TORI

Here’s a guest post by Jaime Glasser, a vet, an artist, a writer, and a cat lover.

I have a new therapist, for the first time in a long while.  She is really wise beyond her years and seems to really understand me.  She has mastered the fine art of listening to me without judgment, and I can tell her anything without reserve.  Her name is Tori. She is paralyzed in one of her legs, but I admire the fact that she does not let this interfere with her sense of adventure and willingness to always try new things.  It does not seem to slow her down at all.  She is a six-month-old rescue long-haired Tortoiseshell kitten.

She has only been in my life a few months, but Tori is already teaching me many basic lessons about how to live a good life.  She has reminded me how to be happier.  The top ten things I have been learning from my new therapist are:

1    Do not hold a grudge:
Even if I step on her tail, Tori does not hold a grudge!  Within minutes she is running after me again, ready to cuddle or play.  I need to be more like that.  Nothing good has ever happened in my life that began with my resentments.

2    Be thankful:
I am always so encouraged to do nice things for Tori because she seems so thankful to me.  Gratitude seems to be a state of mind, that if I could just maintain, would eclipse a lot of other negative emotions.

3    Be affectionate:
My day is brightened moment by moment by the unexpected little gestures of affection Tori takes the time to express.  If I am caught in sadness, one little rub of my ankles brings a big smile to my face and makes my whole outlook change in an instant.

4    Say please:
I think we would all receive a lot more kindness if we could ask for what we wanted with such aplomb and sweetness as my kitten can.  Her attitude is gratitude waiting to happen.  She never apologizes for what she wants, either!

5    Say thank you:
When I take a little time to give Tori attention, I am rewarded by an overflowing of thanks.  If I could let myself feel this pure gratitude more often, I know my happiness would definitely increase!

6    Play:
Whoever knew that such a simple object as a brown paper bag could bring such joy?  When I play with Tori I forget my big, complicated, adult worries and feel the joy of simple pleasures again.  I am going to play more and try to incorporate a playful attitude in my life.

7    Take a nap:
When things are just too much and all else fails, my kitten curls up and takes a nice long nap.  I can’t think of a better time out from stress or an energy boost to get me going again!

8    Stay in the now:
My kitty is right up there with many wise sages.  I am going to try not to let the special moments of life pass me by.  The present, truly, is all we have and I am going to make a better effort to live in the now to experience life more fully, just like my cat.

9    Appreciate the little things:
Cats certainly get the most out of life’s simple pleasures.  Tori can lose herself in a bite of food or a ray of sunshine. Paying attention to the small pleasures in life is admirable and promotes contentment.

10    Don’t worry what others think of you:
My kitten never gives up trying to make friends with my two older cats despite being severely reprimanded with a swipe of the paw!  I will try to not worry what others think of me and cultivate this happy-go-lucky approach to life.

I think if I could just fully incorporate these lessons that Tori has taught me into my daily life I would be much happier.  I am going to practice these ten lessons, and try to be consisitent and see how that works!  I think it will help me live a happier life each day.

No, none of them paid any part of my tuition, fees, or student loans. I’m talking about

how feline demands for human attention helped keep me focused outside of myself when I might otherwise have kept on brooding about whether I would live to age 20, let alone any longer.
Human contact would not have made it for me, not while I was deeply chronically depressed. I was also weighed down by what I now recognize, thanks to 20/12 hindsight, as profound sleep apnea.
A dog would not have been good for me either, because dogs require more maintenance. You don’t have to walk a cat. And anyway, most cats won’t let you.
Having a cat turned out to be a perfect choice. The temptation to say “purr-fect” and fall back on the cliché pun is irresistible. But it’s also very apt.
Whenever I’ve had cats, I’ve found their purring calms me down quite nicely. It’s hard for me to stay anxious or agitated or morose or sullen when a whole ‘nother decidedly alien species has decided I’m perfect company at that moment and comes over for some lap time. I might not be Mr. Right, but at least I’m Mr. Right Now. This became a comforting and therapeutic purr-diem.
It’s been said, usually in superhero comics, that with great power comes great responsibility. The reverse can also be true. With great responsibility, even something as simple as routine cat care, comes great power to look past myself and my problems. And so I bond with a creature who – no matter how independent and aloof he or she may seem – really utterly depends on me. Funny how that seems to reflect my own shy withdrawal, often mistaken for cat-like detachment.
Everything else seems petty when I’m faced with something pet-y.
For me that’s one of the greatest therapeutic benefits of cats. More precisely:
They need me.
I can’t let them down.
To meet their needs, I can’t let myself down. Or let myself go.
QED.

