Hi all, I wanted to start by saying I have an appointment with the vet next Saturday, however the constant crying in my ear and consistent flushing of what little money I have straight down the toilet are driving me absolutely insane and I need to ask SOMEONE because nobody on google has the same problem with their cats apparently. It is 4 AM and I woke up feeling very strongly about this.
At the beginning of the year, my two cats' vet recommended switching them to wet food to help them lose weight. According to the serving size on the can and the vet's calorie formula, my large cat should be eating like 2.5 cans per day to lose weight and the smaller one probably about 1.5-2 (they eat AvoDerm Indoor Weight Support). I keep going back and checking this math and looking up how much cats usually eat on google, and my cats just REFUSE to eat more than maybe one half to one can each daily. I checked the serving sizes on their dry food as well and found that they were eating less than the recommended portion of that between both of them too! There was a significant event in our lives a couple years ago that made them both put on this weight, but I feel like I want to rip my own skin off trying to figure out how the heck they are managing to stay so fat when they don't eat!
A few months ago, I was feeding them 3x a day, half a can each every 6 hours. After a couple months I finally realized that I was literally throwing at least an entire can of food away every day in leftovers. I would put a scoop of dry food out for them at night in case they needed to snack, because they didn't get it during the day, and they wouldn't even touch it because they're both so entitled now. I started giving them less wet food, but I couldn't tell if they were hungry or not because Xanthippe will just sit and cry at the bowl every two hours regardless of how much she's left in there. A few weeks ago she was crying my ear off for hours and it hadn't been time to eat yet so when it finally was (keep in mind I KNOW she hasn't eaten in 6 hours and even 6 hours ago she didn't finish her food) I put down her food and literally watched her take 4 bites and then leave the rest. I want to cry. She did this right in front of me. She did this to me in my home. So I stopped giving them wet food for a while considering my surely-impending bankruptcy and neither of them shut up about it the whole time.
I'm pretty sure they LIKE the food because they go crazy begging for it and sprint across the room when I go anywhere near a can. For now I've been free feeding them dry food again like I was before, but I give them one can of wet food to share in the middle of the day and that's the only thing they seem to be able to finish. I've considered the possibility that they want to eat less, but they're literally eating like half their serving size and they ask for more all day. They have NO IDEA what they want. I know I can't keep changing up their daily diets for the sake of their stomachs so I am really looking for some guidance about what could be going on and how I should proceed. Even the vet said she has no idea how they can stay fat and eat so little. I don't think she believed me. Trust that I am obsessing over how much food they are wasting every time I put it down, so I am certain about their collective intake.
Why can't they finish any food??? HOW ARE THEY POSSIBLY SO FAT??
Thank you so much.
At the beginning of the year, my two cats' vet recommended switching them to wet food to help them lose weight. According to the serving size on the can and the vet's calorie formula, my large cat should be eating like 2.5 cans per day to lose weight and the smaller one probably about 1.5-2 (they eat AvoDerm Indoor Weight Support). I keep going back and checking this math and looking up how much cats usually eat on google, and my cats just REFUSE to eat more than maybe one half to one can each daily. I checked the serving sizes on their dry food as well and found that they were eating less than the recommended portion of that between both of them too! There was a significant event in our lives a couple years ago that made them both put on this weight, but I feel like I want to rip my own skin off trying to figure out how the heck they are managing to stay so fat when they don't eat!
A few months ago, I was feeding them 3x a day, half a can each every 6 hours. After a couple months I finally realized that I was literally throwing at least an entire can of food away every day in leftovers. I would put a scoop of dry food out for them at night in case they needed to snack, because they didn't get it during the day, and they wouldn't even touch it because they're both so entitled now. I started giving them less wet food, but I couldn't tell if they were hungry or not because Xanthippe will just sit and cry at the bowl every two hours regardless of how much she's left in there. A few weeks ago she was crying my ear off for hours and it hadn't been time to eat yet so when it finally was (keep in mind I KNOW she hasn't eaten in 6 hours and even 6 hours ago she didn't finish her food) I put down her food and literally watched her take 4 bites and then leave the rest. I want to cry. She did this right in front of me. She did this to me in my home. So I stopped giving them wet food for a while considering my surely-impending bankruptcy and neither of them shut up about it the whole time.
I'm pretty sure they LIKE the food because they go crazy begging for it and sprint across the room when I go anywhere near a can. For now I've been free feeding them dry food again like I was before, but I give them one can of wet food to share in the middle of the day and that's the only thing they seem to be able to finish. I've considered the possibility that they want to eat less, but they're literally eating like half their serving size and they ask for more all day. They have NO IDEA what they want. I know I can't keep changing up their daily diets for the sake of their stomachs so I am really looking for some guidance about what could be going on and how I should proceed. Even the vet said she has no idea how they can stay fat and eat so little. I don't think she believed me. Trust that I am obsessing over how much food they are wasting every time I put it down, so I am certain about their collective intake.
Why can't they finish any food??? HOW ARE THEY POSSIBLY SO FAT??
Thank you so much.