Will cats bond with each other and not with us? If we are having trouble with one cat, won’t another be more of the same?

The answers, in order, are: no way, no, and heck no. These questions come up because of myths and misconceptions about love.

Concerns about love being finite and limited are especially groundless when it comes to our being loved by many cats. This is a sign of insecurity when expressed by a human who is worried cats will prefer the company of other cats to them.

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The only reason to think this way is when we are insecure about our ability to be a friend to our cat. If this is the case, does it really matter how many cats we are uncertain about making happy?

There are some cats who are wary of people and feel more comfortable with other cats. But this would be true no matter how many, or how few, cats they might live with.

The irony of this worry is how misplaced and self-defeating it is. People hesitate over getting another cat the most when they are already having difficulty bonding with their present cat. They think getting another cat will mean that now both cats will turn to each other for companionship and the person will have no one.

But it is when we are not connecting with a single, first, cat that we would benefit most greatly by getting another cat.

There’s only two ways this thing is going wrong. One way would be that it’s our fault the cat is not friends with us. Maybe we mistakenly used harsh discipline methods and made them afraid of us. Maybe we are not recognizing their overtures of friendship and so we aren’t realizing the cat does want to be friends.

Or maybe we are asking more than any cat can give. They are not going to be constantly on our lap no matter how much they love us. We might have unreasonable expectations, especially if they are rooted in insecurity.

The other way this could be going wrong is also our fault, but in a different way. Because it could be that we have a cat who does have trouble connecting, and another cat would help.

That’s the beauty of getting another cat. If it’s us who messed up, doing it right with another cat will show the first cat we’ve reformed. If we wound up with a cat who has trouble with humans, another cat will be better at communicating that humans are okay.

Far from worrying that getting another cat will mean less for us, we should put the worry aside, and realize that getting another cat will mean more for us.

No matter which way the problem started, more cats is the solution.

[Composed with ShapeWriter -- www.shapewriter.com]

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There’s more about multiple cats in The Way of Cats than the article you are reading now. See more posts on the MULTIPLE CAT ADVANTAGE.

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