My cats are well-hydrated...

At least I thought/think so.  So I checked around and here's some loose math on what I feed my cats.

My cats get around 3-4 ounces of wet food daily.  Three ounces of wet at 75% moisture is about 65ml fluid.  Since my cats get between 3-4, I estimated 90ml which translates to approximately 3 fluid ounces.  I also add about 4 tablespoons of water to my cats' food.  That's approximately 2 fluid ounces.  So my cats get 5 fl oz daily--more or less.  I've always thought my cats by eating primarily wet food with added water were well-hydrated.  But doing the math, it seems they are just about getting enough.  Cats should have 5-10 fluid ounces daily.  Add to this, my cats do get SOME dry food along with treats.  It's usually just over a tablespoon daily.  

The present complication is that my cats are on medication that is causing constipation.  Therefore I am giving them miralax.  I thought the extra water on top of the wet food would be enough moisture.  But are they getting stuffed up?

Before medication (BM), they were urinating 2-3 times daily.  The medication causes some retention so now they are peeing once a day, occassionally twice.  When it's once a day--it is a big clump.

What medication are they on that's causing the constipation?  Have you talked to the vet about it?  Have you tried plain pumpkin?  Miralax tends to sap water from the body, so you would need to add additional water to their wet food.

They are on fluoxetine.  Yes, I've spoken to the vet about the side effects.  His advice is to dose every other day to see if it alleviates constipation and urinary retention.  Though fluoxetine is supposed to be one of the SSRIs with a long shelf line--I still prefer to taper slowly rather than to switch abruptly.  I'm hoping to taper them to a every other day schedule by the end of this week.

I added pumpkin to their food 3-4 times weekly as part of their regular schedule. But once the side effects of the medication started, I stopped the pumpkin and switched to miralax.  With one of my cats, she is so constipated, I worry about adding too much fiber.  One of them is responding to miralax but the other seems completely unaffected by it.

I will try to add more water--the problem is if the food is too soupy, they won't eat.  I may need to syringe.

You can also up the dosage of Miralax if kitties aren't actually impacted at the time.  Just up the dosage slowly so as not to have the opposite problem.

Do they ever drink water? They may be making up the difference themselves.

Denice, after their last defecation, I started increasing their dosage.  I presume after defecation, they weren't impacted.  The volume was large and solidly formed--so I don't think they were impacted.  But the increased dosage has made zero impact in increasing the frequency.  It's a mystery...unless I've been off about their hydration.  

So basically it's Before Miralax: constipated, Start Miralax: constipated (slight improvement for one cat), Increase Miralax: constipated.  Maybe I bought a lemon batch of miralax?  I'm actually using the CVS brand--purelax.  Could that be a factor?  

Willowy said:

Do they ever drink water? They may be making up the difference themselves.

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They usually only drink when they eat kibbles as a main meal.  That happens occassionally or when I travel and the sitter tells me she sees them drinking from the bowls. I do leave fresh water out daily but it usually goes unused.