5 useful cat care hacks (so your baby doesn’t struggle)

Jericho is healthy on paper. His bloodwork is perfect aside from some inflammation (spoiler alert: much-needed dental cleaning).

But he’s still struggling. He’s still super itchy.

Scratching his chin so much that he has scabs. Digging in his ears and shaking his head constantly.

I know it’s annoying for him, and it stresses me the heck out.

I’m sick of going on a hope journey with supplements and this new thing and that new thing.

So I’m going back to the basics and fixing the internal first. Our home.

Here are the cat care hacks I’m doing for Jericho so he doesn’t struggle anymore:

• Cleaning the apartment more often
• Upgrading our home products
• More self-care and less stress
• Switching to a whole prey diet
• A dental cleaning for Jericho

Cleaning the apartment more often

Every week I do the bare minimum of chores. Clean the litter box, bathroom, floors, and laundry.

But so many nooks and crannies don’t get cleaned regularly.

Like Jericho’s carpet cat condo that I haven’t cleaned once since we bought it 7 years ago…

All this dust, hair, and bacteria come into contact with Jericho while he walks, plays, and rolls around.

No wonder why he’s so itchy!

So far, I’ve been dusting more frequently, scrubbed our tub (it’s finally white again – yuck!), and cleaning the floors twice a week.

I used to use a wool dust mop, but it gets covered in hair so quickly.

So I got a vacuum and oh boy it works so well. And I was able to clean the cat condo with it. I also cleaned Jericho’s carpet scratcher.

The vacuum makes it super easy to clean the floors more often. And it removed so much dust and hair from the cat furniture.

So now I need to create a daily schedule of what I need to clean. Including my upgraded home products.

Upgrading our home products

I’m on a mission to eliminate as much plastic as possible. So that means replacing any polyester with cotton.

So far, I’ve replaced Jericho’s rugs with 100% cotton rugs. These go under his litter box and under the Ripple Rug top only.

The Ripple Rug is made out of recycled plastic water bottles. But Jericho really loves playing with this thing. It’s an excellent cat activity mat.

So I compromised – kept the top but replaced the bottom with a cotton rug.

I’ve also tested our tap water quality with Tap Score water test kits. And I got the AquaTru reverse osmosis countertop carafe for clean drinking water.

We used to have polyester (aka plastic) bedding. It was super bright, colorful, and mismatched patterns.

Colors and patterns don’t make Jericho itchy. But the mismatched design does stress me out.

It feels like my whole apartment is a mix and match of hand-me-downs and last-minute purchases.

Anyway, now we have 100% cotton sheets and a wool and cotton comforter.

It’s interesting because Jericho never climbed into bed unless we were in it. But now he goes up to the bed by himself all the time. He absolutely loves the comforter!

More self-care and less stress

The past year has been really difficult for me due to personal financial situations.

Of course, I pray and I’m grateful for what I have. HalleluYAH!

But I still need to work on not giving in to stress, worry, and doubts.

I’ve been working on new strategies in my business to increase sales. Up until recently my main source of income was affiliate marketing (aka selling other people’s products).

But I want/need to get better at selling my own products. I am a business owner after all!

My issue is my past experience at corporate where I was basically a glorified telemarketer. So I have a lot of internal work to do to get over that.

But I’m selling life-changing products! I need to value that.

For self-care, I want to spend more time outside. I go for at least 2 walks a day and see some of my cat friends.

But I want to spend more time at the park (once the spring rain is over). And hit up the ocean at least once a week in the summer.

Small things I can do until then…

Go to the mall and get a 15-minute massage from one of those chairs for $5. I love doing this the same day I do chores.

More quiet time and less TV. I don’t watch conventional TV – no cable, no netflix, no hulu, etc.

But I do watch a lot of YouTube. And most of what I watch is business strategy and education.

So basically I’m “working” all day.

Switching to a whole prey diet

I’ve been putting this off for too long. And this is what יהוה gave our cats for food.

Jericho has been on a homemade raw meaty bones diet since about 2023. He eats whole prey quail. But I plan to switch him to 100% whole prey.

The problem is…

Jericho has a lot of inflammation on the right side of his mouth. So he can only chew raw meaty bones on his left side.

Well, twice now he’s vomited his food because he can’t chew it properly.

And the third time we ended up going to the vet and he could have had an obstruction.

Thankfully, he didn’t and everything moved along as it should.

But this was another push I needed to get him to whole prey.

And also leads me to the 5th cat care hack…

A dental cleaning for Jericho

I’ve been so stressed and worried about this for so long. Hoping that this new thing and that new thing will clean up Jericho’s mouth.

His left side is great – white teeth, no inflammation.

But his right side – inflamed gums, lots of plaque/tarter.

So going to the vet for the potential obstruction was a Blessing in disguise. HalleluYAH!

This showed me he needs to be eating whole prey. But also that he can handle going to the vet and getting a dental cleaning.

His bloodwork is perfect – everything is within normal ranges. And she said all of his organs are great. No sign of any disease.

So now it’s time I bite the bullet and do the dental while he’s still young and his organs are healthy.

I just need to pay off the recent vet visit (which included xrays) first.

So now we know the best cat care hacks so our cats don’t struggle. But how are we supposed to do all this? Don’t worry, I’m here to help.

Benefits cat parents report after switching to raw

What other cat parents are saying about my courses

How Thriving Cats Bundle video courses work

Step 1: Buy the Thriving Cats Bundle

You can purchase the Thriving Cats Bundle here. This bundle includes my Cat Care Binder, Switch to Raw Blueprint video course, and Homemade Cat Food Starter Kit video course.

Step 2: Follow the plans inside the courses

The Cat Care Binder is a centralized place to stay organized with all of your cat’s care needs. Switch to Raw and Homemade video courses both have every week planned out for you to take away the stress and guesswork. I’ve done all the planning so you don’t have to!

Step 3: Your cat is finally living a thriving life

Now you can relax and sigh a big sigh of relief that your cat is living a thriving life through enrichment and a species-appropriate raw diet.

Here’s what’s included in the Thriving Cats Bundle courses

✅ Instant access so you can get started today

✅ Lifetime access to all content and future updates so you can go at your own pace

✅ Printable and digital cat care binders that provide a one-stop resource for all of your cat’s needs

✅ My 5-minute-a-week litter cleaning routine that actually keeps the smell out

✅ How to hire a cat sitter and prepare for visits so you can travel with peace of mind

✅ Video guides showing you exactly how to feed our cats properly

✅ Tips and tricks to please picky cats (that you won’t need if you follow my plan!)

✅ Meal prep hacks, shopping tips, and how to make cat food videos

✅ Complete recipes for healthy adult cats (raw meaty bones, raw boneless, and cooked)

✅ Use the course over and over again for all future cats in your life!