Many of you know I've been here for the past couple of months, chronicling Tim's journey to get off cisapride. He was put on this medication last June after a terrible constipation episode. My husband and I believe the constipation was due to diet - he ate primarily kibble - and we have since transitioned him to all canned. We are doing a few other things under the guidance of a holistic veterinarian. We'll be adding home-cooked and possibly raw in the future. As we gradually taper Tim's doses of cispride, I obsessively track his bowel habits. I never thought I'd be so excited about cat poop.
Meanwhile, my girl Abby seems to have occasional hard poops that we're trying to resolve. Last night, I thought I brought on diarrhea by giving her tiny amounts of psyllium and miralax too close together. Maybe not ...
Abby's a little better today, but still has diarrhea and now so does Tim! His seems exactly the same- sound it made coming out, smell, texture, color ... (I worked at home today, litter boxes are in the home office, I got to enjoy all the action). So now I'm not so sure my "constipation cocktail" worked too well on Abby and I'm concerned.
Before I go any further, I've had two telephone conversations with the veterinarian's office and we have an appointment for tomorrow morning. I've collected, bagged, and labeled fecal samples from both cats. I dug the cat food cans out of the recycling container and labeled with date and time consumed. I pulled the cans with the same lot numbers and put those plus the empties in a bag. Anything else I should take/discuss tomorrow?
Despite multiple trips to the litter box, and even Abby upchucking a bit of stomach acid, both cats wanted dinner. They didn't eat as much as normal, but maybe their tummies don't feel good. I wanted to feed them something somewhat bland, so I fed them a mix of cooked ground turkey with Balance IT supplement and cooked shredded turkey breast. I added quite a bit of warmed, filtered water for moisture. I am obviously worried about them being sufficiently hydrated with all this liquid poo. Does this seem okay? I plan to feed the same thing tomorrow morning to reduce stress on their tummies. So far, I've only given them about 1/3 of what they would normally eat, so if regular cat food would be better, it's not too late.
Any other suggestions for getting them through tonight, somewhat fed and hydrated? Any ideas what this could be??
Thanks,
Meanwhile, my girl Abby seems to have occasional hard poops that we're trying to resolve. Last night, I thought I brought on diarrhea by giving her tiny amounts of psyllium and miralax too close together. Maybe not ...
Abby's a little better today, but still has diarrhea and now so does Tim! His seems exactly the same- sound it made coming out, smell, texture, color ... (I worked at home today, litter boxes are in the home office, I got to enjoy all the action). So now I'm not so sure my "constipation cocktail" worked too well on Abby and I'm concerned.
Before I go any further, I've had two telephone conversations with the veterinarian's office and we have an appointment for tomorrow morning. I've collected, bagged, and labeled fecal samples from both cats. I dug the cat food cans out of the recycling container and labeled with date and time consumed. I pulled the cans with the same lot numbers and put those plus the empties in a bag. Anything else I should take/discuss tomorrow?
Despite multiple trips to the litter box, and even Abby upchucking a bit of stomach acid, both cats wanted dinner. They didn't eat as much as normal, but maybe their tummies don't feel good. I wanted to feed them something somewhat bland, so I fed them a mix of cooked ground turkey with Balance IT supplement and cooked shredded turkey breast. I added quite a bit of warmed, filtered water for moisture. I am obviously worried about them being sufficiently hydrated with all this liquid poo. Does this seem okay? I plan to feed the same thing tomorrow morning to reduce stress on their tummies. So far, I've only given them about 1/3 of what they would normally eat, so if regular cat food would be better, it's not too late.
Any other suggestions for getting them through tonight, somewhat fed and hydrated? Any ideas what this could be??
Thanks,