Lifelong Chronic Diarrhea

[kathyh239]

This post is my last hope. We adopted a kitten 11 years ago that has had chronic diarrhea his whole life. When he was a tiny kitten, he sneezed while on my lap and diarrhea shot out of his rear end all over me. I thought it was a fluke, that he had picked up something at the shelter and it would clear up. It never has and I can't take it anymore.

He has been tested for parasistes many times, and the results have always been negative. I have tried a number of different types of commercial foods, gradually (not abruptly) changing them over the course of the years. We have tried probiotics (no noticeable changes) and he has been on several rounds of steroids (which helped, but as you know, he cannot take them for too long without serious adverse side effects). I have been to several cat exclusive veterinary practices. Nothing has helped in the long term. He has terrible, noxious smelling flatulence. His diarrhea is so loose that sometimes it winds up on walls, furniture etc.

I can't do this any more. He is the sweetest, gentlest creature but I can't live in a house being ruined by cat diarrhea. I can't tell you how many items I have had to throw away. I am at the end of my rope (which I have been saying for years) but I literally cannot take this any more.

I'm hoping that someone on here has had a similar situation and found a solution. If you have a solution that costs thousands of dollars, there is no need to forward me that information. I am currently unemployed and do not have the resources for an expensive procedure.

 

[Neo_23]

Have you tried a raw diet?

 

[Furballsmom]

Lordy, honey I'm so sorry, and I can't tell you the tears that welled up in my eyes as I read that you-all have hung in there with this cat for this length of time. Geez. Poor baby and poor you

Anyway, have you tried raw food, either store bought or home made? Something I've had luck with is where I add a couple nuggets of Primal Pronto to the Big Guy's regular canned food. Offsetting the cost is by doing it every other day and I still see results of no odor, and a decrease in quantity of poop, and a lot of people report the same results.

Also, a homemade recipe can be found on catinfo.org - just in case you want to go that route.

 

[Furballsmom]

This article contains some things that might help.

No Money For Vet Care? How To Find Help And Save Your Cat's Life

There are also some organizations that can help listed here.

Financial Aid for Pets

 

[kathyh239]

Thank you. We tried raw years ago but he stopped eating it. Maybe I can give it one more try. I will go to the catinfo.org site you mentioned and check it out ASAP. Thanks for your response.

 

[Furballsmom]

There are more companies now making over the counter raw foods - maybe Primal or radcat.
Keeping our fingers crossed for you!!

 

[Furballsmom]

Also, if you have a food you really want him to eat, there are tempting toppers to try; either on top of wet food or mixed in, and also in addition such as with the liquids;

• Chicken or beef flavored baby food - make sure it doesn't contain any garlic or onions

• Tuna and/or the juice

• Salmon

• Sardines (make sure there are no bones)

• boiled cut up chicken or turkey with no seasonings - this might be the thing to put on or in wet food

• kitten food - it's usually smelly. See if it's eaten on its own, then mix it in or put on top

• Try mixing in Kitten Milk Replacer - there are recipes on the internet

• Fish, tuna or BBQ flavored canned wet food (I personally have never seen BBQ flavors, but...)

• Lickable cat treats or pouch treat gravy poured over the food

• Pouch cat foods - these typically have more gravy

also Nutri Cal for when it is an urgent situation of the cat not eating

• goat milk, or low/no lactose cow milk
• whole cooked eggs (both yolk and white)
• broth with no salt and no garlic or onion or seasonings of any kind

 

[Neo_23]

Thank you. We tried raw years ago but he stopped eating it. Maybe I can give it one more try. I will go to the catinfo.org site you mentioned and check it out ASAP. Thanks for your response.

As furballsmom mentioned, there are lots of companies making commercial raw food now. You might try different kinds. Some cats like freeze dried raw that you rehydrate with water even though they don't like frozen raw. I would try different kinds of commercial raw till you find some that he likes and then rotate them. You can ask your local independent pet stores for samples or email the companies.

 

[lavishsqualor]

Raw is absolutely the way to go. I'd share my recipe but I'm not at home. Raw made with chicken thighs, assuming your cat isn't allergic to poultry, is very inexpensive too. It may take some time, love and patience to get him eating it and see results but it will be well worth it in the end. There are so many stories online about cats just like yours who began having normal bowel movements once placed on a raw only diet. These cats are most likely allergic to some minor ingredient in commercial foods and once it's removed they're fine. I'll post my recipe when I get home tonight.