Guest post by John Hartsell

Please share any stories you may have about how cats may have helped you, your friends or family.

Want to lower your risk of heart attack? Get a cat.

Yes, it is, or can be, that simple. Just get a cat into your life, and you’ll soon be thanking your resident feline for saving you from a dreaded heart attack.

But what about dogs, you might ask. Won’t they cut the risk of a heart attack just as well as cats? Maybe even better? No, oddly enough, dogs don’t seem to confer that benefit to their humans. At least, not according to a study done by Adnan Qureshi, professor of neurosurgery and neurology at the University of Minnesota.

The tireless prof followed 4,500 people for 10 years. In 2008, he finally announced the result of the study: People who owned a cat were 40 percent less likely to die from heart attacks than those who don’t. The study also concluded that owning a dog didn’t give the same protection.

Of course, having a dog in your life is good for your health too—but it’s just not as heart-protective as having cats. (I can just hear some dog lovers growling.) And the conclusion, as far as I know, is based just on this one research. Who knows, maybe other studies might show that dogs are just as good for your heart as cats.

Meanwhile, it’s fun to speculate why cats are so good for your heart. Do their grace and agility inspire their humans to exercise more?

My guess is not. And, since walking dogs is good for your heart, dog owners ought to have a lower risk.

So, it must be a different reason.

Is it because they’re supremely confident in their own superiority? And they don’t slobber for your affection like dogs?

Hmmm, I rather doubt that catering to a fundamentally narcissistic creature is going to make anyone less heart-attack prone.

There’s one attribute that cats have that dogs don’t have. Cats purr. And what could be more soothing and relaxing than a purring cat?

Think of a cold, wintry day. The wind is howling and the snow is falling outside while you’re indoors snuggling with a purring cat in front of the hearth. Now, if that doesn’t warm the cockles of your heart, I don’t know what would.

Well, you don’t need a winter day to enjoy a contented, purring cat. Maybe cats purr to relax us the way they relax their kittens.

All we can say for now is that the sound of a purring cat soothes humans in ways that we don’t quite understand yet.

So, hug a purring cat today and feel your heart go pitter-patter for joy.

Few things in life are as free, fast, and effective as petting a cat for de-stressing you and helping to lower your blood pressure. It’s not just conjecture, it’s a proven fact. A study done on New York stockbrokers (talk about stress!) who had cats (or, in some cases, dogs) found that they had lower blood pressure and heart rates than those who didn’t have pets.

You’ve got to believe it! Petting pets gives you instant gratification. It’s hard to stay in a bad mood when you’re petting a fuzzy, furry, purry cat. (Or even a cat without fur.) Let’s say I’m really upset because I’m on the phone with the bank customer service – definitely an oxymoron! – giving me the runaround. All my cat has to do is come over and rub against me, and I instantly feel calm.

Now, don’t think that all you’re doing is using your four-legged companion to feel good yourself. Cats benefit just as much as you do from a good skritch.

As it turns out, getting petted by a nice human lowers the cat’s blood pressure as well! Brad Kollus for Cat Facts mentions that an experiment was done where a tiny blood pressure cuff was attached to a cat’s leg. The result? After just 5 minutes of being petted, the cat’s blood pressure dropped 25 points.

By the way, the researchers weren’t some kooks but responsible veterinarians working at the Cornell Feline Health Center. (Never mind that one researcher’s last name was Looney.) Finally, science is proving what cat guardians always knew: you can soothe your cat by petting it. And if you have cats, you also know that you have to exercise good judgment! It’s not always a good time to pat your cat—for instance, don’t do it when she’s in the middle of a cat fight! But I digress…

The de-stressing effect of being petted was also confirmed by the cats’ cortisol levels. Cortisol is the hormone that increases when a person—or a cat—is stressed. Although cortisol is necessary, if it’s elevated for too long, it can weaken the immune system of both cats and people. That’s why too much stress can make you ill.

In an experiment conducted by Dr. Kathy Carlstead, a research scientist at the Honolulu Zoo, the cortisol level of a group of cats whose routines were changed and received no petting or being talked to, showed much higher stress and cortisol levels. The group of cats who were regularly petted didn’t experience quite so much stress or increase in cortisol.

