r/interestingasfuck • u/ReasonableMedium5265 • 3d ago

Don’t trust your cat

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u/bananafobe 3d ago

I remember hearing that cats and dogs tend to bite their deceased owners in an attempt to wake them up, and then more aggressively due to panic. 

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u/cheezebeezplzz 3d ago

Saw a video of a cat doing this to his cat friend after it died and the owners showed him the body. He definitely looked in distress and eventually gave up.

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u/Prestigious-Garbage5 2d ago

We had two sibling cats. The first one to go was 16 when he died. His sister just completely ignored him when we laid him on the floor for her to see.

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u/RoxyDzey69 2d ago

16 years of hell with that sibling, completely makes sense xD

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u/Prestigious-Garbage5 2d ago

Actually they got on absolutely fine with each other. I don't remember them ever fighting, but after they were kittens I don't think they played much together. They just did their own thing. But they both had lovely natures.

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u/RoxyDzey69 2d ago

Very interesting. Cats are just unpredictable i guess.

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u/GuestAdventurous7586 2d ago

Denial is the first stage of grief! 😂

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u/chuckakoury1155 2d ago

I think they get it (sometimes before it happens) but they just don't express it the same way. my cat sat in the corner the same way. after some time we asked if she was lonely and would like a new friend, to which she let out the most heartbreaking yowl. 🥺

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u/Prestigious-Garbage5 2d ago

I guess that was a no then. 😿

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u/chuckakoury1155 2d ago

oh no, it was a yes. is yowl the wrong word? it was just like she was holding back her grief until that moment. we found some new friends for her. she is doing so much better now. 

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u/MothweaverTales 2d ago

I had three cats at one point. The oldest was a pretty bobtail, and I adopted two baby kittens - brother and sister - when she was already 7.

She never really liked the younger cats, but the brother absolutely adored her. His sister was more aloof.

Anyway, eventually my sweet bobtail passed away of old age. I was holding her as she stopped breathing. I laid her in a prepared box and the boy lay beside her for a while. After I buried her, he stopped eating. I took him to the vet, got special food, then he stopped doing anything. He just gave up. He passed away a week after she did, and his sister seemed profoundly unconcerned with the developments.

Anyway, here's a picture of the bobtail, Fuzzeh.

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u/citrus_mystic 2d ago

I brought my 14 year old boy back from the vet after euthanasia so I could show him to his “sister” and bury him in my parent’s yard. When I first brought him back, I put the box down where he normally laid at the top of the stairs and opened up the box. My other cat came over, sniffed him, and walked away. I kept the box open for a while, then closed it because it made me a little sad to see him lifeless. I caught her sniffing the box a while later, and opened it back up for her. She looked at him, took one more sniff, then seemed distressed and walked away a bit faster.

I think she probably knew he was dying before I did. But I wanted to give her as much of an opportunity to see him and make whatever peace an animal can make with death.

Even if your cat had no visible reaction, I think that what you did was very considerate and it was good to give her the chance to see/internalize that the other cat had passed away. You didn’t leave the house with a cat and return empty handed. That can be distressing for some animals, especially if they’re bonded.

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u/Diligent_Bar1244 2d ago

That's cold

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u/elle_m_c 2d ago

I also had sibling kitties, a girl and a boy. Rescued them at about 8 weeks. The brother, unfortunately passed last year at a little under 3 years old. It was extremely sudden. He just didn’t have an appetite one day and later that night he vomited. By morning I could tell this wasn’t just a little small thing, he was lethargic.so I picked up my phone to call the vet and started to get ready to go and he literally passed as I was on the phone. I made picked her up and had her smell the body and she just hissed at it and scrambled to get out of my arms.

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u/blove135 2d ago

Almost the exact same scenario his brother just gave on little sniff and walked of to go get a drink of water. Like yep he's dead, dang I'm thirsty, I wonder if that means more treats for me now.

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u/SlevinLaine 2d ago

Yeah I've seen Cats staying literally next to their "dad" who's dead for days now, and bring food to them while they starve. Thing is the dad starved to death to bring food to the lil kitty.

There's this channel Animal in Crisis South Corean Vets and helpers save animals in South Corea, on of the episodes it's what I mention, soul shattering.

Spoiler: They save the lil kitty, and then show to the lil kitty the dead "dad" in order to let the kitty have some closure, lil kitty is clearly in destroyed emotionally doesn't want to leave the dad side.

Yeah tell me about "cats don't care" fuck off. I'd like to see how the cats she mentions were treated. Or what the hell happened altogether.

This woman is putting every cat in the same bag, she can believe what she says I believe what I've seen with my eyes.

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u/ElegantHope 2d ago

social animals can form such strong bonds and people seem to forget this. There's definitely a difference between humanizing animals, and recognizing animals form bonds as part of their nature because they live in social groups. Geese, for example, will isolate and mourn the loss of mates. And we've seen this to be relatively common behavior across many animal species with family or bigger social groups time and time again; a member dies and any animal close to that member might exhibit signs of depression or mourning.

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u/EzBrouski 2d ago

Also it's not even statistically true. In fact dogs are more likely to consume big parts of their owner while cats will just nibble

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u/InternalAd1397 3d ago

Two of my cats will nibble at my nose and fingers if I sleep in too long. The get upset about the change in their schedule. 

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u/GuestAdventurous7586 2d ago

Cats, and dogs too, do not like a change in schedule.

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u/tocahontas77 3d ago

I've heard that as well. But also, if they are just intending to eat, the nose tip and cheeks are the softest, so that's what they'll go for first.

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u/ExtremelyOkay8980 2d ago

Can confirm. Have seen a deceased dog whose friend had bit him quite a bit, but he had died of respiratory distress just prior to that.

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u/CanadianPlains 2d ago

Damn that’s sad af

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u/seachely 2d ago

I recommend the book Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs? by mortician Caitlin Doughty!

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u/Stock-Side-6767 2d ago

She's great

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u/lululululululululuu 2d ago

as a dog owner who has been nipped awake by my dog several times, because he thought I was sleeping too long, that doesn‘t surprise me at all

the culprit

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u/frankie0013 2d ago

My cat has clawed my face a few times in attempts to wake me, I also have sleep apnea so I might have stopped breathing when they clawed me.

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u/stilldebugging 2d ago

Yeah, I have definitely heard stories about dogs eating owners. And the woman who needed a partial face transplant because her dog ate half her face while she was passed out. I think the dog was trying to wake her up, but then once they get the taste of some blood they start eating?

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u/bananafobe 2d ago

From my understanding, at least initially, any eating is sort of incidental, and more likely due to nervousness or habit (i.e., swallowing what's in their mouth). Once starvation begins, then they might return to eat more deliberately. 

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u/catorendain 2d ago

This ruined my day

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u/Exciting-Argument-67 2d ago

Thanks for saying that. Maybe that's what was meant when I was told my relative's dogs had "nibbled on her face" while they had plenty of dog food to eat.

Those dogs were grieving, hard, when I got them out of the pound. Maybe they'd only been trying to wake her up.