 

[duckpond]

I agree that Raw would be a great thing to try! I think its great for cats if you can feed this way!

what have you been feeding? wet food, dry food? I know when i have a cat with diarrhea the vet has me pull them off wet and dry food only for a few days, seems to work. I would not feed just any dry, i now use only Dr. Elseys dry food, chicken flavor. you can get it from their site or Chewy. might be worth a try if nothing else works. Its expensive, but a little goes a long way.

my son has a cat that sounds much like yours. vets, shots, prescription diet, everything just like a few different vets said to try, this went on with them just about 2 years or so, but nothing worked more than a few weeks. Then they started feeding her Fancy feast classics, and only the chicken, turkey and beef. nothing else 2 cans a day. she got better. Fancy feast may not be the best food out there, and it may not work at all for your cat, but it works like a charm for their girl. As long as they stick to the Fancy feast classics, and a regular two time per day feeding she has absolutely no problems. If they give her anything else, even just a little bit, or once, she is back to the diarrhea again.

Just a few other options. Wishing you the best of luck!

 

[Neo_23]

You can use fortiflora as an appetite stimulant to get him to eat the raw food. Just sprinkle a little on the food.

 

[duckpond]

just another thought. i dont know what kind of litter you use. If clay you may want to try something different. I personally think breathing the clay is not good, and when a cat uses litter they do get the dust, and some litter that sticks to them. when they groom they do ingest this. It may not bother most cats, but some i definitely think it does. i have one i think it causes problems every time i try clay litter. I have used the grass litter for a few years now and me, and my cats are happy with it. I would only start out with 2 or 3 inches in the box, as its light weight and some of mine dont like it to be too deep.

The grass litter clumps as well as clay, which is important if a cat has diarrhea. there is no dust, and no fragrance, which can be a problem with many litters. There are more brands coming out all the time. i use one i get from amazon or chewy
Pioneer Pet / Litter / Litter & Accessories / Cat - Free shipping at Chewy.com

or if you have a Kroger store nearby they have a Kroger brand, Abound, that is as good as the pioneer pet litter.

Just a thought on something fairly easy to try, since you sound at the end of your rope.

 

[blueyedgirl5946]

I adopted my cat from a local pet store. He had violent diarrhea, which nothing would help. They sent him home with the store brand cat based food for sensitive cats. He was checked out and nothing was found. On my own, I decided to put him on a limited ingredient cat food. He eats Green Pea and Duck dry food and Green Pea and Venison wet food.
The idea is to give the cat a diet with limited ingredients and a protein source he never had before. It worked and we are both happy. For more than two years, he has been fine.
Others have suggested a raw diet. I have no experience with that as I never fed it to any of my cats. But I will say here, that a drastic food change might be what is needed.

 

[Neo_23]

just another thought. i dont know what kind of litter you use. If clay you may want to try something different. I personally think breathing the clay is not good, and when a cat uses litter they do get the dust, and some litter that sticks to them. when they groom they do ingest this. It may not bother most cats, but some i definitely think it does. i have one i think it causes problems every time i try clay litter. I have used the grass litter for a few years now and me, and my cats are happy with it. I would only start out with 2 or 3 inches in the box, as its light weight and some of mine dont like it to be too deep.

The grass litter clumps as well as clay, which is important if a cat has diarrhea. there is no dust, and no fragrance, which can be a problem with many litters. There are more brands coming out all the time. i use one i get from amazon or chewy
Pioneer Pet / Litter / Litter & Accessories / Cat - Free shipping at Chewy.com

or if you have a Kroger store nearby they have a Kroger brand, Abound, that is as good as the pioneer pet litter.

Just a thought on something fairly easy to try, since you sound at the end of your rope.

Not sure if it will help with the diarrhea but I agree that grass litter is the best. I have tried all different kinds and it has the least dust and doesn’t cause allergies. I use the Petvalu brand fresh 4 life.

Only thing that sucks with grass litter is the tracking.. but you can’t win em all!

 

[furmonster mom]

My concern is that since this has been a chronic issue, there may be long term damage to his entire GI tract. The explosive diarrhea makes me wonder about bacterial infections or other bad organism growth due to damage. Also, if there is damage and scarring in the GI tract, it could cause excess inflammation, which means the walls become too thick for any nutrients to be absorbed. This is probably why the vet gave you the steroids (prednisolone?), to help with inflammation.

Have you tried probiotics to stimulate good GI health? I personally like Dr. Becker's probiotics through Mercola. They also have digestive enzymes (to help in the stomach as opposed to intestine). You may want to try both.

I also think that raw may be something you should look into again. Start slow and simple, of course.

