Krista's Care

[daftcat75]

Success!

The 5.5 oz cans are different enough to cut through whatever grudge she’s been holding on the 3 oz cans. The 3 oz texture is smoother. The 5.5 oz is gamier. I even made up a small batch of frankenrabbit (rabbit with added pumpkin purée vs rabbit and pumpkin pate) which she ate a few grams of that. I seem to remember we had better poops with frankenrabbit.

The 5.5 oz texture got her eating restarted. But the texture is tougher for the toothless one. She left a third of first breakfast behind.

I added some of the smoother 3 oz to a plate of the firmer 5.5 oz (7g of one to 28 g of the other.). She’s over the food grudge as that smooth line disappeared first. Going to keep it at this ratio for a poop. I need her eating the smooth texture but having the firm poops. Because she’s leaving too much of the firm food behind to get enough calories to make up for not having turkey or homemade in her rotation.

that the smooth rabbit can still produce firm

that this morning’s wet willy isn’t going to produce double blowouts this afternoon or tonight now that she’s on a daily dosing schedule.

 

[daftcat75]

Just watched her drop another long finger of on the camera. It looked good. Maybe a bit much. But she handled it alright.

Looked like a one and done.

Except it wasn't.

About 20 minutes later I watched her deposit something else on the carpet. It looks formed but there was squirty bits at the end.

And I have just watched her drop another bit of squirty mess.

The Spot Bot will have its work cut out for it.

I have a new idea. No smooth cans but take an immersion blender to the firmer food.

She is having issues. I'm watching her turn the living room into one giant poop box. I'd better stop at the store and pick up ALL the cleaning supplies.

 

[daftcat75]

As these things go, tonight wasn't as terrible as I was expecting from what I saw on the camera. Her poop piles were more pretzel and Kisses than puddles like her barf. I probably could have gotten by on a sponge and a spray (of the enzyme cleaner.) But the Bot was coming out anyway for her barf pile. At least it was contained within one Bot spot.

For her food, I'm not going to chase this with pumpkin. It seems like she has enough bulk already. I'm just going to give it a few more days with the all-rabbit diet and the daily Mirtaz dosing.

I took the firm 5.5 oz and blended it smooth with a stick blender. It was a hit on the intake. And now we wait to see how it will treat her on the other end.

 

[daftcat75]

Not at all interested in any of the fountains I’ve offered her. It’s drinking from my cup or the toilet for her.

 

[daftcat75]

She popped after first dinner. I'm not sure what that was about. But she's clearly not holding a grudge. Blending the firm can into a smooth texture most definitely worked. Perhaps too well. She practically inhaled second dinner. I plated it at 10 pm and fifteen minutes later, she's under the bookcase with a nearly clean plate. That'll do, donkey! Sleep it off and digest it well.

 

[MissClouseau]

Not at all interested in any of the fountains I’ve offered her. It’s drinking from my cup or the toilet for her.
View attachment 316318

"This is tested water, human. You drink it and not die."

 

[daftcat75]

Final score yesterday: 5.79 oz for 180 calories, plus carpet bombing, poop puke, and a bonus barf between dinners.

No wonder she's losing weight again. Below 7 lbs now.

On the hopeful side, blending her firm rabbit smooth has enabled her to clean her plate more easily and readily. If her butt and gut can stabilize on the new rabbit-only diet and daily Mirtaz dosing, she should be eating enough again this week to reverse the weight loss.

She's nearly had 3 oz today already. Her scheduled meals will be 1.5 oz again (they were before with the raw portion), and her feeders will add up to an additional ounce times two feeder shifts a day (daytime and overnight.) That should put her scheduled load at 6 oz with burst opportunity to 8 oz. 7 to 7.5 oz seemed to be her sweet spot for weight gain. Assuming she's not losing it to blow-outs.

 

[tarasgirl06]

Final score yesterday: 5.79 oz for 180 calories, plus carpet bombing, poop puke, and a bonus barf between dinners.

No wonder she's losing weight again. Below 7 lbs now.

