How to Get Started

I'm sure a lot of people reading this blog page may not be 100% sure where to start with therapy. Therapy can be intimidating and admitting to yourself and someone that you may need help is such a difficult thing to do. I applaud anyone who has ever realized they were struggling and built up the courage to ask for help. Ever since creating Cats4Health I've been bombarded with questions from people regarding the process of how to even begin my animal therapy. As I've always stated, Cats4Health isn't just some basic animal therapy that provides some random animal to help you with your mental health. We like to personalize this experience and make it as sentimental as it can be. I was someone who struggled immensely with my mental health and was constantly going back and forth on whether if I should sign up for therapy or not. There were countless amounts of times when I would sign up for therapy through my school counseling program but cancel once the appointment got close enough. I was always just so scared to ask for help, and then whenever I did ask for help, I was so intimidated by the idea of a person just sitting there listening to you explain yourself. Yes, this is a psychologist's job, but I always just felt like I was going to be judged for opening. This is where the idea of Cats4Health stemmed from, and this is what made me want to create my own business. 

Now that you are aware of some background behind Cats4Health, I would love to give intense details on how to exactly get started. The first step is just recognizing that you need help. As stated above, asking for help isn't easy, but once you reach out to someone, you are simply one step closer to becoming a part of the Cats4Health family. We realize a lot of people ask for help differently so we've created this business to fit everyone's needs. You can either walk into our building and talk to one of the staff there about what you’re going through OR you can call one of our responders. We have online responders that are constantly working 24/7 looking out for anyone that's calling. A good portion of our clients have been one's that took advantage of the online calling service and are now loyal customers. Our responders are trained very well and have some type of connection to psychology. Majority of my employees happen to have studied psychology in college so many of them are quite wise when it comes to mental health. They'll sit on the phone, listen to you talk, and take notes about what exactly your diagnose might be.

Once, you have finished talking with a responder, the next step is to get you connected to an animal shelter. As started in a previous blog post, I have a very close relationship with three main animal shelters. However, that doesn't mean that there aren't many amazing animal shelters located closer to you. A lot of people don't realize this, but the headquarters for Cats4Health lays in New York City, and that's where I created the very first business. So, those three animal shelters that I talked about happen to also be in New York City. However, once a responder chooses an animal shelter, you will then make an appointment to either keep or foster a kitten. The appointment you make can either me made for in person or even as simple as a quick phone call. We realize some people may not want to fully adopt a cat, so we like to give the option of fostering as well. This wouldn't be possible without the help from the animal shelters and how understanding they are. 

Once you have chosen to either keep or foster a kitten this is where your mental health recovery begins. I've always been the type of person that likes to think outside of the box. I don't like to be told what to do and I like to create different ideas of doing things in life. The whole point of Cats4Health is to take advantage of a newer process of animal therapy and use it to your benefit. Choosing to either keep or foster a cat will start your mental health process. The same people that you originally talked to on the phone, will start to meet with you and discuss your health. The responders will either visit you in person or you can choose to have them visit you virtually and go into detail about the progress you may or may not be seeing. The first question they may ask you is simply about yourself. They want to see if you feel any improvement in your mental health since living with an animal. If you respond with yes, then they'll start to ask questions about the cat and make sure it's being taken care of well. We realize that when people are sad or depressed it may be hard for them to take care of themself let alone another animal. The responders are extremely understanding and offer up the option of being assisted with the animal to the client. If you respond with no when being asked if your mental health is improving, we will then make another appointment with you and really look at animal therapy and if it is the right type of therapy for you. After we ask you a few questions we then remind the client that this is a 6-month program. We want to give animal therapy a decent amount of time to work and from previous experiences, 6 months is typically the perfect amount of time for a client to realize if it is working or not. If you truly feel like the program is not working, you can choose to stop this mental health journey at any time. If you feel like animal therapy is working for you, then you can also extend the 6-month plan to a much longer plan if you would like. 

To conclude, this was the main process on how to get started with Cats4Health. Our main goal is to be there for you, and we are constantly our putting the need of our clients first. I like to tell people that animal therapy can be life changing and it's so worth it to try it at least once it your life!!!!