I've always said I would never declaw a cat, but now I find myself faced with having been suggested to consider it by my vet, and I'm in need of some advice.
Background: My cat, Bubbles, is a 3 year old rescue whom I adopted when she was just over a year old (two years ago next month). When I adopted her, she was "flagged" as a kitty with biting aggression, and was suggested not to go to a home with kids. Seeing as it was just me at home, I decided I could work with her to try to keep her from biting.
Turns out I am the third home this little beauty has had. We've had great luck on a "no biting" command thus far, but what I wasn't prepared for was the trauma that having to maintain her nails would cause her.
Bubbles has FHS (Feline Hyperesthesia Syndrome). This means she has some "flare-up" type episodes that we deal with, but in general, she does not enjoy being touched because it causes her physical pain. She will only cuddle on her own terms (usually tucked into my side), and she enjoys head pats and gentle, brief touches, but overall, being touched causes her a lot of distress.
That being said, she will not let me touch her feet, not even for a second. She also has no interest in scratching posts or similar, and so her front nails become extremely long and sharp and are in need of trimming every month. I've always brought her to the vet for this, and originally, they had success wrapping her in a towel, with one person holding her and another clipping her nails, but each time, she is extremely vocal and violent (due to the pain she suffers) and ends up stressed out from the endeavor.
However, in the last six months, each visit has gotten more and more traumatizing for her. There have been many appointments where I've brought her to have her nails trimmed and the vet techs simply say they are unable to handle her to do so. In August, it was decided that the only way they could get her (then unreasonably long and sharp) nails cut was to sedate her, so we did that, and then tried the soft caps to see if that would work.
The soft caps only lasted a month or so, and now we're back to square one, with the vet saying we must sedate her to trim her nails, and I'm thinking, this can't possibly be a healthy solution, can it? Sedating her every 4-6 weeks to clip her nails?
Her vet has suggested I consider having her declawed, to remove the source of stress and pain of having her nails trimmed regularly from her routine. It goes against everything I have believed up until now, and it almost makes me feel like a bad cat-mom to even be considering it, but all things considered, it also seems like an option I should contemplate.
My reasoning has nothing to do with me or what I want, only because I want to de-stress my special needs cat, for whom stress and anxiety actually worsens her condition.
If you were in my position, what would you do?
Background: My cat, Bubbles, is a 3 year old rescue whom I adopted when she was just over a year old (two years ago next month). When I adopted her, she was "flagged" as a kitty with biting aggression, and was suggested not to go to a home with kids. Seeing as it was just me at home, I decided I could work with her to try to keep her from biting.
Turns out I am the third home this little beauty has had. We've had great luck on a "no biting" command thus far, but what I wasn't prepared for was the trauma that having to maintain her nails would cause her.
Bubbles has FHS (Feline Hyperesthesia Syndrome). This means she has some "flare-up" type episodes that we deal with, but in general, she does not enjoy being touched because it causes her physical pain. She will only cuddle on her own terms (usually tucked into my side), and she enjoys head pats and gentle, brief touches, but overall, being touched causes her a lot of distress.
That being said, she will not let me touch her feet, not even for a second. She also has no interest in scratching posts or similar, and so her front nails become extremely long and sharp and are in need of trimming every month. I've always brought her to the vet for this, and originally, they had success wrapping her in a towel, with one person holding her and another clipping her nails, but each time, she is extremely vocal and violent (due to the pain she suffers) and ends up stressed out from the endeavor.
However, in the last six months, each visit has gotten more and more traumatizing for her. There have been many appointments where I've brought her to have her nails trimmed and the vet techs simply say they are unable to handle her to do so. In August, it was decided that the only way they could get her (then unreasonably long and sharp) nails cut was to sedate her, so we did that, and then tried the soft caps to see if that would work.
The soft caps only lasted a month or so, and now we're back to square one, with the vet saying we must sedate her to trim her nails, and I'm thinking, this can't possibly be a healthy solution, can it? Sedating her every 4-6 weeks to clip her nails?
Her vet has suggested I consider having her declawed, to remove the source of stress and pain of having her nails trimmed regularly from her routine. It goes against everything I have believed up until now, and it almost makes me feel like a bad cat-mom to even be considering it, but all things considered, it also seems like an option I should contemplate.
My reasoning has nothing to do with me or what I want, only because I want to de-stress my special needs cat, for whom stress and anxiety actually worsens her condition.
If you were in my position, what would you do?