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I Hired a Therapist to Love My Cat
Around the second time I met with my new therapist to discuss my unusually vocal cat, he asked me to clarify why, exactly, her meowing bothered me so much.
I sputtered and stumbled all over my words to discuss how stressful it was that she was so needy. That she was confounding me with such intense discontent when the house was full of her things, her belly full of expensive food, and she had very recently been entertained.
“And still she’s unhappy,” I burst out. “She’s haranguing me.”
My therapist peered out at me from the screen. In a deadpan voice that betrayed just a hint of exasperation, he responded, “Do you speak cat?”
Months leading up to my adoption of Odette, I asked my friends about the things I should know if I wanted to raise a cat.
“Cats are different from dogs,” they said earnestly. “They have their own lives, and they need their own space.”
“I want that,” I said. “I need my own space too.”
My singleness was a driving force in my decision to adopt a cat. I was lonely in Toronto after a recent move. Pandemic restrictions persisted. A new best friend had disappeared from my life after being outed as a pathological liar. I desperately needed someone to love.
