How to treat a cat
The best way of treating the cat is to respect it. If you respect your cat
you’ll get on with 
it very well. Respect to the cat partially lies
in fondling it when it wants to be fondled, and to leave it when it wants to be left. You should touch the cat according to its position comparatively to you. If it is
turned to you with its head, pat it on the head. If it is turned to you with its back pass your hand over its tail. Touch your cat softly. Your hand should slide in
the direction of lying the fur. Most of the cats don’t like rough caresses.
If you are not sure in that you should do, let the cat tell you about it. Stretch out your hand towards your cat, but don’t touch it. If it stays motionless or steps back, leave it alone. If it stretches towards you and thrusts you with the nose then pass your hand over the cheek or the top of the head. When the cat turns on the back, be careful! Most of the cats can bite shaming or scratch you with the back paws if you scratch its stomach. As cats get more pleasure of this game, so they will ask you to play it as long as possible.
Most of the cats don’t like being constantly fondled. That’s why they can purr gladly for a minute or two and then turn and bite you without any apparent cause. Watch the slightest changing in your cat’s pose. Tail sweeps or slight tension can mean that your cat is enough with stroking. Stroke it for not more than a minute, then stop it. Many cats can lie gladly on your knees for a long time but they won’t bear being patted too long. My Shvaika can bear it not more than one minute and then either leave or scratch.
Do not betray your cat! Any relationships as with people
so with animals are based on trust. If you undermine this confidence then you lose immeasurably much. In no sphere this rule is observed as clear as in
relationships with cats. The cats that were grown with love and care, never were teased, left or hurt are usually feel calmly in human’s hands. They do not
know that people can hurt. They never had personal experience of it and can’t even imagine it.
But as soon as they find out that it can happen, everything changes. Betrayal can mean different actions: for example hindering cats when they sleep, holding them too tight or teasing too long. People often pretend that they joke in that way and there are people who suppose it to be funny but it is not like that. The most obvious kind of betraying is to hit your cat, to throw it or to hurt it in any other way. No reasons can excuse such actions.
The positive aspect of this problem is that usually cats are accustomed themselves to trust people again and again, if you give them time, show your love and patience and quit treating them badly.
Mind! Let your cat have her own shelter.
There should be the following rule at home: if your cat hides at her shelter, nobody must disturb her there. This place
should be a zone of guaranteed safely for her. And you'd better find such shelter yourself than to leave it to her choice. Put a box in the closet and
put your old pullover there - more often it will be quite enough. But whether your cat uses the shelter you've chosen or not, respect her decision.
Never get into her shelter and don’t try to pull her out, except cases you don’t have another choice. For example, if your house is in fire, if she ran
away during bathing, if she ate something poisonous or if you are to be at your vet’s in 20 minutes but it’ll take you 30 minutes. In all the other cases
leave your cat alone! If she could feel safe at her shelter, then there is an opportunity she will get out of there. My Shvaika chose window-sills to be her
shelter. If I try, for any reason, to pull her out, I should prepare antiseptics beforehand to paint scratched and/or bitten places. And she
defends her shelter bravely.
How not to take your cat
Don’t take your cat by the back of her neck! Mother-cats take their kittens such a way but they do it only with very small kittens and only, of course, they don’t have hands and fingers like human beings. But what is good for kittens not always good and merciful for grown-up cats. When cat gets older, her body becomes heavier. Grown-up cats are not adapted to raising in such a way and doing it means to put them to inconvenience and to hurt them. Don’t take your cat by forelegs! They shouldn’t serve as handles for raising the cat by. If you do it you may hurt your cat and frighten her. Scared cat may react unpredictably. I’m sure such reaction will impress you more than reading of these lines. Don’t grab your cat by the middle of the body! Children often do it ’cos they have small arms and the desire to take the cat is great. But not only children act wrong, some adults do the same. And I should say only few cats like it.
How to make a cat not scratch you
Don’t play the game often when the cat attacks your hand. It encourages her to play aggressive games with people. Don’t shake the cat’s confidence to you! Don’t transform caress into the competition of fight, don’t beat the cat and don’t shout at her - all this increases her distrust to you. Engage the cat in physical exercises! Cats, especially young, must have the outlet for their boiling energy and predatory instincts. Train your cat! If you train your cat on the basic rules of behavior and tricks, it will not only help to build good relations and strengthen the tie between you and the cat, but provide the cat with stimulation of the development of her mental abilities.
How to take a cat
The majority of cats have excellent memory and they are not inclined to perceive bad treatment with humor. The main condition which must be observed, when you take the cat into your hands is support. You need to support her body and then you will not hurt her. The simplest way is to take the cat’s fore paws into one hand and to hold her breast just behind back paws with another hand. In this case you will safely support the cat’s trunk from both ends, it is quite acceptable way for most of the cats. If the cat feels safe it is hardly probable that she will try to get free from unpleasant situation, using claws. Some cats like when you keep them close to your shoulder, as if you are going to carry them as a child. To carry the cat on the shoulder is very funny, but I always do that carefully, because a quick movement can make the cat thrust the claws into your shoulders, to keep its equilibrium. Some cats can skillfully balance on your shoulder not using their claws, but you will have to ask them about that. And finally some cats take it calmly and even like when you wave them in your hands, like a baby. Not every cat likes this vulnerable position but if she trusts you she will enjoy that.
My Shvaika likes to roll itself into
a ball and sleep on my knees when I watch TV. She also likes when I put her on the wardrobe. I guess that the greatest Shvaika’s trust to me is when she jumps from
the wardrobe on my hands or back, though it cannot be regarded as a steady support.
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