11 Incredible Reasons to Get a Cat in Your Life

Getting a cat is a great idea to keep your mind fresh, along with keeping a healthy environment. Cats are great companions for humans, they also keep away creatures like mice and cockroaches away and help to keep your house clean.

Cats have been popular as pets for literally thousands of years throughout history and for good reasons. In this post, we are going to talk about why getting a cat is a really good idea.

There are many logical scientific, emotional, and even financial reasons to keep a pet cat, and we are going to cover all these areas.

Let’s get started:

1. Getting a cat makes you feel loved and important

Cats love their owners, and they always try to show it. They always want to be close to you, look at you with affection, making you feel loved and important.

If you own a cat, it will make you feel like being cared for. When you come back from outside, it welcomes you with warmth. It’ll run towards you, rub its body against your legs with closed eyes, tail held high, making soft purring sound – to let you know how happy it is to see you. Nothing feels better than someone’s happy that you’re there – right?

2. They enlighten your mood

Cats are naturally cute and playful creatures, and they can uplift their owner’s moods with their natural charms. If you are feeling down for no reason, playing with your cat or simply watching it playing can snugly improve your mood.

If the weather outside is gloomy and everything seems boring, take that rubber ball and throw it to the corner of your room for your furry friend to catch and play with it. Most likely, in a few moments, you’ll notice that there is a hint of a smile emerging on your face.

3. Cats understand your mood and behave accordingly

Our mood changes throughout the day for different reasons. It is not constant all the time. Sometimes you feel like doing something, other times you don’t, and cats are really good at understanding that. A 2015 study by Oakland University researchers concluded that cats are really good at detecting the emotions of their owners and they behave accordingly.

When you are really busy with something and don’t want to be disturbed at the moment, your cat is likely to respect that. On the other hand, when you are feeling like spending fun time with your cat, it will detect that emotion and move around you playfully.

Unlike many other pets, cats are less likely to bother you when you don’t want to be – and that’s a great reason to adopt a cat over other animals.

4. Cats form bonds like human-relationships with their owners

In 2011, the researchers from the University of Vienna conducted a study on cats. They found out that cats create relationships with their owners similar to relationships between humans.

Many cat owners feel that their cats are like their family members; well, it turns out cats mirror that feeling too. The study says that they attach to humans not just for food and safe shelter, cats see their owners as social partners – especially female owners.

The affection an owner feels towards his/her purring little feline gets similar affection in return. This exchange of affection creates a wonderful atmosphere between the pet and the owner.

5. The purring of cats could help you with some health problems

A 2001 study published on the The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America suggests that the frequency purring sound of both pet and wild cats ranges from 20 to 50 Hertz.

The sounds in this frequency are like ultrasound therapy which helps people with health situations such as edema, dyspnea, frequent pain, and bone and muscle growth problems.

If you are suffering from such problems, or want to avoid those, getting a cat can be really helpful for you.

6. Owning a cat means better sleep!

If you get a cat, your sleep will be deeper and more peaceful. If you are thinking of banning your cat from your bed so that you could have better sleep – it’s time to reconsider.

There is more than one study suggest that people sleep better with a cat in the bed rather than their partners. The authors of the book ‘Stress Out for Cats, Dogs & their People – SPECIAL EDITION for Pets of the Homeless’ suggest that cats are really good for sleeping well at night.

The book mentioned a UK study where over 50% of the participants admitted that they had better sleep with their cats sharing the bed.

Cats are small, soft animals who take far less space than most dogs, not to mention, humans. And the purring sound they make while sleeping is so soothing for the nerves that you’ll have a deeper sleep. They move less, and you won’t notice if they do – thanks to their small size and lite weight.

Therefore, if you want a pet to share your sleeping sessions, a cat might be the best choice.

7. Cats can save you from loneliness

It is widely accepted that cats are great companions, and cat owners never denied it. They like to stay close to their owners and show their affection whenever they can. If you live alone, a cat in the house can wonderfully fill the void the lack of human presence makes you feel.

They love to cuddle and be in close contact with their owners. As mentioned above, cats are good at detecting human emotions and act accordingly.

If you are feeling lonely, your cat is most likely going to come close to you, sit on your lap and make purring sound to cheer you up. Most of the time they succeed at it. They will make you feel in good company of someone who actually understands you and cares for you, hence, the loneliness will go away very quickly.

8. They teach you to be responsible and have better relationships

Cats are very independent animals. They don’t need much looking after, as they can take care of themselves well enough. However, they don’t mind you looking after them.

They appreciate you feed them timely, take them for a walk, give them a bath once in a while, sit them on your lap and rub your hand on their furry body to make them feel loved and cared for.

Doing these things will teach you to take care of someone and make them feel good. This habit will reflect in your relationships with humans and you’ll have better relationships with them.

Adopting a cat will most likely make you a better parent. There are many couples who get a cat prior to having kids of their own. It prepares them to care for someone as a team, and they become better at taking care of children in general.

9. Cats are great at reliving their owner’s stress

If you adopt a cat, you will actually get living stress reliving machine. Cats can relieve your stress by just being cats. They are cute, sassy, loveable, playful, and they show great affection towards their owners.

These sweet fuzzy animals can instantly change your stressful mood to a more cheerful and happy one through simply jumping around and making noises. If you have a hard day, spending some time with your pet cat will relax your brain and help you forget the hardships you’ve faced early on.

10. Maintaining a cat is relatively less expensive

Cats eat less and takes relatively smaller space. Most of the cats don’t need extra care such as fancy living atmosphere and toys. They can sleep on your couch, under your bed, on a pillow, or even on a chair or table. They are less likely to catch a disease than most of the pet animals – so you won’t have to run to the vet every week.

Cats can eat and digest almost everything, except for some bad foods. If you don’t want to buy special cat foods, they can live off human food. Although, feeding them with cat food is probably the better thing to do, and those don’t cost much either.

Cats naturally like to keep themselves clean, so you won’t need to worry much about their neatness. Just giving them a hot bath with normal shampoo will do. But, if you want to wash them more often or with special cat products – that’s not a bad idea either, and it’s okay if you can’t.

Even if you do get all the best things for your cat (because you love him/her so much) maintaining a cat costs approximately $300 less than maintaining a dog.

Take a look at the following tables:

Annual expense:

As you can see from the above tables, maintaining a cat is quite low cost than maintaining a dog, especially the annual costs.

11. Cats can save your children from certain allergies

It was previously thought that cats cause allergies. However, it turns out that cats can actually save little children from allergies. A study released in 2002 by the National Institutes of Health found that children who are less than a year of age are less likely to be affected by allergies if they are exposed to a cat.

The head of allergic mechanisms department at the National Institute of Health Marshall Plaut, M.d said that children who are exposed to pets at a very early age are well-protected against pet allergy along with many other types of allergies.

Although, the cat parasite called ‘Toxoplasma gondii’ is threatening to babies, changing the pet’s litter box every day and keeping it inside the house will keep your child safe. Therefore, if you have a young one coming or already have a little one less than one-year-old, you should probably adopt a cat.

Having a cat in the house can make you really happy. It can keep away loneliness, relieve you from stress, keep you healthy, keep your house clean from unwanted creatures like mice and cockroaches.

Whether you live alone or with family – having a cat will make your home a happier place for sure. Therefore, consider getting a cat and live a happier life.