I Don't Know What To Do - 15+yo Cat

stacydc83

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Goodness Gracious those fleas! I'm not a fan of Front Line, I tried it once, and it did nothing, Lily was having the worst flea infestation of her life and it did NOTHING. I totally get why your against the prescription ones, I won't use Revolution Plus, I don't even know the words that are used for whats in it, but yeah, after reading on here and googling, it just seems too much. I do trust regular old Revolution though, and in our case, has been the only thing that has treated fleas, just keeping the prescription is a pain. Since Lily was 18 lbs when it was prescribed, she got the 16-20 something dose, and Zoe is on the 7-15, well I'm pretty sure Lily is teetering at about 16 lbs, maybe even 15 again, I didn't and still don't feel comfortable giving her such a high dosage when shes not closer to the mid weight for it. I will probably just tell the vet I need like 4 packs for Zoe and split it between them, because "we gotta weigh her to change the dose" I'm not packing her up and bringing her 40 minutes out JUST to weigh her. Anyway enough with that rant.
Have you tried sprinkling flea killer around and then vaccumming it up? I'm trying to think all the things I did the few times it got real bad here. I guess fleas are a lot worse for you living in the South, and it staying warm. It's been a warm winter here so I'm surprised we're not crawling with fleas yet. I know I did ALOT of laundry, sprayed down their common areas and bedding, then washed them in hot water. At one point I was even taking the flea comb and dipping it in water mixed with dawn and brushing her with that.
 
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FeebysOwner

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stacydc83 stacydc83 - Thanks. That is disturbing about Frontline Plus - :(. I vacuum and then spray the house with various treatments over and over again, and do the dish-soap/water flea combing with Feeby. The biggest disturbance, to me, in all of this is that in my 35 years in this house - never once did I have an issue with fleas, until last July. Now, I can't get rid of them.
 

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Goodness Gracious those fleas! I'm not a fan of Front Line, I tried it once, and it did nothing, Lily was having the worst flea infestation of her life and it did NOTHING. I totally get why your against the prescription ones, I won't use Revolution Plus, I don't even know the words that are used for whats in it, but yeah, after reading on here and googling, it just seems too much. I do trust regular old Revolution though, and in our case, has been the only thing that has treated fleas, just keeping the prescription is a pain. Since Lily was 18 lbs when it was prescribed, she got the 16-20 something dose, and Zoe is on the 7-15, well I'm pretty sure Lily is teetering at about 16 lbs, maybe even 15 again, I didn't and still don't feel comfortable giving her such a high dosage when shes not closer to the mid weight for it. I will probably just tell the vet I need like 4 packs for Zoe and split it between them, because "we gotta weigh her to change the dose" I'm not packing her up and bringing her 40 minutes out JUST to weigh her. Anyway enough with that rant.
Have you tried sprinkling flea killer around and then vaccumming it up? I'm trying to think all the things I did the few times it got real bad here. I guess fleas are a lot worse for you living in the South, and it staying warm. It's been a warm winter here so I'm surprised we're not crawling with fleas yet. I know I did ALOT of laundry, sprayed down their common areas and bedding, then washed them in hot water. At one point I was even taking the flea comb and dipping it in water mixed with dawn and brushing her with that.
What part of Virginia do you live???I mean city...I know Virginia fairly well..
 

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How frustrating that the fleas are worse again. Have you checked with exterminators to see if they deal with fleas. Maybe it would be cheaper, and less stressful, to get the pros on the job.
 
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How frustrating that the fleas are worse again. Have you checked with exterminators to see if they deal with fleas. Maybe it would be cheaper, and less stressful, to get the pros on the job.
I really didn't want to go this route, but at this point I am going to check into various companies and see what they say.
 
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UPDATE: I posted last on 3/8 regarding Feeby's general status. I thought we were pretty much status quo, so I quit making updates. Guess I shouldn't have done that because it has caused me to be a bit more lax about her weigh-ins. So, today's weigh-in surprised me.

