My DSH tuxedo cat, Charlotte, about two years old, has many mats on her back that she cannot reach, mostly down at the base of her tail, but definitely not pertaining to only there. After she was spayed, about a year ago, she gained about four pounds or so. Basically going from 9 pounds to 13. We have all my cats on a diet now, so hopefully soon she will be able to reach her back again to groom. I guess my problem here though is that she is getting VERY violent because of her mats. We recently went from 15 cats to 14 cats, as my cat Athena passed away two weeks ago. We had to shave her regularly ourselves, as she was far too scared to go anywhere else to be groomed, but she was GOOD for us. We figured we could do the same with Charlotte, being that Athena was actually long-haired (ancestry of the ragdoll) and had very thick fur with very, very awful mats that would form. Even though Charlotte's mats are no where NEAR what Athena had, she seems to be 200% more bothered by them than Tina ever was.. she is way too agitated for us to help her or even go near her. She is running around crazy throughout the house, batting at the other cats, chasing herself in a circle trying to reach her back, and crying A LOT. We can't even touch her without her screaming at us and swiping at us with her claws or biting us. We just had her secluded in the bathroom with the clippers and shaved a bit of her back fur off, but no where near the amount we need to. She began to freak out because of the agitation on her back, so we let her out into the rest of the house, where she starting charging the other cats and basically going insane. I was able to get close enough to her to pick her up and bring her into my room, where we both are now. She isn't crying or freaking out now, but that doesn't solve the issue. We need to be able to groom her, but how, if we can't go near her with a brush or the clippers? The instant anything touches her back, she cries and gets really angry.. Any advice?