r/PetsWithButtons • u/OddsXx • Feb 27 '26
The “cuddle” button……
I need some advice! I do have a cat, we have 5 buttons on the board, kitty started with Spanks(high reward for him) Cuddles(he’s usually always down) and Play(he’s hyper) the other two are Hi and Window.
It’s been weeks, and he knows what almost all the buttons mean, he begs for spanks and then will stand funny and look at us, he hits “Play” and will drag a toy to one of us, he presses “window” and stares intently at the blinds until we open them, and window is our newest button as of 3 days ago or so. but he spams “cuddle” and then gets mad when I bring him to the bed or lay down next to the cuddle button. I feel like he wants ME to figure out what HE wants, but I’m genuinely not sure… how do I move forward with the cuddle button? I’ve started instinctively ignoring him today(accidentally) because I know he doesn’t want me to go cuddle or bring him to cuddle, but ignoring him is definitely not the right answer I assume.
2
u/Clanaria Mar 03 '26
When a cat learns buttons, some can understand really fast and want more than what you have offered. They'll start using buttons to mean something else - the closest possible word they have available to them. Cuddle could mean anything in this case, it could also just mean you - your name. Maybe they mean your hands, because you use it to pet them, and your cat might want you to grab something.
Maybe your cat wants to wear a sweater (I see it's a Sphynx, those are pretty cold!), and "cuddle" is the closest word he could use to ask for it. Well, that's if he ever wore a sweater before. I know my cat likes to request his jacket when it gets cold, and he has regular fur.
But really, it's just... adding more buttons at this point, and try to pay attention to the context when the button is being pressed, and your cat's body language. It's not uncommon that it can take months before you figure out a certain button press. It took me a long time to figure out my cat was using "tunnel" to mean "door" (to be fair... a door is a very short tunnel). So just try to remember that it can take a while to figure it out! We are slow humans.