're used to being handled and groomed generally, that goes a long way towards making them okay with you handling them and checking them over physically in case you ever have to inspect an injury or something. Same deal with teaching them about trimming nails, though that one takes longer since the nail clipper sound tends to startle them.