The Seven Deadly Cat Sins!

So how many videos do I have where I'm telling you what to do? Do this for your cat. You really, if you love your cat, do this. If you really love your cat, do this. Now, of course, I don't expect you to do all of those things, but today's video is the seven things not to do to your cat. And I would say out of these seven, don't do all seven. Does that make sense to you? Fine. If it doesn't rewind and do it again. Out of these seven, don't do all seven. Let's get right into it. At number seven, don't feed your cat milk. I mean, this is one of those historical things that you always see a cat with a saucer of milk and cats drinking milk here and there. And you know, the farmer giving his cat the fresh bowl of cream. It's not cool. Cats are by and large, completely lactose intolerant. In fact, I can't even count how many homes I've been into where they say my cat has the worst poops ever. And as we start to narrow down what the factors could be, it was milk. Yeah. Your cat may just absolutely love or crave milk or ice cream, whipped cream, whatever. They do crave that really high fat content, but that doesn't mean that it's going to love them back. In fact, it's probably going to do the opposite. So if you love your cat, don't feed them milk. What not to do to your cat. Number six, don't skip annual vet visits. Now I get it. A lot of people do not bring their cats to annual vet visits. In fact, just a fraction of people who have dogs versus cats. I mean, dogs go to the vet a whole lot more often than cats. And a big reason behind that is it makes cats a lot more miserable. They hate going into their, their cat carrier, which by the way, they don't have to hate it. Watch this video to find out more, but they just make a much bigger deal out of it by and large. And so we go, Oh, I'm not going to put my cat through it. Please don't do that. Take your cats to their, to their annual vet visits. Cats can experience very rapid physical changes, especially as they get older, you know, past the age of seven, eight up until that point, you just want to make sure that you're on top of those changes. And even if just to find out what's the tartar deal here, how are my cat's teeth? Do they need to have a dental? Do they need to have teeth removed? These are things that are crucially important as much as you would bring your children to the doctor every year, just to make sure that they're okay. You really need to do that for your cat as well. So don't skip out. Even if it doesn't make them all that happy, we all have bad days. So I know that there are things on this countdown that are going to make you go, really, you know, like the milk thing. Really? Well, get ready for this one. Number five, don't dress your cat up. Please don't dress your cat up. I know it's cute. I know like, you know, putting your cat in a taco costume just for Halloween is adorable or putting those little melon hats on them. Although I never really understood that one either. Yeah. I'll even look at something sometimes and go, Oh, that's kind of cute, but no don't do it. One of the major reasons are that, and I'm going to say most cats really don't enjoy it. There is this foreign pressure that's going on around their body and cats for, and the whiskers that really are all over their body, not just coming out of here are highly sensitive. And there's so much of their body that's built on that sensitivity and to just cloak them in something, uh, is just not physically pleasurable to them in any way. If your cat had a vote, do you think that your cat would love that taco get up? And I know there's plenty of you going, well, my cat feels awfully regal in their bow tie or, and their top hat. And when they look like Mr. Monopoly, well maybe your cat does love to look like Fred Astaire or whatever. More often than not, they don't. Number four on the what not to do to your cat hit parade is don't force interactions with cats. I mean, no matter how much you want to, no matter how cute Chester is sitting there just with that cute little nose, and maybe he's even doing a little blep and you're just like, Oh, I got to squeeze that face. Don't do it. Cats are very much about their personal bubble. And if you go up to them when they don't want it and you continue to do that, and you're like, I want you to sit in my lap cat, then you're making that, that association they have with you. Just less valuable. Forced interaction also means petting. If your cat really isn't all that into just all that petting and you'll know because they get overstimulated, they'll run away, their tail will wag or maybe they'll even give you a little chomp. And yet you still do it because you like to pet your cat. You got to know the individual cat. And if they are just like three pets and I'm out, respect it. Don't force it because again, all that means is that you'll have a really nice time with them, but they'll hate it. Cats really are about coming to you. I know people hate to hear about all this. Yeah, of course. You can bribe your cat and say, Hey, you want to come sit in my lap? Here's a treat. And they come and sit in your lap. That's fine. But the whole forcing, think about it this way. You know you've got that friend who comes into your house and that friend is all about like, I'm a cat person and cats love me. In fact, people tend to call me the cat whisperer. Hey Chester, come on over to me. And they go there and they force that pick up and put down and whatever. You think that Chester likes that person? No, I don't think Chester likes that person. Chester would love that person even more if they sat there and they waited for Chester to come up and rub against them. And maybe now we give them a little treat. Now that person is like the cat Santa Claus. So don't force interactions with your cats as badly as you want to. Let it be sort of a mutual decision. Now in the middle of this list of all the things you shouldn't do, there is something that you should do, which is subscribe to this channel. It really helps us to make more content, believe it or not. And a lot of you who think that you're subscribed, you're actually not. So join the party, subscribe to the channel, make sure you hit the bell so you know when I'm going live and when new videos are coming out and give us a like, why not? Number three, don't punish your cat. And I mean ever. And by punishment, there, there are a bunch of things that I'm going to lump in here, but they are all straight up destructive to your relationship without any upside whatsoever. You may think that punishment will get you somewhere in terms of having your cat not repeat a behavior. No, no, no. So let's first start with the squirt bottle. Do not squirt your cat with water. Sure. You think after a while if they go up to the couch and you're sitting over here and they start scratching, you go, Hey, and you squirt. All they're knowing is the presence of that thing. Sure. It means water. It also means what's attached to the squirt bottle. So now it's every time