- Joined
- Dec 13, 2017
- Messages
- 212
- Purraise
- 807
Hello! This is my first post here. I have been a volunteer for a no-kill animal rescue for almost 10 years, and I am currently fostering my first pregnant rescue. She came to us from a house with far too many animals (none of them fixed) that was going to surrender to the humane society. I've only had her since last Thursday, and we believe she is roughly 2 weeks away from giving birth.
She is young and very small. We estimate her age to be about 8 months and she weighs less than 7 pounds. When I first picked her up on Thursday, she was not eating, which was behaviour that my fellow volunteer said had just started the night before. I spent most of Thursday feeding her prescription a/d food through a syringe, just to make sure she was getting some calories and not getting dehydrated.
Come Friday, she still wasn't eating voluntarily, so I bit the bullet and took her to my vet. She had been to the vet our rescue uses the previous Tuesday (so one week ago today), but sometimes I feel they aren't very thorough with our rescue cats, so I wanted to take her to the vet I take my own pets to, as I believe they do a better job. My vet did the works - physical exam, ultrasound, blood panel, stool sample, etc. They also gave her a small dose of remeron to stimulate her appetite. All tests came back normal and her ultrasound looked good (the doctor could see skeletons and heartbeats of three kittens). They advised me to give the remeron time to work and just continue watching her.
Now, 5 days later, she is eating MUCH better (unfortunately the only thing she will eat is Fancy Feast; won't eat any of the healthy kitten food I put out for her), but she has thrown up roughly once a night for the past three days. When I go in to see her in the morning I find a pile of undigested food in her room. That's all it is - undigested food - no hairballs, nothing fishy looking.
She is still eating well and her spirits are otherwise great - she has lots of energy, loves to play, and is extremely affectionate. But I'm concerned about the vomiting. I just don't know what else there would be for the vet to do at this point considering they've run every test in the book.
I know that in her old home she was eating nothing but low-quality dry kibble, so could this be a reaction to the change in food? Honestly, that's really what I'm hoping. But I'd love some opinions from people who are more experienced with feline pregnancy than I am! Thanks in advance for any insight and help.
Here are a few pictures of my beautiful mommy, just for fun.
She is young and very small. We estimate her age to be about 8 months and she weighs less than 7 pounds. When I first picked her up on Thursday, she was not eating, which was behaviour that my fellow volunteer said had just started the night before. I spent most of Thursday feeding her prescription a/d food through a syringe, just to make sure she was getting some calories and not getting dehydrated.
Come Friday, she still wasn't eating voluntarily, so I bit the bullet and took her to my vet. She had been to the vet our rescue uses the previous Tuesday (so one week ago today), but sometimes I feel they aren't very thorough with our rescue cats, so I wanted to take her to the vet I take my own pets to, as I believe they do a better job. My vet did the works - physical exam, ultrasound, blood panel, stool sample, etc. They also gave her a small dose of remeron to stimulate her appetite. All tests came back normal and her ultrasound looked good (the doctor could see skeletons and heartbeats of three kittens). They advised me to give the remeron time to work and just continue watching her.
Now, 5 days later, she is eating MUCH better (unfortunately the only thing she will eat is Fancy Feast; won't eat any of the healthy kitten food I put out for her), but she has thrown up roughly once a night for the past three days. When I go in to see her in the morning I find a pile of undigested food in her room. That's all it is - undigested food - no hairballs, nothing fishy looking.
She is still eating well and her spirits are otherwise great - she has lots of energy, loves to play, and is extremely affectionate. But I'm concerned about the vomiting. I just don't know what else there would be for the vet to do at this point considering they've run every test in the book.
I know that in her old home she was eating nothing but low-quality dry kibble, so could this be a reaction to the change in food? Honestly, that's really what I'm hoping. But I'd love some opinions from people who are more experienced with feline pregnancy than I am! Thanks in advance for any insight and help.
Here are a few pictures of my beautiful mommy, just for fun.