Decreased Appetite

*crossed fingers* for Murray.

Thanks for the update. I am SO VERY glad you got Murray to the vet and got the ultrasound. Without this, the foreign body may have never been discovered, or ruptured intestines.

Murray has been...and will continue to be close in thought and prayers!

I think he will come through this like a champ. Please keep up posted.

Thank you all for the thoughts and prayers for my little buddy. I truly believe its helping so please keep them coming!!

He's out of surgery. The Dr. said he's in critical condition, but stable. She did seem a little guarded on his current condition, though. Basically what happened is he swallowed some very fine string that was wrapped around the base of his tongue and was throughout his stomach and intestines. The string was super fine, that's why no one caught it during the multiple different vet visits. There were a few perforations in his intestine (some had already healed, some needed to be repaired) but no damaged bowel or anything that needed to be cut.

He's on a bunch of different antibiotics and pain meds. He's also got a drain tube in place to monitor whats going on inside of him. We are by no means out of the woods yet, but the surgery is done and he's still with us. The Dr is thinking recovery time 3-5 days if there are no complications. And if he continues an uneventful recovery, we should be back on the road to some shred of normality in a week or so.

I'm going to be calling the hospital so often they're going to know my number by heart.

Thank you all again for your support. It really is amazing and I more grateful then you all will ever know that a community like this exists. I'll have more updates tomorrow morning.

That is wonderful news! Murray made it through the worst...now I can sleep easier...but not before more positive thoughts and prayers for speedy recovery.

Tomorrow will bring more good news I believe. Till then...

Poor baby. You need to try to rest too.

Aw, poor Murray. Glad he made it through the surgery and hope he has a speedy recovery.

Another quick update: I got to go see him!!!! Murray is doing well. I was able to visit him last night and he purred up a storm and gave a ton of kisses!! As of this morning, he's still recovering and we're not out of danger yet, but we've made it thru another night. Bloods are normal so they think that they can start feeding him this morning.

They've been testing the contents of the drain tube for bacteria, just to make sure there's no internal infections or anything and we're okay so far. I'll have some more info when his Dr comes in at 1000 today. Keep the happy thoughts coming!!!! and as always, thank you all so much for the support

Such good news !! So happy for you and Murray !

Sounds like he has a great veterinary team around him!

- Murray, feel better soon!

Hope he does well with eating today!

Went to visit Murray again today and were still looking good! Vitals are all good, the drain in his tummy is slowing down, so they'l probably be able to remove that soon too.

He's not eating just yet, but were like 36 hours post op of intestinal surgery, so hopefully soon he'll get his appetite back.

Anyone else have any experience with abdominal surgery on a cat and how quickly they resumed eating?

And here's a picture of my handsome guy from today!

So glad to hear that Murray is doing well.

What a great way to end the week...and what a handsome boy! I am, like you, overjoyed!

Now as far as when he will begin eating, it probably will depend upon when he feels good enough or pain from surgery has decreased enough. I presume he is still on pain meds?
Since he has not eaten significantly in a while, he will probably start slowly, perhaps baby food initially--am not sure if he is able to ingest solids this soon after surgery. Vet can best advise.

Go Murray!

Been a few days since our last update, but things are looking pretty good! They removed the drain in his belly on sunday morning, then discharged him from the hospital sunday afternoon. He wasn't eating in the hospital so they thought he may do better at home, and they were right!

He's been (slowly) increasing his eating since Sunday afternoon. We started at just a few tablespoons of wet food, to actually eating quite a bit of his dry food. We stopped the pain medicine sunday as well, the vet said that can sometimes cause inappetence too. He's been sleeping A LOT, but is gradually becoming more and more active too. He also had his first BM since the surgery yesterday and it looked totally normal!

Again, the vet said we're still not completely in the clear yet. Once we hit the 2 week mark is when we can really start celebrating.

And thank you all so much for the support, kind thoughts and prayers. The doctor said they cannot believe how awesome of a recovery he's having, and I owe much of that to the positivity that this community has shown.

What wonderful news! All here on TCS are overjoyed for Murray...and for you!

Yes, vet was right that pain meds can cause inappetence. It is good he is eating on his own again...a good sign pain has subsided.