I'd start right off with probiotics and enzymes, then work your way to raw.
And try to be patient... this is not an easy fix.

 

[Furballsmom]

Here's another perspective on raw that might also help you to determine how you want to deal with things, from another thread discussion where the original poster is working with information from his/her breeder;

@abby2932 says; I did a quick google search for the Fresh Oasis Feline T and it says that it is made to balance raw or cooked meat into a meal. I saw some calcium in the ingredient list but I didn't see a liver substitute....but the website says to just add it to cooked or raw meat and it should be balanced.
Can you ask your breeder if they know for sure that you don't need to add organs with that premix? If you're sure that this premix will, in fact, balance raw meat then you should be fine.

As far as the Kitty Bloom...I would never use that product. It has a LOT of ingredients in it and the first two are Dried Cheddar Cheese and Rice Flour. The whole point of raw feeding is to cut out all the junk that is in dry and canned cat food. The Kitty Bloom looks like it has a lot of unnecessary ingredients. Their website is very hard to navigate. I don't see clear instructions on what the product actually is or how it is supposed to be used.

Have you ever looked into the premix called EZ Complete? It has everything in there to balance a meal, except for the meat. You could absolutely use your Blue Ridge Beef boneless grinds, add in the EZ Complete supplement and you have a balanced meal.

 

[cat princesses]

HI There!
I'm sorry you are dealing with this. When I first adopted my cat she had very soft poops with fresh red blood and some mucus. It took me quite awhile to treat and cure. I have had really good success with gerber baby food turkey and a probiotic called S. boullardi. I use the nutria cology brand but any would do. I take a small spoon full of the baby food and warm that for 5 seconds in the microwave and then dump in 1 full capsule of the s. boullardi and mix thoroughly and feed to her on the spoon. I had to do this 2x per day morning and evening for months to get her poops firmed up. I also highly recommend B12 injections. YOu will need a script from your vet and then you can order online. The vet tech can show you how to draw it up in an insulin syringe and how to inject - if you google b12 injection for cat with loose stool you will find articles on how beneficial this is. I also really like the Tiki Cat aloha friends wet food because it has pumpkin mixed in already. My cat refused to eat the regular pumpkin nor would she eat it if I tried to mix into her food but somehow she likes the Tiki cat. I feed raw as well but I feed the Rad Cat raw - you might want to try that. I dint have experience with home made raw I always felt like that was way too risky in terms of controlling bacteria and other icky stuff. I like the rad cat because they put all the necessary minerals and vitamins and it’s cintrolled as far as third party testing during the production process.
It could also be a food allergy. You might want to just try feeding only 1 protein and stick with that so say if you go with the raw food only, just feed the turkey and only that and see if that makes a difference. These are my best tips - my cat has had firm poops for over a year now and I still give her the s. boullardi but now it's only 1x per day.

 

[white shadow]

Hi kathyh239 and welcome to TCS !

I'm going to give you a couple of old threads written by 2 very experienced senior members here written specifically on chronic diarrhea.....

• Trouble in Raw Paradise - Clostridium perfringens and my cats
• Saccharomyces Boulardii use for diarrhea and GI disease incl IBD

Now, the first of those was written by "carolina", the second by "ldg" (Laurie).......both of them have gone off and started a raw pet food business, and they are running a raw food group on FB. Here are those links:

• Food Fur Life .com (That's their "About Us" page)
• Raw Feeding for IBD Cats

'The devil is in the details' when treating this condition - I'm going to suggest that you carefully read and dissect the detail of what each of them is saying in those threads. I'm sure you'll be able to contact them as well through those links - and, knowing them, I believe you'll be able to get some 'coaching' along the way.

There's one caveat.....you must keep us updated! This issue crops up here often enough, and, for future reference, your feedback will help others on our forum.

Hoping this will help !
.

 

[Furballsmom]

Hi!
I was looking for something else and came across this - how are things going?

 

[Jem]

Hi! I'm not sure if you're still coming back to this thread, but I figured I'd post my experience.
Our cat, FOR YEARS, had smelly diarrhea, And we tried EVERYTHING, but nothing worked, until he was diagnosed with Kidney Disease. Now I'm not saying yours has KD , but it was a friggin' miracle, when we switched him to the kidney diet, IT ALL STOPPED!!!! NO more clear the room farts!, NO more wafting poo smell for an hour after he went, and NO MORE diarrhea!!!!!!!!
Considering your cat is older, try a kidney disease diet, it probably wont hurt him, but you could talk to your vet if that diet would be OK for him to try.