There was a time when Spenny thought worming tablets were just another sort of cat treat and just lapped them up. Given you’re reading this here you have probably already guessed that this time is not now. The turning point for this is pretty clear-cut unfortunately, and that was changing to a different brand.
The worming pills come in two types, the first for roundworm and the second for tapeworm. The roundworm pills from the new brand were, as previously, lapped up with barely a second thought. The tapeworm pills didn’t go so well. Spenny comes along, sniffs it and starts licking at it until it sticks to his tongue.
Oh dear, the pill has stuck to his tongue all right, but it’s also started fizzing. Spenny doesn’t like fizzing things, especially not in his mouth. A look of alarm crosses his face and he starts trying to scrape the pill off his tongue. In the meantime the pill’s condition has been upgraded from “fizzing” to “frothing” which has really not improved Spenny’s thoughts on the matter one bit.
He manages to extract the pill and spits it out onto the bed where it lies in a puddle of froth. Free of the offending object he regards it with distaste and tries to get rid of the enormous lumps of froth forming around his mouth. His innocence and naivety are now gone forever.
Unfortunately I’m not making things any better as I pick the pill up from it’s puddle, wipe the froth off Spenny’s mouth and try again to get him to eat it. He’s still confused about what’s going on and seems willing to give it another try. It doesn’t even get stuck to his tongue this time, and he spits it out as the frothing renews, leaving the wreckage of the former-pill lying in it’s own mound of disgusting cat-spit and anti-worm pesticide bubbles.
Ho hum, I guess that’s sealed things then.
I give up on that pill and entomb it in a wad of tissue. Time to try again. How do you work out what dosage of worming pill has been absorbed like that? We hazard a guess at about half a tablet, judging from the bits left over and subtracting a bit for the frothing that occurred. Well, Spenny needs 1.5 pills so we’ll leave it at that.
We would leave it at that, at least, if we could convince Spenny to take this pill. He’s not having any of it. His mouth is firmly closed, except for periodic instances where he’s scraping bubbles off his tongue, and he’s avoiding the pill like it’s covered with a cat repellent material. I guess it’s going to have to be the hard way then.
Waiting for Spenny to open his mouth again I pounce and manage force his jaws apart, with the aid of both hands, long enough for boyfriend to post the pill through. The pill goes in, the pill comes out. The pill goes in, pill and froth comes out. As this is happening I’m vaguely aware of my pain nerves screaming “major lacerations detected” through the adrenaline. The pill is starting to lose it’s structural integrity as I separate Spenny’s jaws one last time and my boyfriend slam-dunks the pill past Spenny’s tongue.
Finally it’s over, the pill is inside Spenny, and I leave my boyfriend to feed Spenny a cat-treat to try to regain some of the Spenny-points we have just lost in the escapade whilst I go to treat my wounds.
A week later it’s time for another dose of roundworm pills. Despite being the ones he “liked” he refuses to even entertain the notion of the pill coming near him. Persuasion and blood finally result in that dose being taken, but we decide we must be missing something.
Some time later I decide to ask our vet for help, as we’re just coming up to the time when Spenny needs another (de)worming. It’s clearly not the first time he’s been asked this, and launches into what seems to be a well rehearsed spiel with some advice on how to get cats to take pills whilst avoiding (serious) injury. He shows me how to hold a cat’s head in such a way that it’s lower jaw all-but falls open, and is in a position where the cat can’t reach you with his claws. Ah ha, we are missing something. The vet demonstrates on Spenny, who I’ve been stroking and trying to calm down, he reacts with an expression of alarm and confusion that is covered with “Hey! What the hell? This is not cool! Stop it!” The vet let’s him go and Spenny reacts by trying to burrow into my t-shirt to get away.
The time comes for another round of worming tablets. Using the vet’s technique the roundworm tablets go relatively smoothly. Spenny is obviously really very unhappy about this and let’s us know. Thankfully forgiveness is available in the guise of a can of tuna.
Tapeworm tablets are due the next week. Oh boy. Not only is Spenny upset by being forced to take the pill, but he is really really upset by the frothing again, except this time he can’t even get rid of it because I’m holding him down. Finally we get the pill to stay inside his mouth, by my effort of clamping his jaws closed with both hands and boyfriend rubbing his throat. I am now holding onto a tiny concentrated ball of rage, claws, froth and soaking-wet fur. Major lacerations are once again detected, and the ball of fizzing rage shoots under the bed.
Finally it’s over, and I regard the damage. The bed where we were doing this is covered in a mixture of cat-spit and worming-pill bubbles, my hands are bloodied and sliced open in many locations, and I actually have the shell of one of Spenny’s claws left behind in my wrist.
I’ve had enough of this, and studying the packaging I discover the maker of the pills has a telephone number you can call regarding problems. As I use a pair of tweezers to extract the left-over portion of one of Spenny’s claws, my mind muses the fact that this does indeed constitute a problem. The phone is answered by a very posh sounding woman, who appears to have been sucking plums as she talks her entire life.
– “Hi, is this <worming tablet company>?”
– “Yes it is, how can I help you?”
– “Well, I was wondering if I could talk to someone regarding the worming pills you sell.”
– “I can help you with that.”
– “Oh good, I was wondering if you could tell me something. Does anyone there own a cat?”
– “I’m sorry?”
– “Do any of you actually own a cat?”
– (offended) “What do you mean?”
– “Well, I was just wondering if you owned cats and used your own products on them.”
– “I have two cats, as it happens.”
– “Ah, and have you tried giving them the worming tablets, I mean actually tried giving them worming tablets with your own hands?”
– (very offended now) “I’m not sure what you’re getting at, of course I have!”
– “What, really?”
– “YES!”
– “And you didn’t notice any problems, like the way the tapeworm pills froth up in the cat’s mouth?”
– “Well, some cats do find them slightly unpalatable.”
– “There’s a slight difference between unpalatable and a very frightened cat running around with froth dripping out of it’s mouth like a basset hound.”
– “I’m not sure what you’re getting at here.”
– “Surely at some point you must have noticed that cat’s don’t just dislike the tablets, they’re actually pretty distressed by them.”
– “Have you tried putting them in the cat’s food?”
– “BWAHAHAHAHA.”
– “Butter.”
– “Pardon?”
– “Butter.”
– “What do you mean?”
– “Cover the tablets in butter before you give them to the cat.”
– “Cover them in butter?”
– “Yes.”
– “Why don’t you coat them in something when you make them?”
– “I don’t know, but try covering the tablets in butter.”
– “And that works?”
– “It’s what I do, my cats love the butter.”
– “Of course cats love butter, but surely that’s just going to end up the same as putting it in food, you’ll just end up with a clean pill left over.”
– “Seriously, try covering them in butter, the cat will hardly notice the pill.”
– “Never fails?”
– “Never fails.”
– “I’m pretty sure Jasper Carrott did a sketch about this with moles instead of cat pills.”
– “Look, what do you want me to say?”
– “You could suggest another worming product that doesn’t leave my cat traumatised.”
– (starting to lose her posh accent) “Just try the butter.”
So today, we tried the butter.
I won’t say it’s been a complete success, but it’s better. The whole tablet, covered in butter, went down pretty well. Spenny spotted the big glob of butter, wolfed it up and continued licking my hand to gather any remaining butter. The half tablet didn’t go so well. He licked it up and found the spiky edge of tablet, spitting it out. Several more coatings of butter later it’s pretty clear that we’ve been rumbled. Still, he finally took the tablet using a mixture of butter and the vet’s method, and I’ve only received one scratch in the process, so all in all that’s pretty good going.
He still ate all the butter though 
