How do you stay calm at the vets office

Jordan's going tonight for additional testing. Given his cattitude, I get nervous. I'm afraid he's going to hurt someone (and I'm guessing they will want to sedate him again). I know that my being nervous will only make him worse so how do you stay calm?

Rescue Remedy for me and the cat.

Originally Posted by Rang_27

Jordan's going tonight for additional testing. Given his cattitude, I get nervous. I'm afraid he's going to hurt someone (and I'm guessing they will want to sedate him again). I know that my being nervous will only make him worse so how do you stay calm?

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I'm pretty good at staying calm until they take my kitty into the back. One vet usually has a cage of kittens that I hang at. Deep breaths help too. Good Luck tonight

Originally Posted by Anakat

Rescue Remedy for me and the cat.

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Magnum and Bumps both need 'something' to calm them down and I would rather not a full sedation.

I can not stay. To keep me cool, I must participate - I must to see, to understand, and be sure that my animal (cat or dog) goes asleep in my hands and wake up in my hands - it also reduces their stress.

So far I participated at two ops at vet's clinic - one was at the top ER (my GSD bloated) but I asked if I can be there and they let me in, the other was a surgery on my GSD female, and I asked vet if she needs assistance (it is a small rural vet clinic) and - hey - she wanted me to be the full time assistant for op as her colleague was out of office.

It was not scary, it was great - my job was to check anaesthesia level, keep dog's tummy opened when she was doing the main job as well as few smaller jobs. My hands were hurting two days after that - it is really heavy job, believe me.

That was not an easy op as my dog was beeding like mad and vet had troubles to find the reason, so when we finished all the op room as well as we both were covered in blood.

While I was in doing the job and feeling ok, dh was nearly crying outside in worries (and he is a very strong person), so if you have a chance, ask your vet permission to participate - it really helps as you have no time to worry, you see it all and it helps.

If I would need to stay outside and not able to see what's going on, I would go mad, really.

Originally Posted by Rang_27

Jordan's going tonight for additional testing. Given his cattitude, I get nervous. I'm afraid he's going to hurt someone (and I'm guessing they will want to sedate him again). I know that my being nervous will only make him worse so how do you stay calm?

Click to expand...

I try to think POSITIVE the whole time, take deep breathes, talk to my cats about how much I love them and that I'm doing this for their own good.. I think it also helps that I cannot HEAR them meowing and crying. I do know they make A LOT OF NOISES because every time I bring some of my cats in, people would give me looks REPEATEDLY. Often people would tell me that 1 or 2 of my cats are VERY loud and keeps MEOWING/HISSING..

Luckily, most of my cats are okay with the vet- they just climb all over me to try to hide from the vet.

The only cat that I really have problems with is Tango cuz he really scares the vet. Seriously.... The vet had me wrap him in a towel before he'd even TOUCH him or take him into another room to take his blood. The whole time, I kept telling the vet that this was NOT normal cuz Tango is normally the first one to greet people, etc. The vet kept saying, "yeah right... Yeah right.. Obviously he does not like ME and I don't blame him at all!" Lol.

Try to think positive, keep talking to your cat(s) about why you're doing this (to help them), take deep breathes because the cat will pick up vibes from you. Having a good vet helps too!! Maybe ask him/her if you can try wrapping the cat in a towel first before the vet starts his/her tests and see if that will work instead of sedating the cat?

GOOD LUCK and keep us posted!!

Originally Posted by Rang_27

Jordan's going tonight for additional testing. Given his cattitude, I get nervous. I'm afraid he's going to hurt someone (and I'm guessing they will want to sedate him again). I know that my being nervous will only make him worse so how do you stay calm?

Click to expand...

I stay calm by spending my time keeping my cat calm. I take him out of his carrier and place him on my lap and talk to him and pet him and this calms him down which in turn, calms me down.

How did the visit go?

It went preety well. He did not need to be sedated. He had x-rays done with no problem. They only had a slight problem with the blood draw, but he didn't try to hurt anyone, he was just trying to get away from them. He does this weird jumping thing. They will be holding him, he's tense but just laying still, then he will try and jump away. They think it's unexpected, but if you watch his pupils they dialate just before he tries to get away. I was proud of him for not needing sedation. Part of what helped was that I took a book to read while he was in back, that way my mind was on something else.

Glad to hear it went okay...thankfully I don't have to deal with Trout being a psycho to the vet..strangely enough she is fine there