By Maura McAndrew
Cats are something of an enigma—intelligent, sometimes inscrutable animals whose sensitivity and perceptiveness make them fascinating and lovable pets. But as most cat owners can tell you, cats are also creatures of habit and comfort. They can become stressed or scared by a range of things, from a trip to the vet to a new person in the house.
To tell if your cat is experiencing stress, closely observe his body language, advises Dilara Goksel Parry, a certified cat behavior consultant with the San Francisco-based company Feline Minds. “As prey animals, cats are masters of disguise,” she says. “People need to be able to take in all the information the cat is giving them with their expressions and body language—the tension in the body, the size of the pupils, the movement and direction of the ears, vocalizations, and so on.”
But once you notice your cat is stressed or afraid, where do you go from there? Calming down a cat is a delicate process, so we’ve provided some tips for getting kitty back to his happy, mischievous self.
No bills, no responsibilities, endless hours spent batting toys beneath the furniture, napping in soft sherpa beds and watching birds flit around the feeder outside the living room window.
From a human perspective, the life of a pampered house cat looks pretty sweet. So it can be startling to learn that our cats’ lives might not be as stress-free as we imagine.
Everything from our household cleaning habits to the way we interact with our feline companions can be a source of anxiety for them.
While “one stressor may not mean a lot, a bunch stacked up can make for a very unhappy cat,” says Danielle Bays, senior analyst for cat protection and policy at the Humane Society of the United States. And since cats lack the facial expressiveness of dogs and tend to display their likes and dislikes in subtle ways, it’s easy to miss the clues.
Stress. We hear that word often as it relates to humans but it can be a big problem for cats as well. While stress can’t be totally avoided in life and a certain amount is necessary to help us all survive (Acute stress triggers fight or flight response), we can limit how much cats endure.
Types of Stress in Cats
Acute stress:
This is something cat parents more easily recognize in cats. Just picture your cat on the veterinarian’s exam table or remember the day you brought home a second pet or moved to a new house.
Chronic stress:
This can easily be overlooked. This is the day-to-day stress that a cat may experience from any number of causes. Behavior may change so gradually that cat parents miss things such as change in activity level, appetite, grooming habits or litter box usage. Short-term stress is something the body is equipped to handle but long-term, chronic stress can play a major role in the onset of behavior problems and even disease.
A Veterinary Check-up Comes First
Granted, a trip to the veterinarian is often stressful in itself, but if you notice a change in behavior, weight, appearance, litter box habits, appetite, or water consumption, have your cat checked out. Don’t skip this all-important first step.
Reducing Your Cat’s Stress
Here’s a list of 10 tips to guide you on ways to reduce some common stress triggers.
1. Maintain Your Cat’s Health
Don’t skip annual veterinary wellness visits. Catching a potential medical problem in the early stages increases the odds of successful treatment and maintenance. Also, keep up at-home health routines such as good nutrition, parasite control, dental care, grooming and nail care.
2. Less-Stressful Veterinary Visits
Stress is one of the most common reasons cats don’t see the veterinarian as often as dogs do. You can reduce that stress in a few easy ways. First, get your cat comfortable with the carrier. Leave the carrier out and periodically toss treats near it. This helps take the fear out of the carrier’s presence. When going to the veterinary clinic, bring an extra towel which can be used to cover the carrier opening to give kitty more privacy. When sitting in the waiting room, hold the carrier on your lap or on the seat next to you. Avoid placing the carrier on the floor since that can be more stressful. If you have a carrier where the top can be detached from the bottom, during the exam you can let your cat remain in the bottom part.
3. Consistent Cat Training
Reduce stress by making sure everyone in the family is on the same page with training. For example, if kitty isn’t allowed on the table by one family member but is permitted by another, it sends a confusing and stressful mixed message. Train with kindness and consistency.
4. Create a Peaceful Mealtime
It starts with feeding a high quality food that’s appropriate for your cat’s age and health. Next, create a peaceful mealtime setting by keeping the feeding station clean and inviting. Use a food bowl that’s a comfortable size and shape and doesn’t cause your cat’s whiskers to get squished. Locate the feeding area in a quiet place that’s free from sudden noises. Place food and water a little distance apart as many cats don’t like water right next to food. In a multicat household, give each cat an individual food bowl because cats aren’t social eaters. You can discourage one cat from nosing another cat out of the bowl if they each have their own separate dishes. If necessary, feed cats in separate rooms to reduce stress.
To encourage successful mealtimes, add a grain-free topper like CORE Simply Shreds to your cat’s meal.
5. Your Cat’s Social Interaction
Never force your cat to interact. Let kitty set the pace of how much he wants to engage. Don’t insist on holding or petting your cat if he doesn’t want it. If he doesn’t mind being held, always put him down before he starts to struggle. Keep the experience positive. You can give him incentives to be more sociable, such as offering a treat or playtime, but always let it be his choice of whether to accept or decline.
6. Happy Litter Box Set-up
Make sure the litter box is the right size and type for your cat. It should be 1 ½ times the length of your cat from tip of nose to base of tail. As for litter, most prefer soft, sandy, scoopable litter. Texture is important to cats. Scoop the litter box at least twice a day to ensure there’s always enough clean area for elimination. Locate the box in a quiet spot that’s convenient and comfortable to access. In a multicat home, provide numerous litter boxes scattered throughout the house so one cat doesn’t have to cross another cat’s area. The general rule is to have one more box than number of cats.