3/8 - 15.6 pounds, averaged about 270 calories per day for previous week
4/16 - 15.0 pounds, averaged about 255 calories per day for previous 2-3 weeks
4/28 - 14.2 pounds, averaged about 238 calories per day for previous 2 weeks

Do you all think that the drop in her calories would be enough to warrant her weight loss? Based on months of recorded stats, I am sure some variance can be tied to typical things like time of day, amount eaten, use of litter box, etc. The other possible noteworthy item is that over the course of the past 2 months, she has pretty much stopped eating any dry food at all, so since 3/8, her calories are entirely from canned food. Could this be part of the difference?

I am sure she still qualifies as overweight - LOL - but, I was OK if she spent the rest of her life hovering around 15-16 pounds. So, I am not going to set off alarms just yet. If I can get her back up closer to 270 calories and see a slight weight gain, then I will stop worrying so much. If her weight goes down again, it is off to the vet for her semi-annual check up - assuming I can get in to see him under the current circumstances. She is past due just by a week, but I was hoping to avoid taking her in until I could be with her through the vet visit. All other aspects about her - other than the ongoing flea battle - seem normal.

What do you think - am I being overly cautious...or, under cautious?
 

molly92

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The weight loss makes sense with the calorie consumption to me. I'm not doing a lot of math to figure that out or anything, but it doesn't strike me as out of the ordinary, and I kept very close logs of my cat's weight loss and calorie consumption when we were in our strict dieting phase.

The last 2 weeks is a little on the high side of safe, though (she lost an average of about 3% of her body weight per week, when you want it to be less than 2%), so if you can get closer to the 250 calories/day mark for weight loss that'd probably be better (or more for maintaining/gaining weight). I don't think anything is alarming, but monitoring her closely as you plan to is probably a good idea.
 

verna davies

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This is just my personal opinion. If 270 cals each day maintained her weight then anything less would cause her to lose some weighdo and 238 cals is a 16% reduction which is a bit high. The weight reduction over the 7 weeks does seem a little high thought. Can you increase her cals by feeding something like fresh chicken which is comparatively high in cals and protein? Weight her each week to see how she is doing and please keep us updated. Come on Feeby, eat all your cals for us.
 

rubysmama

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What do you think - am I being overly cautious...or, under cautious?
I don't think you're being overly cautious, as with our cats we have to be super observant since they can't tell us how they're feeling.

I do think, though, that eating less makes sense that weight loss would occur. Especially when she's stopped eating dry food, and that generally is higher calorie dense.

I can't remember, is Feeby a fussy eater, or on special food? If not, could you try buying some cans of kitten food, as I think they have higher calories, since they're given to growing kittens. Or even trying her with KMR or goats milk for some liquid calories.

Just did a search and found this TCS article I don't recall seeing before. Maybe something in it will be helpful.
How To Get A Cat To Gain Weight
 
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Thanks for the replies. Feeby is on Hill's C/D canned food (chicken) mixed with some Fancy Feast pate (multiple flavors). Her intake of these can range anywhere from about 200 (3 meals) to 265 (4 meals) calories per day - all depending on her choice. I put more food down for her all day long and into the evening - whenever the dish is pretty empty (and, whether or not she is in the middle of a lengthy nap!). So, it is just a matter of whether she chooses to eat it or not. The later in the evening it gets, the less likely that what is still remaining will get eaten. Some nights I have waited until 8PM to replenish her dish (meal #4), and I know for almost a certainty that a fair amount of it will either be tossed or refrigerated. I still put it out, just in case.

In addition, almost daily, she used to eat a small piece of deli low sodium turkey, a bite or two of baked chicken or fish (multiple varieties) - even a bite of (cooked) hamburger or bacon now and then. She is pretty much 'over' the turkey and chicken, but seems to still be 'into' most of the fish. So, this does somewhat factor into her diminished caloric intake. There is no correlation between when she chooses to eat these 'snacks' and how much of her own food she ultimately eats.