On the hopeful side, blending her firm rabbit smooth has enabled her to clean her plate more easily and readily. If her butt and gut can stabilize on the new rabbit-only diet and daily Mirtaz dosing, she should be eating enough again this week to reverse the weight loss.

She's nearly had 3 oz today already. Her scheduled meals will be 1.5 oz again (they were before with the raw portion), and her feeders will add up to an additional ounce times two feeder shifts a day (daytime and overnight.) That should put her scheduled load at 6 oz with burst opportunity to 8 oz. 7 to 7.5 oz seemed to be her sweet spot for weight gain. Assuming she's not losing it to blow-outs.

Hoping for you both to be over this little rough patch very soon! and for Krista to put on some weight again. I feel that way about Tarifa, too, after one friend has remarked a couple of times on how thin she was. She wasn't, actually -- she was perfect weight -- but she's been enjoying her food a lot and is now football-shaped. Cats aren't supposed to be overweight. I know that. And I agree. But at 16, I like her to have just a little roundness to her shape. Especially in winter.

 

[daftcat75]

Hoping for you both to be over this little rough patch very soon! and for Krista to put on some weight again. I feel that way about Tarifa, too, after one friend has remarked a couple of times on how thin she was. She wasn't, actually -- she was perfect weight -- but she's been enjoying her food a lot and is now football-shaped. Cats aren't supposed to be overweight. I know that. And I agree. But at 16, I like her to have just a little roundness to her shape. Especially in winter.

This is not subjective. She’s too skinny. I can feel leg bones I don’t want to be feeling. She’s lost lean body mass covering over the base of her tail. I can feel her pelvis again and neither of us like that.

But for all the poop issues and the weight loss, she’s still more social and loving than she used to be when she had the mouth pain. Back then, she’d eat and disappear until she couldn’t hold out any longer and then she’d reappear to eat and disappear again. She spent much of last year under the bookcase. Sometimes I wish she would spend a little more time down there instead of dancing and singing all over me throughout the night. I kinda like it when she disappears after a meal now. I get a few minutes to relax at the end of a cat shift (feeding, washing dishes, cleaning the litterbox, and lately attending to any new puddles or piles on the carpet.)

 

[daftcat75]

She had another carpet bomb. It’s like she’s waiting too long to poop and then has a colon and then some worth of poop. She puts out a healthy amount of well-formed poop. And then she has the bonus stuff. I could almost give this a week to see if it will clear up.

But...

She threw up after first dinner. Possibly just that she ate too much. Because after emptying herself, she was hungry again. An IBD barf usually puts her off her food.

I don’t have the discipline or the heart to thrust more rabbit on her than she can handle. And she doesn’t have the weight to wait this out.

I am bringing back the medicine meal.

Until I can get her better medicine (pred in a form she’ll take?), I mixed a pinch (1/16 tsp) of Vitality Science’s Feline Comfort Plus (a super-mix of gut-soothing supplements like slippery elm bark and probiotics) into a small amount of Luxolite (bentonite clay) and made a tight slurry. Then I mixed that with 6 g of Rawz turkey. That’s all the turkey she gets until the morning medicine meal. I meant to only give her 5 g. But I needed the extra gram to get her to finish the medicine.

This is serving two purposes. First, it may be the only way I get her to take these supplements (aside from tuna like we did when she had pancreatitis last summer.) But it also gives me a chance to see if I can work the turkey Rawz back into her rotation.

I just don’t think she’ll be able to eat enough rabbit and keep it down. She will need help from turkey and/or raw.

I want to switch vets on her. But that means she needs new blood and new ultrasound which she should have anyway. So it could be a few days until we’ve got a new prescription for pred. And another few days to get that compounded. I’ll make the call tomorrow and start that process.

But until then, I need to try something other than stuffing her until she pops.

Let’s see if she can finish the week taking medicine meals. It might help. It could get worse though. I’ll keep an eye for this.

 

[daftcat75]

I just gave myself good feedback.

She isn’t put off her food when she barfed just now. Not a classic scarf and barf. But she probably just ate too much.

But that also means we’re not going to get bigger portions. Perhaps with a stomach or gut too full, she doesn’t have enough capacity to digest it all.

