New Relationship With Cats
I've been allergic to cats ever since I was a kid. We had our first cat since I was a baby or even before assumably. My mother unfortunately had her declawed. My second cat when I was 10-12. She's clawed.
I loved those cats as a kid, but when I became a teenager I realized stuffy nose, puffy eyes, sneezing, needing allergy meds = cat. The puzzle finally made sense.
So, my family pawning off my allergies as not real ''because I've been around them all my life'', gave me a distaste for my cats. I started to dislike them, to see them as just a nuisance. Something to be avoided. That I had to take it into my own hands.
I took Benadryl not knowing that there were other meds like Allegra at the time, and then I stopped taking any altogether believing none of them would work and I'd just have to suffer eternally. I did tons and tons of research on cats to improve their QoL, like introducing them properly so they stopped fighting and encouraging my mother to not hit them, trying to get my eldest cat to connect touch as a positive thing instead of anticipating pain, but mother never listens.
About 2 weeks ago I ran out of my old allergy meds and decided to make a switch to something cheap, supposedly better, on a whim: genetic Claritin. What I didn't realize until I looked it up on the website and label is Claritin is a 12hr or 24hr medication and I couldn't just take it when my allergies flared up, I had to take them every day.
So I did, thinking it was just the standard allergy med like my last one.
Then I went about my day. 679
Decided to pet my cats, then ended up touching my face without realizing.
Immediately, something was wrong. I felt all the puffy cat fur, but my eyes didn't become the size of balloons.
I realized.. there's actually allergy meds that actually work aside from crappy benadryl.
Fucking. Game. Changer.
My relationship with my cats has COMPLETELY changed. I disliked them because I couldn't touch and connect with them, but now I can love, pat, cuddle on them, I can bury my face in their fur and be fine!
And I love it so goddamn much. They are real, living, breathing creatures that I no longer want to avoid like the plague. I want to be part of their life and them to be part of mine. (though I'd still prefer a dog, rat, snake or insect)
For the first time in my life, I ''talked'' to my declawed, elder cat. And I felt like she was an actual individual creature in there, with her own emotions.
I told her I wish that she could just be a normal cat without all the trauma and pain of walking the way she is, unable to jump, to play with toys without recoiling due to declawing, unable to grab or bat at things.
She gave me a deep look, and I slow blinked to her and tried to gently head bonk her (like when a cat just bonks your shoulder or leg with their head) but she's not really the touchy type. I'm still trying to figure out what happened to her to make.
But thanks to my discovery, things are seriously turning around with them.
And I love them. 679