Two young anorexic cats with normal blood work. Please help!

Hi,

I am throwing this out there to the community because I (and my vet) are at a loss.  I have two cats, both under two, adopted a year ago.  One was semi-feral & one was from a hoarder.  They came to me with voracious appetites due to their previous neglect.  I have only fed them the very best, some high-quality canned and raw meat cat food every day.  They ate a little kibble as a snack, but mostly wet.  The hoarder cat (Henry) would beg and holler as I prepared his food each day & was extremely food-motivated.  His little brother James was less voracious but still a good eater.  He definitely looks to Henry as an example.  

Over the last two weeks Henry has become less & less interested in food to the point of anorexia.  James is following suit.  I feed them separately, but neither is interested. Yesterday they had full vet exams and blood work.  All of the results are normal.  These are indoor only cats and I am meticulous about keeping plants, cleaners, essential oils & inappropriate foods away from them.  They have no symptoms of a blockage or food poisoning.  They are happy, purring playful cats who appear perfectly normal.  Except they will not eat.  Henry seems interested in the concept of eating until the food is in front of him.  He sniffs and walks away.  Last night I tried 6 foods...treats, salmon fillet, two types of canned food, tuna, raw beef cooked, kibble.  I try warming the food, sprinkling with bonito flakes or nutritional yeast, all to no avail.   James will eat a couple bites of each thing & then lose interest.  Henry will not eat at all.

I AM DESPERATE as I am watching both my boys basically commit suicide.  If they don't get calories in them, their livers will start to fail soon.  Has anyone seen anything like this before??  Thank you for any help you can give!!

The vet didn't give them fluids and nutrition via IV?  They need something!  Try plain meat baby food (no onions or garlic, turkey or chicken flavors) to see if that works.  Also, try some of the original pate Fancy Feast.  It's actually grain free and usually gets kitties to eat.  Did the vet check for blockages in the intestines (maybe constipated) and did he draw a urine culture?

Hi, and thanks!  No, the vet did not do IV nutrition.  She suggested I try the meat baby food & the Fancy Feast tonight...then we will try appetite stimulants. She did blood work to check kidney / liver values (and to rule out late stage FIP).  I believe the UA would be to check urine concentration, but since BUN / creatinine are normal, kidneys are fine.  If it were just one cat, she might look for diabetes, cancer, etc. but with two cats??  And they are not constipated.  I can now see this has been a slow progression to this point.  Any blockage would have become acute before now.  It is just odd that both are suffering from something (and we know it's not bacterial).  Maybe a virus is the vet's best possible guess.  But they have not been in contact with any other cats...  Thanks again for your help!

Have you noticed any vomiting in the past couple of weeks?  They could be associating that ( or some other negative experience) with the food and thus avoiding it.  You might also try warming up the food for a few seconds to enhance the aroma and entice them to eat.  Add some tuna juice, too.