To get her through this, I have to reduce her portions and bring back the middle of the night meal. Not just the feeders. But that middle of the night when she’s anxious for the first feeder to open, I should plate a fresh portion. Or at least a fridge portion.

So no plate larger than an ounce right now. But I’ll feed her six or seven times a day if that will get her gut and butt back in order.

 

[daftcat75]

The medicine meal was a blowout bust. Unfortunately, I didn’t receive that feedback until I gave her another.

Foul smelling pudding poops mostly made the boxes. Spraying the pee pads under the boxes is par for the course. That’s why they are there.

This tells me either Rawz turkey is out. Or the supplements are no longer agreeing with her.

We’ll skip the medicine meal tonight and see if we can get her poops mostly back to normal.

Our little medicine meal detour tells me we were on the right track with rabbit. I just need to adjust portions and timing again. Because she produces mostly perfect poops on rabbit only. She just has too much of it like her input rate is too fast for her output.

A third test I’d like to try is homemade again. With the correct calcium balance.

She looks pretty rough for her pudding poops this morning. She was doing great last night on a 3 hour feeding schedule. Even if I wasn’t getting much sleep. I feel bad she has to go through this once more tonight for this morning’s “medicine” meal.

 

[daftcat75]

Less bookcase time when I right-size her meals. I will discuss with boss later this week. But I am thinking she needs at least a few weeks of round the clock feeding like the feeders can’t accomplish.

I put a couple grams of pumpkin purée into this meal since I already know tonight will be a blowout.

 

[tarasgirl06]

The medicine meal was a blowout bust. Unfortunately, I didn’t receive that feedback until I gave her another.

Foul smelling pudding poops mostly made the boxes. Spraying the pee pads under the boxes is par for the course. That’s why they are there.

This tells me either Rawz turkey is out. Or the supplements are no longer agreeing with her.

We’ll skip the medicine meal tonight and see if we can get her poops mostly back to normal.

Our little medicine meal detour tells me we were on the right track with rabbit. I just need to adjust portions and timing again. Because she produces mostly perfect poops on rabbit only. She just has too much of it like her input rate is too fast for her output.

A third test I’d like to try is homemade again. With the correct calcium balance.

She looks pretty rough for her pudding poops this morning. She was doing great last night on a 3 hour feeding schedule. Even if I wasn’t getting much sleep. I feel bad she has to go through this once more tonight for this morning’s “medicine” meal.

It's really too bad that there aren't cat foods made from cats' natural prey, small rodents including mice. I wonder if that would set well with Krista. Some people do buy mice online, I know. IDK how their cats do on them. But it is logical to me that the best diet for anyone is their natural prey or diet. Domestic cats are many generations removed from their natural diet, but I would think their digestive systems would be glad to return to what they were created to eat. Make sense to you?
All the best with hitting the right formula!

 

[daftcat75]

It's really too bad that there aren't cat foods made from cats' natural prey, small rodents including mice. I wonder if that would set well with Krista. Some people do buy mice online, I know. IDK how their cats do on them. But it is logical to me that the best diet for anyone is their natural prey or diet. Domestic cats are many generations removed from their natural diet, but I would think their digestive systems would be glad to return to what they were created to eat. Make sense to you?
All the best with hitting the right formula!

The trouble with mice is that there's no way around feeding it whole prey. I mean, yes, I can put the mice in my grinder and make a pate for the toothless wonder. But she will have to eat it with the bone. There's no sourcing boneless mouse meat or organs.

Rabbit is close as I'll get. Even there, she's never been that excited about the boneless rabbit grind from HT and organs are hard to source.

So Rawz Rabbit is what she will get. It is as close to raw as I can do with boneless rabbit for her. If we can stabilize the gut and the butt, I would love to try homemade turkey again. But seeing the blowout this morning, I'm not sure how optimistic I am about turkey anymore.

There is also the possibility that the blowout was the medicine itself. It's a superset of probiotics, clay, aloe (the safe kind), enzymes, and more. I've been reading my food journal from her pancreatitis in 2018. It seems we didn't stick with Feline Comfort Plus for very long. I'm not sure why. I didn't note that. The most popular med stack I used was CBD oil, flora, and enzymes.

