Xiaohei [Photo by Yang Yang/China Daily]

For a start, the cat seemed to be immune to toilet training and would constantly leave its mess in various parts of Qiu's apartment.

That led to bouts of her yelling at the cat, which in turn seemed unable to play the usual role of the docile feline that will do anything as long as it is pampered.

The more Qiu did to keep the cat out of the kitchen or bedroom, the more eagerly it tried to get in. Sometimes, she says, the cat seemed to do its business outside the toilet out of spite.

"Then I realized that perhaps I was being mean to her. She was doing her best to make me think about my relationships with my parents and friends."

Wu Jian, 27, of Changsha, Hunan province, who lives with his girlfriend in Beijing, says they adopted a ginger cat three months ago.

"We wanted to make ourselves feel responsible for taking care of a living creature, so we looked for a slightly intelligent mammal that could be with us. A dog was the first choice, but we weren't sure we would have the time to walk it every day. So we opted for the cat."

Sometimes the two, both from one-child families, would quarrel over whether they should beat the cat if it bit them or after it did its business in the apartment, or whether Wu should shout at it either in anger or when he was having fun with it.

"If we could tackle these disputes in a positive way, we could do the same when we had other similar problems and get along better," Wu says.

Wu's girlfriend even created a Weibo account to record interesting moments of their daily lives from the perspective of the cat.

Many Weibo accounts have become popular based on regular postings about lovable animals, including cats, dogs, pandas and parrots.

"Perhaps our cat could be a bit hit on the internet, too," she says.

Wu says that when he feels depressed, the cat can cheer him up.