Krista's Care

[daftcat75]

It wasn't cold. I'm a stickler for body temperature water to the point that I've measured the water stream with a candy thermometer and marked it off with two halves of a sticker on my kitchen sink. I started that to thaw raw without cooking it and use it for any water that goes down the tube. I think it was probably just too fast. Still, I think if I can get it down to 10 cc, I think we'd both feel more comfortable with that. I'm not doing this for nutrition--just a soft landing for the medicine.

I don't know how well the stoma site cleaning went. It's difficult to do with just me and a squirmy cat. I got the flush on it and the cream, replaced the pad, and put the kollar back on. It should be good enough until Dr re-checks tomorrow.

 

[daftcat75]

This time it was too cold. I should pour my coffee (for myself, not Krista) before I tube feed the cat. And then stubborn me, "I'm sorry it's too cold, but can we split the difference so I can get meds in you without starting over?" Yeah, I'm not sure how effective that was. I got to see the morning session in reverse slowly trickle out of the tube. I sure hope some of the medicine was retained for our efforts. She finally squirmed off and I had to corner her for another flush and to seal her up. How many more times until I get this right? Good thing she's tough! Then I put down the last of the Rawz duck from last night (about 1/4 of a 5.5oz can) and she demolished it. Apparently, putting a little tube food in her either settles her stomach or stimulates her appetite because she goes to town when I put down food after the tube session is done. Now she gets to hide it off for an hour before I have to stuff her in the carrier and off to the vet for another re-check.

 

[daftcat75]

I thought this was going to be a Dr visit. Turned out it was just a tech visit for a blood draw and wait briefly for the in-house results. I love those in-house results rather than the day wait from IDEXX. ALT is stable but still slightly elevated. At 210, it’s not urgent. The GGT is creeping up. I’ll wait for the Dr to get back to me but I’m thinking she’s going to want me to start the Veraflox and continue with the ursodiol. I still think working the diet angle, we can get this back on track. But I may try her on the antibiotic anyway just to get us over the hump until all the Fancy Feast insult and injury has healed. Last night’s poop was a two-parter and I know which part was the FF. She’s also shaking her head less last night and today since we stopped the FF. Clearly there’s an allergen or irritant in that. That’s a bummer. I liked how readily she ate it when she was fussy about everything else. Tiki Cat needs a turkey, rabbit, or duck flavor. Or Krista needs to become a red meat cat so I can feed her Rawz beef or get her eating any number of exotic game meats that I can pick up frozen at the supermarket. Which reminds me. I still have a 10 lbs of rabbit and 5 lbs of turkey for when she’s ready to start eating raw again.

 

[daftcat75]

Globulin levels rose. 2ndchance suggests this could be either chronic liver disease/chronic dental disease, or more likely given the head-shaking the other night, an allergic response. No more Fancy Feast! I may try her back on the mirtazapine to get her eating more. She’s nibbling frequently but not eating enough cumulatively.

 

[daftcat75]

Dr called me last night. She said she too was confused and disappointed that the appointment was set up as a tech visit rather than a doctor visit. She said that the ALT didn’t get any worse is a good sign. She agreed with me that the rise in globulin combined with the head shaking the other night could indicate that there was an allergen in the Fancy Feast. Given how much FF I fed her last period until the head shaking, it doesn’t surprise me that the numbers didn’t move. Actually I’d have expected them to keep rising. The GGT, although elevated, is not yet at a level for concern but we have to keep watching that one if it continues to rise. The Dr likes my theory that if I cut the FF and keep feeding high quality food to her, the gut inflammation should subside and the liver enzymes could come down again. The current plan is to continue the ursodiol and re-test when she’s due for another B-12. Which is maybe Wednesday? Shoot! I really want her to have another week before I stuff her in the carrier and shuttle her back to the vet. She’s taking it like a pro but I’d feel better if she got a week without the vet.

Today’s tube feed went better. I need to order another couple Kitty Kollars and dress her stoma site later today. Even at 5 cc, she still dribbled a little food back up. But I got the medicine down and that didn’t dribble back up. Then she demolished another plate of food. She’s still not hungry on a schedule anymore but she’s finishing the plates when she gets around to them. That’s sort of fooling the plan of having food always available to her. I put down 1/4 can at 11pm, 2am, and 6am this morning. Sleeping in shifts again. Still, somehow 2 and 6am jive better with me than midnight and 4am. Put down another quarter can after her tube feed and that’s nearly gone too. She definitely has an eating shift from about 7pm to 9am. I should probably stop worrying about her daytime intake.

 

[daftcat75]

Glyco-Flex! I’m sad I didn’t pick this up for her sooner. I still don’t trust her teeth but I powder the chew for her and it is her new favorite topper. I’m so happy we’re finally doing something about her arthritis.

