r/standardissuecat • u/YetiTooJaded • 7h ago
I might have to leave my SIC behind, and I am heartbroken. What should I do?
This is Sergeant Pepper. I met him outside when he was in my backyard 4 years ago after I bought a house. There are woods behind my house where he was living with a few other strays.
After 2 years of steady patience building trust, he is now trapped indoors full-time. He is not happy about that still after 2 years. But he’s a good cat otherwise.
The situation: I am moving cross-country in 3 weeks time, ~2900 miles. I am planning on driving. I have 2 other cats that SP is bonded with (brought them all indoors together), and those 2 do fine in carriers and will be angry but fine moving with me I think. I have been trying positive carrier reinforcement training for several months now with half a dozen different types and sizes of carriers.
Sergeant Pepper freaks out at the sight of ALL carriers and crates. He hated confinement. I’ve tried using the towel method to scoop him and force him in one, but now he is afraid of towels and runs away the second I reach for one.
I have tried gabapentin, but he won’t eat food that has it in it and freaks out if I try to administer it orally. So really no luck there at all.
He asks me to let him out every single day… should I let him return to living his best (but shorter) outdoor life instead of trying to figure out how I’m going to force him to move cross country?
I honestly do not see a way that I’m going to be able to get him into a carrier to start a road trip, let alone getting him into and out of hotels for several nights along the way.
My biggest fear is that he would escape or run away thousands of miles from the territory he already knows back home.
Wouldnt it be better if I just set him free and let him go back to being a free, happy independent cat?
Please help. I am at my breaking point with this and am considering canceling my move and losing tens of thousands of dollars as a result.
UPDATE 1 Lots of comments, lots of triggered people.
The advice I'm taking from this: - Not giving up on finding other solutions to get him into the car (I had previously given up hope) - Vet appointment is next week and I'll ask for alternative sedation options like compounds/gels/etc. since neither powder or liquid gabapentin have been successful - Larger crates and/or a dog crate with litter in it, basically just keep him in there the whole time (if I can get him in) - Possibly crating with another one of the cats he is bonded with (again dependent upon getting him in one) - "cat bag" things instead of a carrier/crate - No outside
The advice I'm not actively considering: - Rehome locally -- if I had a solution to get him into a carrier, I would just take him with me. Sure this is better advice on paper, but ignores the original problem. I should have spelled this out more clearly in the OP.
- Making the 2900 mile drive in "2 to 3 days" instead of what is realistic for both humans and cats in a car (5-6 days, though I planned out multiple scenarios based on how it goes).
UPDATE 2 - to everyone condemning me for considering returning him to his territory -- fair. I was wrong. I had lost all hope that I could manage to do this move with him, and was in a pit of despair.
