Getting kitty to the groomer

[Kathy Stark]

My new cat was previously abused. She and I have developed trust. However, she bites me if I try to,pick her up and put her in a carrier for a nail trim visit she needs badly. Then he hides under the bed, a visiting groomer expects me to pick her up prior to arrival and put her in the bathroom. I don’t want to,loose her trust. What should I …

 

[maggie101]

If you have a walk in closet, keep the carrier in there. Would a trail of treats help? My small adult 7 pd cat has a large carrier so she can't grab the sides. Box springs under my bed are removed. If you use the bathroom, be prepared ahead of time. Cats know the sound of a carrier. Best time to pick her up is when she's napping

 

[FeebysOwner]

How 'new' is this cat? Has she been to see a vet? If so, the vet might be willing to prescribe some gabapentin to help calm her down before the groomer visit. A lot of folks who have 'anxious' or easily riled cats will give them a dose of gabapentin just to help settle them down a bit.

If you can wait longer, then do so. Otherwise, plan on giving her a whole lot of treats after the trimming, or maybe even during.

 

[Kflowers]

Now that the weather's a little cooler. Use a large bath towel, throw it over kitty, bundle it around kitty and stuff her in the box. Don't pull the towel tight. Getting out of the towel in the box will keep her occupied on the drive rather than thinking about the drive. Or she will hide in the towel and that will make her feel safer.

 

[Furballsmom]

Is there any way you can get one claw at a time trimmed while she's napping?

 

[redcat57]

We give one of our cats 100mg of gabapentin before any vet visits.
She used to bite the heck out of the vet staff, now she is manageable.
She is 13 pounds so your dose may vary.

It mixes easily with food.

 

[FeebysOwner]

redcat57 - Would love to know how you can get gabapentin mixed with food. That stuff is nasty tasting and every form I have tried with Feeby makes her foam at the mouth. There is no way I could add it to food and expect her to eat it.

 

[redcat57]

Interesting!
I will have to taste it.
I use my 100 mg human prescription capsules (my new vet is a little uptight about that, our old vet was fine and our Parrot's vet was fine with it).
I use wet food: Friskies - Sea Captain's delight (I blend it with extra water since 3 of the cats have crystal problems).
I just open a capsule and add it to the serving of whoever needs it, and stir it in (usually with my finger).
I have sprinkled the powder on dry kibble mix, but that is not reliable in terms of dose.
Right now Lillianna is on soft food (post tooth extraction) so I just added some of her dry kibble mix to water and soaked it, added the powder to that.

I might try adding the powder to a pill pocket for one of the other cats (yes it would be fiddly).
Lillianna does not apparently like tuna pill pockets...I give them all dental treats and hairball treats when Pippin gets his thyroid pill twice a day. Since Lillianna is on soft food, I thought I would give her an empty pill pocket for a treat. No go!

 

[Coolgram]

My new cat was previously abused. She and I have developed trust. However, she bites me if I try to,pick her up and put her in a carrier for a nail trim visit she needs badly. Then he hides under the bed, a visiting groomer expects me to pick her up prior to arrival and put her in the bathroom. I don’t want to,loose her trust. What should I …

Have you tried trimming her nails yourself? Someone else here mentioned trimming one paw at a time when she's sleeping if you can. My Gretel allowed me to do that from the time I got her at aged 6 months. I would wait until she fell asleep in my lap and then start trimming (when I wasn't trimming her nails I was always stroking and handling her paws so she was used to that). Sometimes I would get an entire paw done before she woke up and jumped down, sometimes a nail or two was all I could get done before she lost patience. Then the next day I would do more until finally they were all trimmed. More recently she hasn't been as tolerant of it, so I've hit on another solution. I wait until she's relaxing on her cat tree, then I bend over and put my upper body across her so she can't go anywhere and still have two hands free to trim her nails. I'm usually able to get both front paws done at the same time if I'm quick enough. I'm sure glad she lets me do it because I'd probably have a nervous breakdown if I had to take her to the vet every time she needed a nail trim!