My kitty might have cancer and I am scared to death

That must be so frustrating! But you have a very good regular vet who obviously relates well to Mindy. Fingers crossed for her and hugs to you.

Hi everyone,

Well, Mindy and I are having a bit of a tough time with her pills. Up until the past couple of days she has been taking them so well hidden in a piece of cheese. Now she wants nothing to do with the cheese, meat, pill pocket, whipped cream etc that I've hidden them in. I've tried to pill her and it's been a nightmare for both of us. The last episode ended with me holding her and sobbing for her to just please take it. Needless to say the stress is no good for either of us. We have a regular vet appointment tomorrow for her monthly adequan injection and her rabies vaccine, so I'm going to talk to the Dr about all of this. I can't see forcing her to take medicine that is only buying her time if that time is no good and she starts to hate me. I'm wondering if she is starting to feel a little better and has some fight back. Has anyone had any experience with prednisolone in non pill form? We hAve a great compounding pharmacy locally that was able to help my vet with getting her pain medicine in liquid chicken flavor form, so I'm hoping they might be able to come up with something.
I can handle pilling her a couple times a week with the lukeran-it's the twice daily pred battle that is wearing us out.

On a positive note, the cystitis seems to have let up. She is dealing with some diarrhea, but we think that is from her new favorite canned food, which I'm sure she will snub next week silly kitty. I just love her so much and can't bear the thought of giving up yet.

I'm so sorry. I am having similar problems with my cat. There is a strong likelihood that she has intestinal cancer. It is so hard when people act like "it's just a cat". You and your kitty are in my thoughts.

Hello missmindy!

I had a conversation with a coworker, just randomly about our cats. She said that her kitty was taking cancer medicine but in liquid form that she put on her kitty's ears. She said she found a pharmacy that was able to do that since her kitty was like mindy and refused anything!

Another thing I tried with Mimi is making a mini meatball from wet food or a meatball from dried fish it's called cat man do. It's dried fish flakes and the cats love it even if they don't eat so muc. But still ask your vet if there any possibilities for the liquid ear medicine .

Hang in there.

Hi arinlars-we were able to get the ear gel made which takes a lot of pressur off of us both.  I will have to try the meatball idea too.

Mindy is not doing well at all.  She had a rabies vaccine last night.  I didn't want to give it to her as she has had reactions in the past but her vet assured me she would be fine.  All of her vitals were good and her weight was only down by an ounce or 2.  She has barely eaten today, won't leave the bedroom, and appears to be lame when she takes a few steps. I dont' think she has slept at all either.   I gave her her pain medication, but it didn't seem to help at all.  Maybe I administered it wrong and she swallowed it instead of absorbing it.  I am calling the vet first thing in the morning, but I really really fear that our time together may be running out.

Don't give up yet - a reaction to the rabies vaccine is very common. I am a little surprised that the vet insisted on it, given her lifestyle and condition, but the after-effects may well be temporary.

Don't give up missmindy. She will be better after the rabies vaccine side effect goes away!

I know how INCREDIBLY stressful it is to have your kitty not eating and being listless. Hang in there. Try to give her food she likes, even if it isn't ideally what she's supposed to be eating. The important thing is to get her to eat to keep her strength up.

I had a cat who was old and had health issues and when he got the rabies shot, he was sleeping and ate very little for 2-3 days and then recovered.

Thank you again everyone!

@jennyransonI think she was a bit insistent as the apartment I live in is really old and I've had squirrels get in in the past.  It hasn't happened in a long long time, and hopefully won't ever again!

Her appetite is a little better today and she was up and moving around for a bit this morning.  She is still having pain though as she cries and shudders when I touch her right hip area.  Her vet recommended keeping her on consistent pain meds for the next couple days to see if it will help her get through this rough patch.  She also thought she might be having pain due to the injection itself.  I've had to call her a 2nd time today as well as now Mindy has developed consistent liquid poo.  It's been going on since Sunday and we tried fortiflora for a few days, but now her poo is very very dark and still liquid.  I was hoping it was just the change in food, but now that it's been almost 6 days I don't know.  I hope her vet calls back soon.  I'm thinking what else can go wrong with my poor kitty.

I understand. I hope you find some way of making her more comfortable soon.

Poor baby.

Talked to the vet and we are going to try one more food change. If this doesn't work and she continues to be listless and painful, then we will have to talk about saying goodbye. all combined it might just be too much for her. Heartbreaking doesn't begin to describe it.

Missmindy to stop the diarrhea consider to give her s boulardii or canned pumpkin ? I'm so sorry for this I can only imagine your pain mindy get well soon I'm sending my positive thoughts to both of you

I'm so sorry. You are doing the right thing by her.

arinlars said:

Missmindy to stop the diarrhea consider to give her s boulardii or canned pumpkin ? I'm so sorry for this I can only imagine your pain mindy get well soon I'm sending my positive thoughts to both of you

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I would absolutely try these, they can't hurt. :heart2:

I'm so sorry your vet insisted on the vaccine.

@arinlars  I am going to try the pumpkin tomorrow.  Her appetite has been so on and off I never know what she might feel like eating.

@scarlett68  Thank you I hope I am doing the best for her

@LDG  I'm really kicking myself for going along with the vaccine now.  She did say her being on the pred should counteract any reaction, but that doesn't appear to be hapenning.  Her poo problem seems to be worsening and tonight I think I saw blood.  The vet said today to try and bring a sample in tomorrow morning so she can try and determine what we might be dealing with.  I can't even begin to figure out where her sudden lameness is coming from.  She's arthritic so maybe everything piling up at once is stressing her already weakened body.  She's just so lethargic and doesn't really want me talking to her or petting her.  She's been in the bedroom again all day.

I don't know what I would do without this site and all you wonderful people.  Thank you all for caring!

Mindy buy our canned pumpkin make sure it has no sugar at all. Put one tablespoon is the food or feed raw but I doubt she will like it. Just mix it with her favorite food, any food at this point. Try friskies all cat like it

When my cat has stopped eating, due to this intestinal disease, the vet advised to feed her ANYTHING she likes, just to get her to eat. So I don't think I'd stick with cat food if she likes something else even better

so we have blood-quite a bit- in one of 3 samples.  The vet said it's fresh so it's coming from somewhere in the lower GI-maybe from the tumor itself.  She basiclly said the same thing @scarlett68  to let her eat what she wants for the most part.  We are adding a medicaiton-the name slips my mind now but others here have mentioned their cats have used it (think it starts with an M).  Neither of us really wanted to add another med to the arsenal, but feel like we have to make this last effort to get her comfortable and as healthy as she can be.  I don't want to torture her with more tests but it's a pretty safe bet she is very anemic as well.  Otherwise, well, her quality of life will be reduced to her just exsisting and not living.  At least I'll feel like we tried everything.

@LDG  you gave me some great info on how to help Mindy's urinary/bladder issue.  When she started refusing her tuna cat food, I switched to chicken and within a day or 2 the issue seemed to stop.  It's been about a week now of no tuna food and very little urinating outside of the box.  I'm keeping all that info you gave me for our next vet visit.  I forgot to ask her to ask the oncologist about the krill oil.  He's so "old school" he will probably poo poo it, but she's always willing to do the research on her own to find out.

@arinlars  -pumpkin has been bought-just waiting for Mindy to get hungry again.  She devoured an entire chicken nugget earlier this afternoon which was nice to see

MissMindy said:

 
She devoured an entire chicken nugget earlier this afternoon which was nice to see

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That's great!!! I bought tuna, canned salmon and canned chicken, and let her eat that. It was great to see her eat. Nothing tougher than watching them not eat