We will skip the med stack tonight since she's already in for a blowout and there's little I can probably do about that. When the formed rabbit poops reappear (even with bonus bombs, but no blowouts!), we can try again with the CBD oil, probiotics, and enzymes in a tuna medicine meal. I prefer a small medicine meal (as small as I can make it and she'll still eat it--usually about 7 grams) as opposed to "poisoning" her normal meals. If I put her off rabbit, we're in big trouble.

This is why I don't feed tuna on the regular. The appeal should be strong enough to cut through any dislike of the medicine. But it will likely taste just enough "off" that she'll still want her "unpoisoned" rabbit.

Anyway, we did this once before when she had pancreatitis. She dropped as low as 6.3 lbs. But amazingly, she also gained weight on as little as 180 calories per day. I think the trick is making sure she digests her food and isn't barfing it up or blowing it out, or dropping minimally digested/undigested pudding poops.

 

[daftcat75]

As blowouts go, that wasn't so bad. I mean it was a nasty mess of chocolate pudding. But the color seemed appropriate. Some of it hit the back wall of the enclosure. But it didn't drip down the back wall. The pee pad beneath the box also lives to see another day. And so far, it seems to be a one-and-done. I don't see any carpet bombing campaigns. And no poop pukes either.

I'll put a little more pumpkin in one of her meals tonight and we'll skip the medicine meal. So far, she's eaten, and kept down, close to 4 oz and we haven't hit the dinners yet. I think we're on to something feeding her only an ounce every two to three hours. Maybe we can have solid poops and a little weight gain before the week is out. Even if I have to feed her around the clock and sleep in two hour sprints between feedings.

 

[tarasgirl06]

As blowouts go, that wasn't so bad. I mean it was a nasty mess of chocolate pudding. But the color seemed appropriate. Some of it hit the back wall of the enclosure. But it didn't drip down the back wall. The pee pad beneath the box also lives to see another day. And so far, it seems to be a one-and-done. I don't see any carpet bombing campaigns. And no poop pukes either.

I'll put a little more pumpkin in one of her meals tonight and we'll skip the medicine meal. So far, she's eaten, and kept down, close to 4 oz and we haven't hit the dinners yet. I think we're on to something feeding her only an ounce every two to three hours. Maybe we can have solid poops and a little weight gain before the week is out. Even if I have to feed her around the clock and sleep in two hour sprints between feedings.

Really small meals, frequently, are recommended for a lot of human maladies, and it makes sense for anyone with digestive issues, don't you think? Good luck with that way, and come on, Krista!

 

[daftcat75]

Really small meals, frequently, are recommended for a lot of human maladies, and it makes sense for anyone with digestive issues, don't you think? Good luck with that way, and come on, Krista!

Her schedule of four meals plus two feeder shifts was borne out of small meals more frequently. This cat would be dead by now on two gut bombs a day. Before the feeders, I was feeding her every four hours, night and day. I fed her 2, 6, and 10 whether it was AM or PM. For the short-term, I can do that again. I'm actually feeding her every three hours so that we can get closer to the 7 oz I want her to eat. The food journal I've been reviewing is all about small meals. During pancreatitis, sometimes she would only eat 10 grams at a time. I'd record it and wait until she was hungry again or a couple of hours had passed, and we would try again.

 

[daftcat75]

I don’t know what it is.

When this adorable cuddle nugget climbs onto my belly, walks straight up to my chest, and sits down so close to me, her paws actually go to one side of my neck, when she gets her face in mine, I can’t look at her or I bust up laughing.

“Look at the balls on this cat!”

“Give me scritches and tell me I’m pretty!”

 

[daftcat75]

Final score: 7.39 oz for 230 calories

One pudding poop blowout from her medicine meal in the morning. But no barfs and no bonus bombs. Progress!

Her next poop should be any minute now.

She's lost a step or two from the weight loss and all the GI disturbances. I really want to get her back on homemade again. But stabilization first!