 

[FeebysOwner]

Yay! If it works for Krista the way it has worked for Feeby, you will love it! And, yes, when I first got it I was like: "Holy cow - the smell!!". Feeby was like: "Hey, what are you talking about, it smells pretty good to me!". No wonder Krista likes it for a topper!!

 

[mrsgreenjeens]

Maybe she'll eat more just by you using that Glyco-Flex on her food. Win-win

 

[daftcat75]

She only gets two GFs a day and I still don’t know how the other ingredients will treat her. Otherwise I’d be happy to powder up a bunch ahead of time and use it as an every-meal topper like her freeze dried turkey liver treats.

I need to get a new food scale. My old one broke. I have two food dishes I use in rotation. One that I serve from and one that I’m cleaning. I plate the clean one, set it down, lift up the old one with her remainder. I need to start weighing what I put down and what I pick up so I know how much she (and the carpet) is eating.

 

[daftcat75]

Ziwi Peak confuses Krista.

“But I don’t like lamb....but there’s green mussel and tripe...but I still don’t like lamb.”

She ate more than I thought she would but not enough to justify $3 for 3 oz.

I saw freeze-dried Green Mussels at local store. If there are any allergens in the Glyco Flex, I can move her to the more natural source.

 

[daftcat75]

It will be very helpful when Krista’s balance is back to normal. She still believes she can make the jumps but she did the big one from ground to top of storage unit and flopped against the wall. It was a really ugly landing. She’s tough though. She finished nearly 1/2 a 5.5 oz can for dinner. I could have gotten her to finish it but I also don’t want to press it. She’s got plenty of time to finish the other half. Freeze-dried duck liver treats I just picked up are a huge a hit with her.

The frustrating part is that she has furniture to make that jump easier and she just won’t use it.

Just finished the stoma site clean. She almost sits still for most of it. She doesn’t realize how many steps are involved. It’s tough to tell how it’s looking because I didn’t have the lighting set correctly. It’s tough to adjust that with an exposed and squirmy cat. I did pick some crusty off so we’re better for the cleaning today than not. Duck liver treat and we’re done. Oh here’s another duck liver treat on the rest of your food and I’m done molesting you tonight. We can make our way through the rest of this can as the night wears on but you have earned a groom and a nap. I’ll even leave the office door open for you if you want to take that nap on my chair.

 

[daftcat75]

Krista's 2-parter poop last night tells me the Ziwi Peak is not for her. The first part was Rawz and it looked great. The second part was, "how did so little Ziwi Peak turn into so much mush?" I forgot that Ziwi Peak has chickpeas and her old dry food had chickpeas pretty much ensuring she'd have a reaction. So the named organs, the green mussels, the tripe, it all means squat because of the inappropriate inclusion of chickpeas. Just as well. At $3/2.8 oz, it's twice as expensive as the Rawz!

We're one dinner away from being out of Rawz duck. Here's hoping she can be steered back to turkey or rabbit for a week or two until her duck comes back in stock.

Actually....

Maybe her disappointment with being out of duck will allow me to restart her on homemade this weekend. She did love the homemade duck formula I made for her.

She alternates between being a lethargic and muted version of a cat's cat and a regular Eeyore! We'll both be happier when her ear has resolved.

 

[daftcat75]

Krista found her voice and some of her spunk tonight. She's been rather mute and mopey since all of this ear stuff happened. I came home tonight and she meowed and squeaked a couple of times.

"Okay baby, let me get dinner ready. Oh no, don't do that. Okay, that's better!"

Sometimes she does listen to me. She was getting ready to make that big jump that planted her against the wall yesterday. At my words, she reconsidered and took the easier jump, e.g. the cat tree I bought specifically to break up that jump for her. Once in her usual meal spot, she happily snarfed and scarfed through much food and then realized, "why am I eating for free when I could be getting bribed?" Bugger! I feel for parents sometimes. I fluffed up the mess she made, separated it into piles, and sprinkled duck liver on each pile. Then I begged her to eat one or two more bites. Okay, the rest we can save for later.

I also realized that the bowls I've been using to swap the food in and out are too deep for her and that's why she kept leaving a layer of food at the bottom. I left her flat plate out when I left her this afternoon and that was licked clean. While she finishes her post-meal epic groom and a nap, I'll walk to the thrift store next door and pick up two more flat plates for her.

 

[daftcat75]

So much for buffet style. We’re still not back to scheduled feedings unless every two hours is a schedule. She was dead to the world after dinner by 8 pm. I was worried that she wasn’t going to touch the rabbit since we ran out of duck. But I set down a plate while I was up at midnight. She sat up to watch me but she wasn’t interested. Shoot! Then 3am hit and she woke from a dead sleep to mow down most of the midnight plate. I set down another plate which she made great progress on at 5am. And at 7am she finished her 5am plate and was up on the bed again asking for more.

