And I thought I'd had a bad week or two

[cjsmith]

Lately I've been noticing Duchess, the largest of my cats, clicking when she walked. Time to clip her claws. She doesn't love it, but she permits it. I started in on her a half hour ago.

I was way, way too late.

Ever seen an ingrown claw? A badly ingrown claw? On a forepaw, which the cat uses to dig in the sandbox?

I just doctored one.

She is the sweetest, most patient cat in the universe. I am not speedy with this type of thing. I am positive that it hurt, probably badly, at more than one stage in the "treatment". But she didn't do more than twitch and make a little vocal complaint.

Poor Duchess! She's been walking on that thing for ages like this. And she just had it pulled out, by an amateur, with (forgive me here, folks, it's the best thing I had for the job at hand) a pair of pliers. I can only imagine how much it's been hurting. I am such a bad kittymom, letting it go that long :-( :-(. At least it's out now.

Comments

[sunnydale47.livejournal.com]

Hehe, don't listen to Val! He only has back claws, or he'd need his nails clipped periodically too. He was just wedded to using the upholstered furniture in the living room as his favorite sharpening spot, and no matter what else we gave him or what we did, he simply Would. Not. Stop.

Finally something had to go: the furniture, the cat, or the claws. That was my good furniture and I wasn't about to get rid of it, nor could I let Val just continue to destroy it; and we really loved that silly cat and wanted to keep him; so, reluctantly, we had him declawed.

Despite all the PETA literature about declawing, it's never bothered him. For 14 years he's never appeared to have any pain in that area, and he certainly uses his paws a lot. He's also extraordinarily dexterous with them. He can catch anything any other cat can catch -- he even killed two mice that apparently got into the house somehow six or seven years ago. We couldn't figure out how he managed to catch and kill them without claws, but he did. He actually uses the toes on his front paws like fingers to grab onto things. When we play Catch-the-Ribbon he siezes it and hangs onto it with his "fingers," and I can't pull it away. All he lacks is an opposable thumb!

And it's a good thing I don't have to clip his claws, because he does hate having his feet touched. Friday doesn't mind at all, I can stroke Friday's paws and hold them, and he doesn't care. But I can't even touch Val's -- he yanks them away if a hand even reaches for them! His back claws don't need attention -- he really does give himself very careful pedicures back there!

[dizzdvl.livejournal.com]

My brother-in-law is a vet and his cats are declawed. I don't think he would do something that was detrimental to the cat so PTTHHHBT on the people who say mean things. Plus, you cat (who is very cute btw) probably batted the sense out of those mice and then just chomped on them, so no claws needed. My cat doesn't use her front claws for anything killing wise. Sadly she has NO TOLERANCE to me touching her feet so clipping claws is no fun for me. I tend to bleed after, but I will check for ingrown claws now. Each and every time she professes her love by kneading into me I will look and see if all of the implements of scratchy doom are fine.

*MEOW FFFFT FFFFT*

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

*grin* Yeah, some of 'em tolerate claw-clipping just fine and some really fight, don't they? Jackie is a freakin' terror, but Duchess and Little Girl are both very calm about it. Thank goodness. Two out of three isn't bad.

[eeyore-grrl.livejournal.com]

when maxling was a kitten i started touching his paws all the time to get him used to it. so claw clipping time is a breeze with him now. i am *SO* glad i did that!

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Yes indeed, well done! There are advantages to having a cat from kittenhood! :-)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I rarely even look at my cats' back claws. Those somehow seem to take care of themselves very well. The front ones, well, my cats do seem to want to shred furniture unless I clip 'em. (Incidence of this went WAY down when we redid the couch in leather. Heh!)