I question however whether large amounts of dry food might be irritating to his GI tract this soon after surgery. I would think soft wet food might be less abrasive to sensitive tissues.
In general, for a variety of reasons, wet food is preferable to dry. Perhaps you might want to discuss this with your vet.

Thanks for the update...will continue thinking lots of positive thoughts for Murray!

babiesmom5 said:

It is good you have a GI Ultrasound scheduled for Monday/Tuesday because pancreatitis usually does not occur in a vacuum. There is usually a chronic underlying issue such as diabetes, hepatic lipidosis, cholangitis, and inflammatory bowel disease present. The Ultrasound should help with diagnosis.

The mainstay for Pancreatitis is fluid therapy, pain management and nutritional support. It is very important for you to keep your cat eating. At this point, I would try to get him to eat something...anything. Have you tried plain chicken baby food slightly warmed?
Have you tried warming some of his favorite food? Try something smelly.

Hopefully, the pain meds, anti nausea meds and steroids will "kick in" soon. If they don't, the next step is hospitalization with IV support. They may have to put in an esophageal feeding tube to get nourishment into him temporarily until he can resume eating on his own.

So in answer to your question: "could all this be just from an inflamed pancreas"? Short answer, yes, but I suspect something more is going on. You have to find out what that is; meanwhile do everything you can to treat and heal the inflamed pancreas.

A good source on this topic is www.ibdkitties/net/pancreatitis.

Please keep us posted. Fingers crossed he turns around soon.

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Hi babiesmon5


I’m new to this site and sadly my first post was in crossing the bridge. I wish I had come across this site years ago!


After reading this post of yours talking about ibd/pancreatitis, it seems you have a lot of experience/knowledge on this subject and I have a couple of things I can’t get straight in my head from a recent experience and wondered if you might have any ideas.


I will try and keep it short as possible. I had my 8 and a half year old baby boy put to sleep on 22 March 2018 and torture myself everyday about it. The first sign of his illness was last August when he began vomiting quite often and was on and off his food but not completely inappetent


Mid September he didn’t want to eat at all for a couple of days and he was vomiting a lot so we visited the vet and after complete blood work he was diagnosed with pancreatitis. Whiskas was given an appetite stimulant injection, prescribed anti sickness drugs and pain killers then we went home. He began eating at home but was not quite himself and very lethargic. After a month or so this happened again, and then again. My baby was beginning to look so sad and fed up. I tried so very hard trying to make sure he would eat.


Come December he was hospitalised for a few days as this time he hadn’t eaten for more than two days, had been vomiting and was dehydrated. They confirmed it was pancreatitis again. He came home began eating.


In February I began to see his waist and I also started to see a little pattern going on, he would vomit for a couple of days and then be completely ravenous for a few days, like I had never seen before, so much so that he was trying to eat food off the kitchen side and all sorts. This carried on and off through to March. It was so out of character, he definitely was not himself, sleeping a lot, licked all the fur off the end of his tail, didn’t want to play, would sit in loaf position, would fight me and my daughter for the heat from the fire, didn’t want to go out and when he walked down the stairs he looked like he was 100 years old. He would however still come and wake his mummy for love and kisses.


As things did not improve I took him back to the vet to have an ultrasound, an X-ray and complete blood analysis. They found the whole of the intestinal tract thickened which they said was either severe ibd or possible lymphoma, a shadow in stomach that could have been inflammation or a mass and bloods revealed pancreatitis again. My poor baby!


I am so confused and am trying to get things straight in my head as to why he may have had such an increased appetite some days when cats with pancreatitis normally don’t want to eat at all? Also everything I read about cats with idb/pancreatitis suggest these cats have diarrhoea and I didn’t witness this? Any ideas?


I loved/love him more than words can say x

Hi Tabbytastic,

I am so very sorry about your boy Whiskas. No doubt you are heartbroken beyond words. I do understand.

Since the originator of this thread appears to have his cat's issue resolved, and since you asked me specifically about IBD and Pancreatitis, I feel it might be best to answer your questions at length by PM.

If you are not familiar with PM, it is when a TCS member responds to you privately. You will be able to see my response by checking your "inbox", the little envelope at top right of your screen. I will go there now and type my response.

babiesmom5