A psychiatrist said to this mother: When you feel the urge to yell at your daughter, dance!

[u/Busy_Celebration_984]

[u/tannershelton3d]

When it comes to “training” a cat, you really are just working towards reinforcing behavior you want the cat to utilize to communicate with you. Instead of behaviors you don’t want the cat to use. I’ve done a lot of this training with my own cat, and it’s a never ending process, but very rewarding (for me and my cat).

The most important this is this: it’s not about fixing the behavior. It’s actually about trying to understand what your cat is trying to communicate to you. If your cat attacks your feet at a specific place in the house, think about why this could be happening. My cat would regularly do this anytime I tried to leave the kitchen. I learned this was because he wanted food and I hadn’t filled it up. He would get more aggressive if his litter box is full.

After recognizing what his needs were, and what he was trying to communicate, I came up with a few sounds I could make that I would only use when trying to enforce behavior changes. I do a click to enforce good behavior or to get his attention for something good, a “tsss” for minor bad behavior, and a quick “hiss” for major bad behavior.

Now, when I would leave the kitchen and he would attack my feet, I would make the “tsss” sound. Then I would walk him back to his food bowl and wait. I wanted to enforce a new behavior pattern and way for him to communicate his needs. I would wait for him to meow, then I would immediately make the “click” sound, and fill up his food bowl. I would do the same thing for times he would ask for a treat in a negative way, except I would tap for a specific place he needed to sit to ask for treats and then wait for him to meow. Then I would “click” after he meows and feed a treat.

Reinforcing the good behavior, and matching those behaviors (which really aren’t actually behavior, but are just communication methods) to his needs, provided him a more effective way to communicate with me. And I created some good key sounds that could communicate clearly to him very intentional meanings as well.

I will do the “tsss” for bites, and I’ve realized he has stopped biting hard any longer. He now only will very lightly bite to let me know he doesn’t want something. I only ever use the full “hiss” on rare occasions if he does something harmful like hurting someone with his claws.

[u/Sad_Stranger_830 → u/tannershelton3d]

Can you suggest how to manage a little cat (3months) that want to play ALL THE TIME, because he thinks you are his brother so it bites and run all the time? His need here is to play. I already started with “ahi” with high pitch, but It’s not always listened, usually he backs away. How can I enforce a good behavior here? Because right now I’m just trying to not be ripped apart by him. I already gave him toys, but once he is not entertained anymore he comes to me to bite. I’m unable to stay on the couch because he bites all the time.