🏆 Cat Person of the Month: Rachel Geller

Rachel Geller, Ed.D. is the Founder and President of All Cats All the Time, a 501c3 nonprofit dedicated to preventing the surrender and abandonment of cats who have behavior problems. Rachel is certified as a: Cat Behavior and Retention Specialist, Humane Education Specialist, Pet Chaplain®, Fear Free Shelter Specialist, American Association of Feline Practitioners Cat-Friendly Veterinary Advocate! Rachel has presented for numerous animal welfare groups on cat behavior, cat behavior & retention programs, and surrender prevention. She is also a presenter for the annual Online Behavior Day sponsored by the Community Cats Podcast.

MY: Dr. Rachel, we are so happy to have you on our website! Tell us about your work training cats and their humans

RG: I work with cat owners to resolve their cats’ behavioral problems, always with the goal to create permanently harmonious relationships between cats and their humans. Helping cat owners with their cat’s behavior problems can be the difference between a cat remaining in his home or losing his home. Typically by the time I’m called, the person is frustrated, has tried a lot of things, and is at the end of their rope – which is why I do this completely free of charge. It is my mission that there never be a financial barrier preventing people from keeping their cats in their homes when the issue is behavioral.

Cats don’t purposely misbehave, and I help cat owners to understand that cats don’t think in terms of right and wrong like we do. Often what a human defines as a behavior problem is, in reality, a cat’s natural response to something in his environment, and he is trying to solve this problem as a cat. Once the client understands the cat’s needs, then I work with the cat owner to make sure that the home environment meets these needs from the cat’s perspective.

MY: It’s so true. People don’t realize that most cats just want to please us and sometimes just need us to pay attention and better understand their behavior and needs. Can you tell us more about the work you do at the shelter?

RG: I work with many shelters doing “surrender prevention” which means that when a cat owner wants to surrender a cat due to behavior problems, the shelter will say “We can provide you with cat behavior counseling, completely free of charge, that will solve this problem so that you can keep your cat.”

Most people really don’t want to surrender their cats, but they have lost hope and don’t know that most cat behavior problems are solvable. This is where I come in – my goal is to make sure the cat remains in their new home by working with the owner to resolve the behavior issue. This saves two lives because the cat who is in a home will stay there, freeing up a spot at the shelter for a truly homeless cat. I also provide volunteer and staff trainings at shelters, free of charge, on cat behavior, socialization and working with shy/scared cats. Last year I kept over 1,000 cats in their homes, cats who were going to be surrendered to shelters for behavior problems.

MY: Your volunteer work is truly inspiring, Rachel. Thank you for all the work you do to help cats and their people. I also saw that 100% of the profits from your book, “Saving the World, One Cat at a Time,” is donated to cat shelters, rescues and animal welfare organizations! Please tell us about the book!

RG: Saving the World One Cat at a Time, is what I call an “instructional memoir.” It’s about my life and how I got to this point, and also common cat behavior problems and how to solve them.

MY: Wonderful! A question I love to ask is, when did you first fall in love with cats, and what was it that made you fall in love with them?

RG: I was probably only 5 or 6 years old when I discovered an endless parade of cats in the neighborhood who really needed me and somehow ended up at our house. I fell in love with these beautiful creatures who were also amazing communicators, using their minds and their bodies together to let me know what they needed, how they were feeling, and their love for me.

Bringing these cats home came with lessons in responsibility. I can remember being a little girl, sitting at the kitchen table eating breakfast, when my dad walked into the room. He saw me eating and asked if I had fed my cats yet. I said I hadn’t, but I promised I would as soon as I was done eating. He told me to stop and to go feed my cats because they were dependent on me and it was my responsibility to protect and safeguard them, to take care of their needs before my own. To this day, the first thing I do when I wake up is feed my cats, freshen their water, and clean their litter boxes.

MY: What a wise man — Your dad taught you a lesson in empathy and responsibility all in one! And who are the cats in your life today?

RG: Currently, I have two cats of my own to whom I am unhealthily attached, haha! Their names are Elijah the Tishbite and Sosil. Their names have stories: Elijah the Tishbite is from the Hebrew “Eliyahu ha Tishbi” which is loosely translated as the prophet of peace will dwell in your home and Sosil is a Yiddish derivative that means “sweet.”

MY: Such beautiful names, Rachel! Thank you so much for sharing with us today. And where can our friends go to learn more about your work, buy your book, and/or contact you?

RG: Visit my website: https://drrachelcatbehavior.com/which has all of that information and more! You can watch videos on common cat behavior problems and read informative articles on cat behavior topics.

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