you pick it up, they run away. That's about you. That's not about the squirt bottle. And by the way, it stops working. You think that your cat isn't scratching that couch when you're out of the room? That means that the squirt bottle is not doing anything. And speaking of that, yelling at your cat when they're doing something, that doesn't work either. Again, it comes from you. It's your voice, the same voice that says, Oh Chester, I love you. And no, Chester, don't do that. Now again, if it's scratching the couch, maybe it gets him away from the couch for a minute. Every other minute of the day when you are not in the room, he's going to scratch the couch. So what have you gotten out of that? You've gotten fear and that's it. And that's really what ties a lot of these together. Whether it's a little pat on the butt or a spank or a flick on the nose or anything like that, or whether you chuck something at them, that's never going to solve anything. All it's going to do again is make your cat fearful of you. Here's the thing about if you're going to have any sort of behavior correction. And I really do think that you want to focus on positive rather than negative. But even if it's that little air canister that tells a cat don't come up on this couch, it has to happen every time it has to happen with the same intensity. It has to happen within about two seconds of the action or it's just not going to work. So whether it is the spank, the water bottle, the yell, the timeout, so to speak, all of those things give you nothing but distrust and an erosion of your relationship with your cat. And number two on the what not to do to your cat countdown. Again, this is one of those things where you guys are going to be like, really Jackson? I mean, come on, really? And that is don't do anything that your cat wouldn't want in order to make content. I'm going to let that sink in. Cause you know, we're on YouTube here and a bunch of other platforms and I don't care whether it's, you know, it's Tik Tok or, or reels or, or you know, Facebook or whatever, YouTube. I'm not being platform specific here, whether it is dressing your cat up, whether it is surprising them by putting a cucumber behind them, whether it is running them under the bath just to see how cute they are when they're wet. You know, all of these things that your cat, if they had a vote would be like, yeah, I don't, I don't, I don't want to making them do that in order to have the potential of a viral video is just, in my opinion, an absolute abuse of the relationship that you have with this cat. And if you catch them in a little sleepy position and you want to make that part of it, or you catch them doing something fun, go with it. But please don't put them in a situation where they are not going to have a good time in order for you and your subscribers to have a good time. And number one on the what never, ever, ever, never not in a million years, things to do to your cat. Don't declaw your cat period. And now I know that there are a lot of people who are like, yeah, but if I don't declaw my cat, I'm going to have to rehome them. I have to have a declawed cat because beyond I value my furniture and it's really expensive and I can't get them to stop scratching or I have a baby and I'm afraid my cat's going to scratch my baby or even I'm immunocompromised or it doesn't matter. There's always a way around the behavior, always a way around the behavior without having to mutilate your cat. And that's what declawing is. It's straight up mutilation. We are not just cutting back their claws. What we're doing is de-knuckling them. That's what it is. I don't care what anybody tells you. I don't care what your friendly neighborhood vet says right before they give you the deal. Hey, I'll spay your cat and declaw them. It's a deal. Don't do it. There's a reason why over 27 countries in the world have outlawed it. There's a reason why we're making this effort to criminalize it in different cities and States around the US. We're trying desperately to pass this message along that it's not good for your cat. And there's also the argument that is patently ridiculous and disproven through statistics and studies, which is, well, declawing your cat is a whole lot better than having to surrender them to the shelter. No, it's not. Basically what you're doing is you're, you're doing a short term solution. There's a, there's a real good probability you're going to have a longer term solution. You're still going to give them to the shelter. And those behavior problems are going to follow them through their lives. I have seen cats and I've been doing this for a very long time. And it's always been the case, whether it is cats who refuse to use the litter box afterwards, you're worried about them scratching. Well, now you're going to have to deal with pee outside the litter box. And you're dealing with a cat who once they've lost that preliminary line of defense, which is their claws. Now they're going to bite much more often, much more readily. So you're worried about, for instance, you have a toddler, you're afraid of what's going to happen with those claws. So you get them declawed. Now you're going to have a cat who's going to more readily bite. So whether it's the pain that they go through, whether it's just the destruction of their natural cat mojo, whether it is problems that now will arise because of the quick fix that you went for, none of it works. And what I will tell you is there's a pathway through that will work behavioral techniques that I tell you about, whether it's in my books or my videos, I tell you about it all over the place. You can get nail caps that you can put on your cat's nails. You can just trim them every couple of weeks. So those points aren't as bad as they were before. If Chester is scratching on my beautiful little purple chair here, well, we can start with something like sticky paws. You put sticky paws right here. You have the wide ones and the narrow ones. You put it against here. Every time he reaches up, it's like, you can get these on the Jackson galaxy website along with the yes part of this, which is a nice beefy scratching post that would go right next to my beautiful purple chair. So we're saying no Chester, not here, but yes, right over here. There's ways through all of this. None of it calls for a shortcut. Please do not declaw your cat. So that's it, everybody. That is your top seven list of what not to do to your cats. I'm sure that you've got plenty of additions to this, so I would love to see them in the comments. So let me know. And also if you have any other ideas for videos, let me know that as well. I know that there's some things in this list that made you go, yeah, no, never. And there were some things like, oh, really, you know, whatever it is across the spectrum here, just know that everything that I've said is really just strictly for the love of your cats. And that's why I'm here for the love of cats. So join me next time. Until then, all light, all love, all cat mojo to you.