Gatophobia – also known as ailurophobia, felinophobia and galeophobia – is the irrational fear of cats and this article is about curing your panic from cats. You can also read the e-book on curing anxiety or simply discuss your fear with us!
Cats. A very popular musical is named ‘Cats’. And a species as well. You hate those cats. But why?
Those tiny animals are sweet and social creatures. Unlike men cats would never extinguish each other because they believe in different Gods.
Perhaps it’s because cats are autonomous and independent? Because they are free? Because you can’t make them obey like dogs?
The Fear of Cats
Since you cannot control cats and since you cannot make cats do what you want you might be interested in understanding yourself when you crave things. An example: Today you want to go out with some friends and get in touch with other people. You do so. Nobody is going to stop you from doing it.
Later that day you come home (it’s probably night already) and you pull out your keys to open the front door. Do read this carefully: You’ve got keys to open a closed door. Cats don’t. That’s why they miaow when they want in.
Another example: Cats are intelligent. You are also intelligent. You would easily win dozens of prices if you had to compete in an IQ test against any cat. But – this is the funny part – you would definetely lose against any cat when it came to hunting or trapping ‘food’ regardless of your IQ being 150.
Gatophobia is about Control
There is human intelligence (which is not perfect if you consider murdering each other because of different points of views to be stupid – and you should do so) and there is cat intelligence (which of course isn’t perfect as well because cats just don’t invent crazy tools like keys to open the front door).
Marianne Williamson[1] said:
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.”
She might be right! We have compared people who fear cats with people who love cats. Cat-lovers are sort of ‘ready’ for the next step – whatever the next step will be. Cat-haters (those who suffer from Gatophobia) tend to be impatient; they want to know the next step, want to foresee it and act accordingly.
You can now understand why many people who fear cats do love dogs: They are predictable.
Overcome your Fear of Cats
Cats are very popular pets today and you are very likely to encounter one of those creatures a few times in your lifetime. While you could easily avoid exotic animals like the Black Mamba or an elephant you won’t be able to avoid cats. And you shouldn’t.
This final part of our article about Gatophobia will hopefully help you with getting along with cats.
Our 5-step program to cat anxiety relief:
1. Confront, understand & categorize
You cannot get relief if you do not work on your problem. Furthermore we suggest you play with your fear instead of working on it. You want to live a happy life and not strike out stuff on a huge todo list, don’t you?
You could – many people have great success with this method – start right now and write down the essence of your fear of cats. Summarize all aspects of your very anxiety.
What makes you run away when you see a cat? Is it their slow yet uncontrollable movement? Their voice? Or do you fear to be mauled? Or does your fear come from infections you heard about?
2. Learn facts about cats
I, the author of this text, do not fear cats at all. I do adore cats more than most other animals. I’m able to adore cats because I know a lot of things about them.
I learned facts about cats when I was a little child and I’ve been living in a cat-loving family for over 20 years. To overcome one’s fear he or she has to take control of the very subject of fear.
Not by actually putting cats into cages. Take control over your knowledge (or rather the lack of it) about cats and why you are afraid of seeing, hearing, touching and finally accepting them.
3. Watch cats in a safe setting
It might become a lonely mission but if you happen to have nice friends you can ask them for help. When you feel ready you should take the next step in overcoming your fear of cats: Watch them in a safe setting (preferably with a friend of yours who can hold your hand).
Many people prefer doing this outdoors because they have more room to maneuver if anything goes wrong. Before you enter the room or the garden where a cat is known to reside you should clear your mind and focus. Do not focus on your fear but on the facts you know about cats.
4. Get in touch with cats (under sb’s watch)
If the above step was successful (Congratulations!) you can quickly move on. First you should evaluate the knowledge you gained by watching that very cat. Did your knees tremble? Did your heart beat like hell? Or have you been able to relax?
In step #1 you took notes on every aspect of your fear of cats – is fear the correct emotion when facing a cat? Would you call yourself irrational if you were looking over your own shoulder from a third perspective? Get back to your notes and realize your progress!
When ‘relaxed’ describes your mood best while watching a cat you can easily go on with getting in touch with cats. Yep, I mean literally touching them.
Do not perform this last step within a building or while the cat is in some kind of cage or something! Cats are very sensitive and they can feel your anxiety (just like dogs). A cat could easily understand your anxiety to be a sign of danger for its life so be aware of getting attacked.
This is sort of a horror scenario and is not very likely to happen but it could easily ruin your party.
A few last advises
The 5-step program is pretty easy to understand and also very doable. If you happen to fail – most likely on step #4 or #5 – you should not give up but remember how far you’ve got already!
You can repeat the procedure at any time you feel ready for it. When you are finally done with this you will be very happy. That’s a promise.
References, such as footnotes
[2] Gatophobia – © Illustration by Denise Busch
