Ray Ray, a five-year-old cat at a rescue centre in Montana, longed for human contact but reacted with hissing and swiping whenever anyone tried to pick him up or stroke his back. Although he clearly wanted affection, his responses made handling unsafe and re-homing impossible. During a class I was teaching, I was asked whether I would work with him.
To help Ray Ray focus and engage safely with the remedies, I placed him in a large crate with carefully arranged herbs on one side and soft, comfortable bedding on the other. This setup is something I routinely use with rescue cats, as it creates a calm, contained environment that allows them the stillness needed to focus and self-select.
Ray Ray showed a clear preference for birch and German chamomile, although initially he only took brief sniffs of the birch. I applied a couple of drops of German chamomile to a piece of cloth, after a while I reintroduced birch on another piece of cloth, placing them about eight inches apart on the crate floor. He lay beside the German chamomile, breathing it in deeply for around twenty minutes, before moving to the birch, settling with his nose almost touching the cloth and eyes closed. He remained there for a further twenty minutes, after this, he stood up slowly, walked away, and curled into a deep, peaceful sleep.
After the session, he emerged from his crate and jumped on top of it. A staff member reached out tentatively to stroke his back. To her amazement, instead of reacting defensively, Ray Ray purred. Then, with quiet confidence, he approached each student in the room, rubbing against their legs while enjoying their touch, stroking his back, something he had previously been unable to tolerate.
At the end of the class, I asked the students what they had taken from the session. Many were visibly moved, others had teas in their eyes, not only by Ray Rayā€™s transformation, but by the realisation that cats, like other animals, are capable of self-medicating with essential oils, an ability that has long been misunderstood. See cat misinformation in the theory section.
This misconception has welfare implications, as denying access to appropriate remedies can prolong pain and distress. Ray Rayā€™s selection of birch, followed by the sudden resolution of what had been labelled a behavioural problem, revealed the true source of his reactivity: physical pain. Within weeks, he was adopted into a permanent and loving home.
