We give pain medication before, during, and after the procedure, and we give a long-acting pain medication after surgery so that you guys don't have to worry about pills or liquid or anything, especially with outdoor cats. We don't send you home with anything unless you feel they need it.

Since neuters are a little bit less invasive, they tend to heal a little bit quicker. We don't put stitches in the male, so it's just keeping them a little quiet. It's usually about five to seven days of keeping them quiet. We will get them back to normal. Sometimes they act like nothing happened the second they wake up, but I recommend treating them with kid gloves for a couple of days since they did have surgery. They deserve to be spoiled. In females, since we do go into the abdomen to take out the uterus, it's a little bit more invasive. It's about a week to 10 days of just keeping them quiet and comfortable. We do a good job managing pain, so they tend to stay comfortable. Again, it's more about keeping them from being too active. That's the problem more than anything else.

Yes, definitely. We will send you home with written instructions. Our technicians will go over everything, and we'll talk with you on the phone after the procedure as well. So you'll get it in lots of avenues to help. I know it can be overwhelming sometimes, so if you have questions, write them down. That way, you won't be all flustered and try to remember what the questions were that you needed to be answered. The technician or the doctor will answer it for you.

It can. That is especially true for females. When the hormones kick in, they tend to tell you, and removing the hormones and the ovaries can help prevent that or at least minimize how vocal they are. Females come in and out of heat during the warmer months. So it can be several weeks, and they go out for a couple of days and come right back in. Unlike dogs, where they go into heat and come out for several months before going back in, cats can be in heat the whole summer long.

I would recommend against it. This time of year, especially. This is filmed in spring. There are so many cats out there that need homes and have kittens, especially in denser populations, where there are more cats than we have homes for. So cats don't have that maternal need like some people feel. It's more just hormones telling them to do things. Unless you really have a plan for the kittens, there are so many kittens in shelters that need homes. I would recommend against doing it for the sake of doing it. Mom doesn't need it, and we have more kittens. Don't wait because they become sexually mature very early. You don't want to think of your little kitten as having those tendencies, but suddenly they're pregnant, and then that's not the time you want to make that decision. Along those lines, there can be complications with pregnancy, like needing C-section and emergency situations. So it can be stressful to have kittens and a financial strain, more so than just simply having the kittens. It's not all just, they have them, and they all go away and find their homes. There's a lot more to it.

It certainly can. We recommend neutering sooner, as early as six months, sometimes a little before then, because as it goes on, sometimes behaviors can become habits. So a 10-year-old cat who's used to doing it may be driven by more than the hormones. Especially in our younger pets, it should help since a lot of that is a hormone-based behavior.