Luigi Teaches me about TTouch with a Hairbrush

Recently I was in San Francisco, visiting my mother and sister and, of course, my sister's wonderful cats, Zoe and Luigi (pictured above). Luigi reminded me once again of how individual cats are as to their tastes! It turns out that one of the textures he really responds to is that of a large hairbrush (made for humans), the type with a rubber base and plastic bristles, as shown here. Many cats prefer something less intense, but he is a big, strong, cat. You can see a youtube clip of this here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iZ3VFf5R_A.

I began to brush him with it and then began to do circles with it, going down his back, which was very relaxing for him. I also found that brushing forward to back with the brush on his head was extremely relaxing for him. Please keep in mind that the TTouches I was doing were still using a light pressure, just enough pressure to move the skin around in a circle and a quarter. I didn't push into him with the brush.
As you can tell from these pictures, he was clear in his communiication that this is extremely relaxing for him! xo

Garbanzo Teaches Me How to Brush Him :)

My cat Garbanzo led me to TTouch and at 16 years old he still teaches me new things every day.

He gets easily stimulated when I brush him and wants to use the brush for a play toy. After a lot of expermentation, I discovered that the method I show above really works well with him and lets me brush him for a long enough period of time to really get the excess hair off. I use two different brushes, a rubber zoom groom (they make one for cats and one for dogs) and a wire brush (I use a wire brush meant for kittens as it is softer than others). First I do circle and stroke with the rubber brush, then a slow, long stroke down the body with the wire brush. As I am not doing a continual brush, brush, brush, this method is less stimulating and more relaxing. You see him watching me as I do this as I had already been brushing him for a while before I taped him :)