I don't want to start adding extra-calorie supplements to her existing diet because I am concerned about skewing any ability to find a natural balance for her calorically - she has got to have one, unless something else is going on. I have only really seriously tracked her since last October and in looking at the big picture, she has definitely taken a downward trend in her intake - of her own accord.

Her last geriatric evaluation was at that time, but no blood work because her 4/2019 and 7/2019 results were very good and showed no negative changes. The vet said he wanted to wait until what was her scheduled appointment last week to do blood work again.

Sorry for the l-o-n-g post. I am not sure any of this gives any clues to anything.
 
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FeebysOwner

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Having the blood tests done will put your mind at rest, will your vet do them at this time?
Haven't asked, so not sure. But, if they would see her for a blood test/check up - it would have to be without me being there with her. Not a fan of doing that, but will check into it if her weight loss keeps up.
 

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Mealtimes help. Jackie knows for sure he gets fed at6 am & 6 pm. His 12 am & 12 pm feedings usually happen unless he gets a whole pouch at 6 (2 meals.) I started only giving him 1/2 pouch at a time & saving the other half in a small Tupperware container in the fridge.

That said Salem is a cranky
Old man with beginning kidney failure. He lost a lot of weight, then gained it back thanks to kitten dry food & making sure to feed him his own plate away from juvinelle/bullies. Before Salem got sick both him & Dante list over a pound in a year, just by reducing their treats. Instead of getting 3-5 a day, they got 3-6 max a week. Since this left them at comfortably chunky, I let it be. Also might I suggest the fancy feast flaked chicken/tuna/salmon treat pouches? Looking back at it I wish I just let Salem stay a little fat over him getting do frail & thin! We are just happy he gained a pound or two back. He is still yo thin but no longer starving thin.
 
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Mealtimes help.
Did specific meal times for a while, but all that resulted in was her eating even less. She won't eat a lot at once, so that is how designated meal times blended into putting down food whenever she finished the previous meal. She was a grazer for the first 12-13 years of her life - after that long, don't think you can undo some of that 'mindset'. I considered myself lucky to get her on canned food a couple of years ago after her having had nothing but dry before that.
Also might I suggest the fancy feast flaked chicken/tuna/salmon treat pouches?
Unfortunately, she won't eat any wet food besides pate. :(
 
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5/4 - Back to updates, at least for a while.

Weight: 14.8 pounds (vs. last week at 14.2). I am sure there has to be a bit of fluctuation going on with intake/output levels at the time of each weigh-in, but...I guess this change is realistic? 3 weigh-ins done, just to be sure - all the same.

I managed to get an average of 288 calories per day for Feeby this past week. That is the highest average intake since early February. The previous week she averaged 238 daily, the lowest amount since I've been recording it. The only thing I did differently was add more food to her dish when it got down pretty low. As I likely mentioned a long time ago, she isn't keen on finishing off her meals if there is only a small amount left in the dish. How this plays into why she eats more if I quickly 're-fill' it vs. when I don't - I have no idea. But, I do know she seems to want to eat most of her meals well before evening time. At that point she is likely to be much less interested. Set meal times are pretty much down the tubes for now.
 

verna davies

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Sounds as if she is doing well, nice weight gain. Mine seem to not eat the last of their wet food until I stack it up, I wondered if it was the teeth, tongue coming in contact with the bowl, but who knows with cats. Its hard work counting calories for cats, your doing a great job, I hope Feeby is showing her appreciation.
 
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Sounds as if she is doing well, nice weight gain. Mine seem to not eat the last of their wet food until I stack it up, I wondered if it was the teeth, tongue coming in contact with the bowl, but who knows with cats. Its hard work counting calories for cats, your doing a great job, I hope Feeby is showing her appreciation.
I think with Feeby it is a 'hold-over' mindset from being starved before she found me at 2+yo. Before I started giving her canned food, she never liked to see a tiny amount of kibble left in her dish, and always looked for me to add something to it to make it look less empty - even if she would then walk away without touching it.

Trust me - I've screwed more times than I care to admit about keeping a very accurate calorie count!!!!!
 
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