fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2712 ]

[ SECRET POST #2712 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2712 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.

[Hemlock Grove]

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02.

[The Walking Dead Game/Toy Story 3/etc]

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03.

[Long Live the Queen]

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04. [repeat]

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05.

[Rupaul's Drag Race]

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06.

[Dr Who - An Adventure in Space and Time]

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07. http://i.imgur.com/TEcm28n.gif
[moving gif]

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08.

[Conchita Wurst, Daniel Gildenlow]

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09.

[petals on the wind]

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10.

[Until the Full Moon]

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11.

(Homestuck, John/Jade)

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12.

[Once Upon a Time]

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13.

[Homestuck]

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14. [WARNING for rape]

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15. [WARNING for suicide]

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16. [WARNING for abuse?]

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17. [WARNING for suicide]

Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 000 secrets from Secret Submission Post #387.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Is it normal to threaten to kill your pets when they won't cooperate with you? I always scream bloody murder at mine when I have to chase her around the house because she won't go in her carrier for a vet trip. I scream that I'm really going to kill her this time, and how I'm going to do it.

I have no urge to kill her, and I hate myself for how I act. I always know I could control myself better, but it just feels so good to scream about it when I'm frustrated. Does anyone else with troublesome pets do this?... or is the thought of it disturbing?

Eh, I don't think it's strange. It's not like she understands what you're saying, and you're getting frustrated at her because you're trying to help her, not do her harm, whatever her little brain thinks. I don't go so far as threatening death, but I curse out my cats and their entire lineage when I'm trying to clip their nails, or getting them out of something that's going to get them hurt, or chasing them in circles like we're in a cartoon. They don't care, they disrespect me same as ever.

That sounds a bit disturbing to me. I'm not saying it's abnormal, but it certainly doesn't sound healthy - both your words and why you are thinking to say them, even mindlessly, and though they cannot understand the words, cats certainly react to tone of voice.

Certainly screaming at them isn't going to help, and I think you should feel bad about threatening to kill them because you are frustrated - even if you don't mean it, even if your cats can't understand it. And going so far as to vocalize how you're going to kill the cat? I don't think those are thoughts you should even humor, let alone say out loud.

Remember, your cat is not being a jerk because she doesn't want to get in the carrier. She isn't trying to not cooperate with you. She simply doesn't want to be stuffed in a tiny, scary box, and go to the vet, which is terrifying for pets. You yelling at her like a lunatic doesn't make her any more comfortable, either. The fact that your cat runs away from you should be pretty telling.

Yes, thank you. Please don't scream at your pets out of frustration. I know it's easy to lose it for various reasons, you don't have the time, the pet desperately needs medical care, and so on, but screaming at your pets does nothing to solve the problem. I always hated it when my mom would scream at the cats over stupid shit, and then she'd always make it seem like THEY were the assholes for not doing what she wanted them to do. She never bothered once to read up on them and figure out their intentions or motivations. Nope, it was always "the stupid cat peed on the couch because he was mad at me because I didn't pet him." No goddamnit, he peed on the couch because you accidentally closed the door to the litter box room and the couch is probably the closest thing to a litter box he can find after five hours of having no litter box.

I hated it because I did lose my shit once or twice too, and hated myself for doing so. Oddly, it wasn't the cat I was mad at, he couldn't help getting diarrhea all over himself. But I dropped an f-bomb when I tried to get it out of his long fur and paws using baby wipes, it was first thing in the morning and I had to be at work. It was made worse by the fact he was supposed to be put to sleep later that morning (he was 19 years old and in rapidly failing health -- the vet even warned us he was going to go quickly).

Well Jesus I just went off on a tangent there. I don't even know why I wrote any of that. I guess I haven't told anyone and it's been a bit of a weight on my chest. That was also four months ago. I don't have any more pets at the moment. Some days I want some, but then I wonder if I'm capable of handling them, if I have the time for them, if I have the patience and understanding for them. And then I refrain. Maybe it's too soon, or maybe I'm just not cut out for it. I don't know.

DA

I'm sorry for your loss, anon, and for the frustration involved in caring for a very ill cat. I have that worry too about having pets, even though part of me really wants one. I worry that I won't be up to the task.

(and I also get mad when pet owners yell at their pets or make up convoluted species-inappropriate motivations for their pets' behavior).

ayrt

Thank you.

convoluted species-inappropriate motivations

And I like this. :P

Oh man, I could have written this word for word.

OP, it's normal to get angry and want to scream. But it basically never solves anything. It just upsets your pet, which likely leads to behavior that upsets you even more. Being calm and patient will make your lives much nicer.

Oh, I do that. It's not like they can understand me, so it's an opportunity to say things like "If you chew through another eighty-dollar power cord, I will tear your furry little legs off and shove them up your ass sideways."