7. Environment and Resources
Cats live in a vertical world. Provide cat trees, perches or other elevated locations to create security and comfort. Cats also like to alternate between being hidden and being visible. Offer hiding places for those times when kitty wants to watch the household goings-on as an undetected spectator. Indoor cats have to share overlapping territories so reduce stress by making sure each cat has comfortable places for napping, hiding and resource availability within their preferred area. This can go a long way in increasing multi-cat harmony.
8. Cat Communication
Cats are masters of communication and just their body language alone can tell you so much about what’s going on inside their heads. Observe your cat’s body language and become educated about whether he’s saying I’d rather not be disturbed now or please play with me.
9. Stress-Reducing Playtime
Playtime is more than just fun and exercise. Playtime releases good brain chemicals and helps a cat develop positive associations with their environment and people around them. Playtime is beneficial to reducing stress on an everyday basis as well as when you’re dealing with a particularly stressful event. Engage in interactive playtime daily and also create fun activities for your cat for when you aren’t home. This can involve puzzle feeders, tunnels and other activities to keep your cat stimulated.
10. Less-Stressful Life Transitions
Cats are creatures of habit but unfortunately, life is full of changes. Some changes are unavoidably sudden but if there’s an upcoming anticipated change, ease your cat through it gradually. Whether it’s the addition of a new baby, new cat or any other disruption in his normal routine. Go at a slow pace and let him take small steps through the adjustment. Your cat will appreciate the extra effort made to help him through life’s surprises.
Those of us who own pets probably enjoyed their company in the depths of the pandemic. Not only are pets potentially good for our physical health, but they also benefit our mental wellbeing. Indeed, they may have even been a way of coping with pandemic-fueled mental health problems.
But this is still an emerging area of research, so the impacts of pet ownership on human health aren’t always clear cut. Recent research suggests that having to care for a pet during the pandemic could actually have compromised our quality of life — including how satisfied we are with our health, lifestyle, and relationships.
In the same way, how we interact with our pets and how we choose to manage them might inadvertently be causing them stress, too. While some family pets may have enjoyed their owners spending a lot more time with them than usual, there have been reports that some cats were less enamored with these changes to their routine – even reportedly becoming sick from the stress of their owners being home all the time. So how do these dynamics work, and is there anything we pet owners can do to minimize them?
Affectionate but independent — Those of us less enamored with domestic cats might see them as a bit aloof, or cold and calculating. We might assume that cats are less interested in us or aware of our feelings compared to dogs, for example.
But cats are actually capable of being highly sociable with humans and are probably picking up on a lot more than many people give them credit for. For example, cats are able to recognize their own names and are sensitive to the emotional expressions of their owners. Cats may also be negatively impacted by our personalities, with anxious and depressed owners linked to greater stress in their cats.
Cats have potentially also mastered the subtle art of human manipulation within their purrs by embedding a “cry” sound within them. Scientists think they use this sound to tap into our caregiving instincts, just like human infants do. Indeed, cats are capable of producing a broad range of different vocalizations to express themselves — though we might not necessarily understand them.
Yet while cats can certainly develop positive relationships with humans, they’re not born with an innate desire for human company and must be sufficiently handled when young. As adults, some cats are much more sociable than others — though even friendly cats prefer people that allow them to dictate the nature of their interactions. Not stroking them too much can even increase their levels of affection and reduce aggression.
This is very different from humans, who use touch (like hugs) to strengthen our social relationships. Humans also tend to seek support from others when stressed or unwell, while cats prefer to hide and be alone.
Cats also experience greater stress when exposed to unpredictable routines and handling. In general, cats value their autonomy and to be able to avoid the things they find unpleasant.
How to stop stress in pets
Have you considered giving your cat a spa day?Shutterstock
The rise in some cats’ stress levels during the pandemic is likely due to the disruptions to their daily peace that we’ve unwittingly caused. By being at home more, we have probably created a much busier, more chaotic environment than they are used to — and may be causing them more stress when we want to lavish them with attention.
Given that cats can recognize humans emotions, our elevated stress levels and desire to spend more time interacting with them have likely made matters worse. Some people may have also made other changes during the pandemic – such as redecorating, having a baby, or even getting another pet.
There are many things we can do to help cats better cope and be less stressed:
4. Provide cats with a predictable routine. This means keeping mealtimes, play, and interactions with them to a schedule where possible.
3. Give them a dedicated quiet room or area. And when they’re in these areas, ensure they’re never disturbed. You should also let your cat choose when they want to interact with you.
2. Create an enriching indoor and outdoor environment. To help your cat feel safe, provide them with lots of hiding options and places they can get up high. Place litter trays in separate areas from food and water bowls and locate all these resources in quieter areas of the home. Provide toys, climbing frames, food puzzles, and cat-friendly plants (such as catnip) to help keep your cat physically and mentally stimulated.
1. Give your cat plenty of time and space to themselves. If your cat is sleeping, resting, or otherwise seems happy doing its own thing, don’t be tempted to disturb them or solicit their attention
Keeping your cat physically fit and ensuring they are in good health will help to rule out any underlying medical issues. If you think your cat could be suffering from stress then seeking professional advice from a vet and subsequently, a qualified cat behavior specialist is also recommended.
With many of us starting to return to normal, our cats will be faced with further changes to their environment. But cats are most likely to cope well as you leave the house more – so long as new routines are predictable and they have plenty to keep them occupied while you’re gone. In truth, many cats will likely appreciate the extra peace and quiet.
This article was originally published on The Conversation by Lauren Finka at Nottingham Trent University. Read the original article here.
