I must admit that I would not be happy with a vet who told me to tranquilise my cat before bringing her in, although you may not be able to do much about that if it is the only surgery available to you.

None of our cats like the vet. Sam and Daisy are well behaved, if frightened, and you do have to drive there with all the car windows open. Jessica has the worst reputation. She was feral for around three years and raised litters outside before we got her. She takes no nonsense from anybody. We selected our vet because they didn't operate an appointments system, because we didn't know when we would catch them and had to be able to take them to the vet right away. When they were getting their injections for the first time, the vet put them into what she called a crush pen. It doesn't crush the cat! It is like a carrier, but the sides and the top move in so that the cat can be held in position while getting injections. They only used that the first time we went, since then we have always taken Jessica's own towel with us to wrap her up and try to make her feel safer.

Even so, there has been much growling and the odd chase round the surgery. There was one spectacular occasion when a newly qualified vet was on. I have no doubt she was very good, but she lacked the experience and authority of the regular vets. Jessica had the measure of her very quickly and realised the vet was nervous of her. In one beautiful flowing movement of her head, Jessica managed to bite all three of us. To this day I don't know how she did it.

So after waffling for several paragraphs, I don't really have any advice. Take her own towel, stay calm yourself (because cats can read your mind) and hope she calms down in a couple of years. A good vet is really important though.