I can see saying it once in a while if the pet is being annoying, but I'm disturbed that you're screaming at them. That might be causing her anxiety, leading to more problems. You would run away from someone who was screaming at you, right? You sure as hell wouldn't get into a box for them. Also it might feel good to scream but you shouldn't direct that at a living thing that is helpless, that you're responsible for caring for. So um. Yeah you should really find a healthier outlet for that? Put yourself in her position.

Animals can read your tone. IME, making your cat scared of you as well as the vet isn't going to make her less troublesome.

It's not exactly abuse to yell at a misbehaving pet, and it's not really something to worry about unless you are really fighting an urge to harm the animal.

You should probably work on dialing it down (because it's not the best place for your mind to go and screaming probably worries your pet even though she doesn't understand the words). I'd find it disturbing if I were in a room with you or overheard it. But even though you should step away from screaming at your pet about killing her, it's not in the same ballpark as directly physically harming your pet, which would be really disturbing.

You don't have to feel like you're a terrible person, but you could be more considerate toward your pet. She's not avoiding the carrier out of malice; it's just a source of stress that she is very understandably acting to avoid. She is not capable of understanding the long chain of causality that makes this stressful situation a good thing for her in the long run (this can be hard even for humans, with their much greater capacity for long-term thinking and abstraction). Screaming at her just compounds the stress (and stress is a kind of physical harm).

If you're going to behave as if your pets understood language and had complex motivations for not getting into the carrier, the better thing to do would be to explain to them calmly and in detail why it's important to go to the vet and why the carrier is a necessary evil. It won't be any more effective than threats would be in terms of what words your pet can understand, but it might help decrease the overall stress level for both of you.

I understand that it's hard, but give it a try. If you wouldn't scream this way at another human, you know you can exercise the same control for your pet. Take your frustration out on something that isn't alive.

Screaming is only going to give her massive anxiety about the whole thing. Going to the vet is TERRIFYING - crammed in a tiny box, taken to a strange place where they can smell lots of other animals, where there may be very sick or dying animals as well - it's pretty traumatic for a lot of animals. Chasing her around screaming is only going to make her even more terrified.

If she hides as soon as you get out the carrier, try closing her in another room (where it's easier to pick her up) before you get the carrier out, then talk to her gently and calmly while you get her inside. The words aren't important, but the tone is - yelling and being audibly frustrated will only scare the shit out of her. Speak gently, or at least use a normal tone.

Also, thanks to your early behaviour, it IS going to be hard to get her to go into the carrier, since she'll only associate it with your anger. Don't take it out on her or get frustrated with her for it - the only person you have to blame is yourself.

If you must scream, for fuck's sake, do it OUT of earshot of her, okay? It's not her fault for being terrified.

So, other people have said why it's not a good idea to scream at your cat. I agree with them, but I want to add in something that might make it easier for you the next time you have to bring her to the vet.

Leave the carrier out and open for a while. Allow her the opportunity to explore it in a neutral space, at a neutral time. Then, when it's time to go to the vet, put the carrier out the night before rather than right before the appointment.

We've done this with our cats, and while they're still not happy when we shut them into the carriers and they figure out what's happening, we have a much easier time getting to that point. They don't necessarily associate the carriers with the vet; the carriers are neutral objects that are sometimes for getting carted off, but which are also often for play. So, they usually do half our job for us. They sometimes crawl into the carriers all by themselves.

On top of that, to reiterate what others have said, use a calm tone, even a babying one, and give her lots of affection before and once she's in the crate. It'll make things easier for you and it'll also make it so that she's less mad when you get home (my cats act as if they think that we didn't want to go to the vet, either. When we get home, they usually want to cuddle and groom us).

It's not abnormal, but I don't think it's exactly helpful to your situation. Animals will not approach a screaming tense person, most of the time. Next time try stopping, taking a deep breath, and slowly counting to ten or something.

But I've known that frustration, and I have definitely yelled at my dog once or twice when she was being super obnoxious and I was beyond the end of my patience. It's not a proud moment, but I think it's normal for people to react irrationally like that once in awhile. As long as you're not hurting the animal or like screaming directly at them or something.

Normal? I don't think so, but I'm not sure. It's pretty creepy though ngl. :(

I do it, too. I don't abuse my dog but he pisses me off with his shenanigans sometimes and I tell him like, "This time, I am so serious." It doesn't help, though, so I know I've got to find a different way of dealing with him.

I think it's pretty normal. Most of the people I know do it. Not like towering rage or intimidating but like yell at the animal from across the room when they're picking up after them.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ SECRET POST #2712 ]

Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)

Re: Is it normal (TW for animal abuse?)