**JQ**

hopingwaiting

Any advice on how to teach my toddler not to antagonize the cat?  The previous uneasy truce has been broken and I fear it could get ugly.

Jacquiemark

What is your LO doing? DD chases our cat all over but also plays with him using some of his toys. We have some of those sticks that have the string and feathers at the end. It helped a lot. He enjoys it because she plays with him. She still doesn't always pet "nice," but he is tolerating it. I still try and always correct her. Is your cat hiding from DS?

Jacquiemark

I saw this too.

https://www.babycenter.com/400_how-should-i-handle-our-toddler-who-tortures-the-family-cat_500168_1.bc

 

.ETA: Holy crap, there are 161 comments on that. Yikes! Some good and some bad advice I see.

I like this advice (It's worth the try):

we did a complete turnaround and if she did anything even remotely hurtful to the cat, we made a HUGE fuss over the cat and completely ignored her, e.g. "oh, poor kitty! Are you okay? Poor baby! You got hurt." It drove our daughter CRAZY and she stopped tormenting the cat within just a few days. Then, we really went out of our way to give her MEGA praise when she would treat the cat well. If we saw her petting the cat gently or playing with him nicely, we really played up how wonderful that was and would sometimes even surprise her with little prizes -- "wow, you are so nice to the kitty -- how would you like a sticker."

hopingwaiting

He chases her everywhere, pulls up and cruises along whatever she is sitting on, waves his arms at her, pulls her fur/tail/ears, pets too rough at times.  It's all out of love because she is his most favorite thing, but depending on her mood, she interprets it as picking a play-fight and swats back at him.  We keep her claws short, but she's still gotten him a few times when I didn't get there in time to separate them.

I really like the bringing back her toys idea.  I'm a little afraid LO will just put them in his mouth rather than play with the cat, but we can keep trying every few weeks.

Off to read that link....

Jacquiemark

hopingwaiting:

I really like the bringing back her toys idea.  I'm a little afraid LO will just put them in his mouth rather than play with the cat, but we can keep trying every few weeks.

 

If you have one of those sticks with feathers atthe end, you can show DS how to play with her using it. Amelia thinks it'd hilarious when the cat plays with toys.

Our cat got A a few times and she was in such shock. She didn't cry but it was obvious she didn't like what happened. I try to get in-between them when she gets too rough as well. I usually just put my arm out and let the cat swat at me.