Our two (formerly three) cats were all declawed, and none of them have problems. They still scratch at things (just without leaving the claw marks), stretch fine, and climb our Christmas tree every December. We could NOT get them to stop clawing up everything; we were in school, my parents worked, we couldn't be there all the time to discourage them from doing it. Our calico used to run down our hall and jump and hang on to the door frame and slide down; we still have marks in the wood. She used to do it sans claws too! She's getting older now so its slowed down, but I can assure you my cats did not and do not know they're missing their claws. They aren't aggressive.

It was either declawing or nothing. They're 100% indoor cats; we live around the woods, so in addition to those predators, we have lots of large dogs around our neighborhood and idiot drivers who drive too fast. A year ago our dog was run over while sitting in our yard. Some idiot swerved off-road and ran him over. Intentional or not, it still happened.

I guess we should have just gotten rid of them, though. Death by car or dog or sitting in a shelter by themselves until they were euthanized was a much kinder option than giving them homes.

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