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

Luigi

Above is one of my sister Katie's cats, Luigi. Luigi has a very big personality and is a sweet, lovable guy, as well as being incredibly smart and interactive. I did TTouch and Reiki on him for quite a while the other day, and he continued to follow me around for a good deal of the rest of the evening while I was at my sister's apt.

I am doing a short demo on him of zigzag touch, and what I call "knuckle on the noggin", but what is really a circular touch I do with my thumb instead of my fingers. This is not an official TTouch, as I have never seen Linda or others use their thumb instead of fingers, but I have found that when doing TTouch on the forehead of a cat, it works very well to stabilize my fingers behind the cat's head and then do the circular touch (doing a circle and a quarter) using the thumb on the forehead. Doing these touches on the forehead is very relaxing for cats, and also works very well for humans. I do these touches on my human companion, Jeffrey, when his mind gets too busy in the middle of the night, and quite often, moments later he is snoring away.