How Adopting My Cat Frank Changed My Cleaning Habits Forever

It was not love at first sight for Frank and me. On our first night together, he peed in his carrier on the way home from the shelter, immediately requiring a bath when we got home. After what was a traumatizing bathtime for the both of us, he hid under my couch, soaking wet, refusing to eat or drink water all night. The shelter volunteer I frantically texted told me I just needed to give him some time, so I went to bed and left him alone in the living room.

When I poked my head out of my bedroom in the middle of the night and spotted him relaxing on my pink velvet couch, I thought we were finally making some progress. He saw me watching him, meowed once, and peed. I reacted like anyone who has never dealt with a pet would: I cried, closed my bedroom door, and went to sleep.

It was brutal. Frank and I were locked in a fierce standoff, and I was losing. Badly.

The following morning, the unbearable smell hit me as soon as I stepped out of my bedroom. I was instantly hit with a wave of regret for not staying up the night before to deal with the mess. Before I tried any of the at-home remedies Google recommended for me, I decided to head to the local pet store and beg the store clerk for help with my couch. His advice? “Throw away the couch.” If you’ve ever smelled cat pee before, you’ll understand why. My couch had been with me for less than a year, and I was not ready to give up on it just yet, though.

My next stop was Target, where I picked up a new bottle of laundry detergent, a spray upholstery cleaner, and a box of baking soda. Frank sat in the opposite corner of the living room and watched as I sprinkled baking soda on my couch, let it sit for an hour, and then followed up with the upholstery cleaner. Next, I unzipped the couch cushion covers and tossed them in the washing machine. Three back-to-back wash cycles later, I finally couldn’t smell cat pee on the fabric.

Still, when the summer was in full swing, I swear there were days I could still smell the stench wafting off the couch cushions when I least expected it. Needless to say, I’ve continued washing my cushion covers in the washing machine every couple of months since.

I knew having a cat meant I would have to clean more often to keep my apartment free of hair, but I could never have imagined just how frequently I would need to dust and vacuum. Frank is not a climber, yet somehow, I find his hair on my kitchen counters, in the glasses stored in the cupboards, and on every other surface in my apartment. What was once a weekly swipe of a microfiber towel dampened with a multipurpose cleaner has become a daily task—at least on the surfaces I cook and eat off, like my kitchen counter and dining room table.

I was already in the habit of vacuuming the kitchen every night after dinner, but with a cat for a roommate, I was pulling my vacuum cleaner out of the closet to clean all the rooms in my place every two days now, too. That got old fast. After buying all the cat toys, beds, and food bowls available on the internet, my next major purchase was a robot vacuum. Every two days, my robot vacuums my apartment all on its own. Frank hated it the first couple of times it ran, but now, he sits on his throne (the couch he marked the first night) and watches it drive around the apartment, picking up his hair. 

Within Frank’s first two months at home with me, I bought and disposed of four litter boxes, each with their own awful, messy litter. I wanted to be a good cat mom, so I kept buying every kind of organic, nonclumping litter I could find online, only to grow tired of stepping on pieces of it all over the apartment after a few days. I wish I could say I’ve found a solution for this, but I haven’t. Every time I vacuum, I’m still picking up loose bits of litter all over the place.

Besides the issues with the litter itself, there’s also the matter of what goes on in a litter box. When I’m home, I’m basically keeping an eye on Frank so that I can follow him into the bathroom and immediately scoop his litter when he uses it, but even with my meticulous care of the box, it has a funky smell most of the time.

Heavily fragranced products have come under a lot of scrutiny lately, and I try my best to keep them out of my apartment for my own health and Frank’s. Even so, I keep an activated charcoal odor absorber, a plug-in air freshener, and an air purifier in or near the bathroom at all times to try to combat the stinky box smell. On a good day, it’s enough.

Frank won’t let me cut his nails, pick him up, or hug him. He doesn’t like it when I have company and, most of the time, pretends I don’t exist. I do laundry and vacuum a lot more often, wash more dishes every day, and find myself talking to a cat that talks back in a surprisingly human tone more often than I’m ready to admit. But he also sleeps on a pillow next to my head every night, greets me at the door every time I come home, and stands watch over me anytime I’m in the bathroom.

Accepting that I will never again live in a hair-free home took me about as long as it took Frank to adjust to living with me. Now, I think we’re friends and I can’t imagine not having him around. My mom was wrong for once—the extra cleaning is worth it.