We do her tube feeding at 8 am. Due to her squirminess, this is getting more and more abbreviated that I’m concerned I left the medicine in the tube without enough of a flush to get it down. She was feisty enough that restraining her any longer was probably going to burp her contents back up the tube. I got between 0.5cc and 1cc of the flush before I finally decided to call it and seal her up again. I want to ask the vet office for a length of the tube for me to practice with and see just how much it takes to flush it. She would never tolerate a 6cc flush before and after like the youtube videos. She barely tolerates a 2cc flush. I have new Kitty Kollars and new syringes on order. Maybe things will go easier when the food syringe has more than one speed which requires so much pressure that I’m afraid it’s going to pop one of these days, and explode my cat. I’m going to assume that her recent feistiness is a sign that we may not have to do the medications much longer.

She’s doing much better with the flat plates. I knew this already but somehow I thought it was more acceptable to use the shallow cat dishes. She flings food just the same so I shouldn’t have been fatiguing her whiskers and what not.

I could be imagining it but it seems like she’s moving easier already since we started the Glyco-Flex.

At 9 am every morning, I have a multi-device smart-home alarm set: the Tv shuts off, the living room lights turn off, and the soundbar starts up with her cat rock on repeat for the day. This is my cue as much as hers that the morning handling and feedings are over and I should shift over to my own day now.

 

[FeebysOwner]

I think you are on track about the meds - given her behavior and seeming to get better - you might be on the end stretch!!! Let's hope so!

Just so you know, about the Glyco Flex: even though I read it can take up to 6 weeks to see improvement, I could swear I started to see a difference in Feeby after just a week. And, she was certainly back up to jumping on all of her favorite stuff within 2 weeks. So, I am not sure what the "6 weeks" is all about - at least not from Feeby's standpoint.

 

[mrsgreenjeens]

Oh those syringes. You definitely need more than one because they do easily start to stick and then dosing slowly is out of the question. New ones should do the trick, for sure. I use saucers on placemats for my guys and those tend to work great. Sometimes their food ends up on the placemats, but when they had bowls that happened too.

I love your 9 a.m. alarm

 

[daftcat75]

Once we get back to raw meals, she will definitely eat those in her old spot on the kitchen counter next to the sink. I would rather pick flung food off my coffee maker than out of my carpet or under my fridge. She’s even been showing up in that spot a lot more lately. I’d almost just feed her there but it’s a lot easier to get her to graze throughout the night if the food is just a jump down off the bed. It’s also in a strategic spot where if I fluff it up or add bribe to it, she can watch me do that from her “hiding spot” under the book case. I’m thinking that if her ear is bothering her, dark and ground-level is probably more comfortable than in her tree.

I like my morning alarm. Though often times I just remain in the living room with my iPad until I finish my coffee. But the smart home hack that I really appreciate is every hour at 15 past, I send the “off” signal to the space heater in the bathroom. I no longer worry about whether I turned it off or not. I wish I had the same with the stove.

 

[daftcat75]

Finally got around to submitting Krista’s big vet bills to Trupanion this morning. This is their last chance. If they refuse this bill, I’m canceling them. This hospital stay is exactly the reason to carry insurance. And if they’re going to say her liver problems are preexisting because of her IBD, then they are no use to me. There just aren’t enough conditions left for her that wouldn’t be denied.

 

[daftcat75]

Made an appointment for Saturday to give her another B-12, have her stoma site checked, have her ears checked, and re-check her liver chemistry. We'll also weigh her again. She feels bonier than before. She did lose 1/2 lbs to all this.

Like a boss! We did a stoma site clean and tube meds back-to-back this morning. She did get fussy during the food, like she always does, but we got a few cc in her, medicine, and the full 2cc flush. 2cc is what the vet office told me to use for the flush. We'd be there forever and she would never tolerate 6cc flushes like the youtube videos talk about.

No longer on poop watch. It was a two parter. The second round suggests that I'm giving her too many liver treats. I'll use FortiFlora to bribe her to finish plates. I think she could use a probiotic about now.

Even discounting the One Tooth tithing (with one canine, she doesn't clean a plate like she used to), I believe she's eating between 6 to 7 oz a day now. I'll see her weight on Saturday and decide whether I have to go back to weighing plates or if our new system is sufficient.

 

[daftcat75]

Wondering....

Does the e-tube restrict her meow? It's been muted or very soft like she can't get it out. Sometimes she tries to meow but all that comes out is a squeak. She trills and purrs just fine and can walk backwards and forwards over me while I sleep so clearly she doesn't need the meow. The squeak is a cute development as long as it isn't distressing her. Maybe another question for the vet if I can remember...