The same scientist also inserted a catheter in the cats’ legs. Not surprisingly, that’s a stressful procedure for cats. But, if the cats were petted by people, they showed no rise in their cortisol levels. On the other hand, cats who wouldn’t let themselves be petted because they weren’t socialized to people, showed high rises in cortisol.

Right, then. Go stroke a cat. You’ll lower your risk of getting a stroke. And it’ll do you and the kitty a lot of good!

No, this is not a mistyped follow-up to “What do cats and software engineers have in common?”

Both cats and software will sometimes do very strange, totally inexplicable things. A typical manual for a software product might refer to this as “unspecified behavior.”
No matter how much we think we know about any non-trivial software, there’s always the chance it will do something totally strange, completely confounding even the original developers who – at least in theory – should know quite a lot, if not everything, about what their software can and will do.
So it is with cats. No matter how long and hard we study them, they always seem to find some way to astound and tickle and mightily puzzle us with seemingly random behavior, driven by uniquely feline purpose and intent and utterly inscrutable to mere human minds.
Take for example the first cat I and my family ever had, a dark grey and bright white kitty which for reasons lost to history we called Nora-chan. Sometimes my Mom will refer to that cat as “first neko-chan.”
Nora-chan was a great example of a cat with personality. More about that later.
Anyway, one night – I must have been no more than ten or eleven years old – I was in bed and ready to go to sleep. Mom was in the room, cleaning out the litter box (the cat slept in my room back then).
For reasons Nora-chan never discussed, let alone committed to paper, she suddenly started running at full all-out “mad kitty dash” speed on top of my bed, right around the edge.
She ran from the foot to the head of the bed, right along my left side. Then she ran across my chest to the other side of my bed, right down that side, and across the foot of my bed to the corner where Mom stood.
Then Nora-chan stared Mom right in the face and made the sound “T!” Imagine the explosive sound of /t/ like a human forcefully emphasizing the first sound of “terrible” or “treat” or any other English word beginning with T. It sounded like Nora-chan was trying to spit in Mom’s face.
Then she (Nora-chan, not Mom) did the very same sequence of things again!
Then Nora-chan did the sequence a third time!!
I guess that closed whatever action item was on Nora-chan’s hidden agenda, because then she curled herself up and plopped herself down on the bed with a haughty, imperious air of feline self-satisfaction.
I’m sure anyone who has ever been owned by a cat will recognize that attitude projection. I’ve heard that referred to as “cattitude” which pretty much sums it up, I reckon. Anyway…
What was that running and spit-sound-making all about? How does that arise from Nora-chan’s heritage as a stealthy predator, or enhance any feline’s ability to survive in the wild?
What part of Nora-chan’s programming, in kittenhood or adulthood, caused her to run around and make a sound like that?
What triggered that weird response? What input resulted in that very strange output?
Cats and software, eh?

STRESSED TO KILL

Are you stressed beyond belief? You know that stress can kill you. But, if you’re a cat-lover, you already know the best antidote for stress: Cats! And, it’s official now. It’s not just conjecture. Read on.

The National Institute of Health and Science has recognized the overall value of pets! The Institute hopes to harness the power of the human-animal bond to improve lives.

If you’re like most pet owners, you already know that your companion animal enriches your life. Whatever species your pet happens to be, it improves your emotional well-being.

The animal doesn’t even have to belong to you for you to reap benefits. It turns out that you don’t even need to have the actual animal in your presence. One study showed that just watching dogs in movies reduces people’s stress level considerably. I’m sure that the same holds true for cats. I know that simply looking at cat pictures makes me happy. Actually, I don’t even have to look at photos of cats. All I have to do is to picture my cats in my mind and that helps me to relax at stressful moments—like when the dentist is about to give me an injection. (Ouch!)

A researcher analyzed people’s saliva after they watched dogs in movies and discovered that the levels of cortisol, the hormone associated with stress, lowered dramatically.

The researcher who conducted this study was Cheryl Krause-Parello, assistant professor and director of the Center of Nursing Research at Kean University in Union, New Jersey.

I hope she follows up this study with more tests involving cats. I’ve noticed that even though there are now more people who own cats than dogs in the U.S., the majority of studies are about the effect of dogs on human health. Cats are being given short shrift, I think.

At any rate, the good news about cats lowering your stress level is that you really don’t have to do anything. You don’t need special equipment or learn any special techniques. All you have to do is to look at your cat or stroke her to feel instant relief and relaxation.

For me, what works really well is to grab my cat Lydia, lie down and place her on my chest — then let her purr away.

How about you? Do you have a favorite way to de-stress with your cat?