[Blarg]

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To reduce your allergies:

Hardwood is better than carpet.
Get a good HEPA air purifier and put it in your bedroom.
If possible, keep the cat out of the bedroom at all times.
Have her brush and wipe the cat down regularly.
Feed the cat high-quality food.

If these steps help your allergies, how about you make an effort to accept the cat into your life? They're really wonderful animals. If you can't at least give it a shot, having the cat come live with you is a really terrible idea for everybody.

Obviously, don't beat the cat.

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Great post.

I very strongly agree about NEVER letting the cat in the bedroom. EVER. If you go to sleep with the cat in there, it will have hours to expose you, and you will have hours to build up exposure. They are also nocturnal, and will often run and jump around at early morning hours, wake you up to try to play or see if you're alive, whatever. It can be extremely frustrating in an adorable kind of way that makes you want to punt them over the fence.

Plus, their hairs will find a way into your closets and you will find yourself picking cat hair off your suits and jackets and shirts and pants all the time, even if the cat never touches them and never gets in the closet even once.

Plus, clean as cats are, let's face it, they don't wipe their asses. Perfectly clean, they sadly are not. Have one trot by your face with a freshly shat back door and you'll become aware how much the idea of a cat's cleanliness is a myth. They do NOT lick their bungholes. They WILL drag whatever stayed stuck around with them, and you don't want that stuff by your face.

If a man's home is his castle, you should be able to have at least one or two rooms that cat is not allowed in, ever. If your girlfriend is like most people, she'll just do what she wants and not give a damn anyway, even if she agrees, because it doesn't concern her directly and people love being transgressive and sneaky. But, it's worth a shot trying to get her to take very seriously that sneezing and being allergic during the day is one thing, but you need to sleep every night without problems, unless you win the lottery and stop having to go to work in the mornings.

The brushing and wiping down is a good idea too, as is the HEPA filter.

I do predict you might wind up liking the cat more than you think you would, though. They're really pretty cool, as LFS notes, very low cost to maintain, and basically zero maintenance. Not a bad deal.