Concern over snoring.

So my 8 year old cat Gir has recently started snoring while she sleeps and sometimes when she is relaxing with her eyes open.

My husband and I are wondering if she needs a vet visit. She gets very nervous going to the vet so I don't like to take her but I will if it is necesary the poor girl sheds so bad when we go

At first the snoring concerned me because of the way it sounds, its not like a congested snoring, I guess it kind of sounds like she is blocked maybe? I wish I could record it. I did look on youtube to listen to cats snoring to see if it was very abnormal sounding and I didnt think so.

She sounds like this cat, not 100 percent accurate to her but pretty close:

I would go to the vet for a check-up. Vet visits are always stressful to cats, though some are more stressed than others. However, if it is something serious, or she has pain, I'd rather have her a day stressed than things get worse or she lives in pain daily.

I don't know about the snoring. Is she overweight? Since you're talking about gaining weight.
For an older cat it can be normal, but it depends on how it sounds etc. 

About the jumping problem..I'd go to the vet for that too. There are many possibilities but they say there are pretty much cats with (lower) back pain. Having trouble jumping could be a symptom of back problems.

It could also be arthritis. However, it's hard to say for me, but I would advice you to go to the vet. Otherwise you will keep worrying perhaps, or the cat actually has something and things get worse.. Better stress for a day or so, than pain / health issues. 

Thank you for your Reply! I'm thinking a vet visit for her for sure. I do worry about her and it would if nothing else ease that. I just want her to be a happy kitty! And she is so very private and it's already hard to tell if cats are in pain sometimes. I'd hate for her to be hurting and me not know

Personal story with snoring cat. My cat Willis developed sneezing and stuffy nose characterized by noisy breathing and snoring (asleep and sometimes while awake) over a year ago. I tried many things to address this - several kinds of antibiotics, lysine, steam treatments, nasal flush, prednisone - sometimes it got a little better and then it would get a little worse. The vet was out of ideas. Then it got a lot worse. Not only was his breathing very noisy with copious productive sneezing, runny eyes;  he got lethargic and weak and lost his appetite or it was just too painful to bend his head down to eat. This had just been going on for too long, he was now testing abnormal in thyroid and liver function, and other blood markers. Last week he went to an internal med specialist who did xrays, CT scan, rhinoscopy and nasal biopsy, another flush.  VERY $$$!! He went on a new antibiotic for infection and cerenia for inflammation - yes cerenia. The good news is he is feeling a ton better now, though still on the mend, and he doesn't have any of the really bad stuff like tumor, cancer, fungal infection, polyps. The bad news is he has severe chronic inflammation with infection in nasal passages and frontal sinus with unknown cause and therefore treatment will be hit and miss, probably for the rest of his life. YES, go to the vet, it could just be your cat is getting older and has become a snorer. But it was much more than that in my cat, who also is overweight and has gained weight, making jumping up more of a challenge. He is also currently on a diet : /  Interesting point: hypothyroid - underactive - almost never happens in cats unless it is part of a disease process elsewhere in the body. In the case of Willis, presumably his ongoing and then acute rhinitis and sinusitis likely caused it and it will normalize as the respiratory infection improves. 

Good luck!

I'm sorry, I don't mean to scare you with this information, it's just that I believe the situation with my cat wouldn't have become as serious as it is if he had been put on the correct med for long enough to clear the infection when he first presented with symptoms last year. For some of these upper respiratory issues the cat needs to be on the meds for a month or longer - Willis is on a 6 week course of azythromycin right now.

No worries and thank you for your story. She is pretty much her normal self except she has been lounging around often but to me it's not much more than normal. She sneezed the other day but I was in her face and I think She could have sniffed something on me she didn't agree with. Otherwise she doesn't sneeze or cough, she has no nasal discharge or anything. But I'm making her an appointment anyway. I'm starting to wonder if maybe she might have a touch of arthritis. I hope not but better to go and find out now.

She is the oldest cat I've ever owned as I'm only 22. I got her when I was about 14 so i don't really have any previous experience with cats getting old. Hopefully her vet check will be good and nothing serious.

I'm sorry I don't have any good advice, but your kitty is gorgeous! She really is beautiful.

I hope you get some good news from the vet. I'm a new cat owner too and my cat does snore occasionally and I have a friend whose cat snores too and is in good health. However, both our cats are young. But definitely, since your cat is considered a senior to some, and her habits have changed, it's good to get her checked out. 

Just a little update, She had her vet appointment yesterday. The vet said that she looked good, I got a joint supplement to try for her. The vet also gave me some antihistamines to try to help her snoring in case it is allergy related, she looked in her nose and throat and everything looked fine. She said it is possible that this is just something that is happening as she is aging so we will see if the meds do anything. I haven't given her the antihistamine yet as I'm trying to decide how I want to administer it to her.

She did well on her visit, she cried a little on the way there and back and didnt like the vet and vet tech touching on her but she did great, i'm glad she isn't a scratcher or a biter lol.

One thing that was alarming is her weight gain, when I had her spayed in November she weighed 9 pounds and when they weighed her yesterday she was up to 11. So i'm going to have to watch her weight. Otherwise everything seems okay!

Funny, I had a vet tell me that my 10 lb cat was little and they were concerned about the dosage of medication on such a small cat.  I didn't think 10 lbs was such a small weight for a housecat.  But hopefully your pet will exercise more if she feels better with the joint supplement.

The vet didn't seem overly concerned about her weight but suggested I may feed her  a little less. I knew that she would gain weight after her surgery but I wasn't expecting those 2 pounds in such a short time. she is a small cat and has always been small, She sure has a belly now though!!! lol I still think my male cat who is 2 and slimmer is heavier than her.

I'm hoping she will be more active too!

They gain weight pretty fast after surgery One of my cats became too fat. Due to the fact that it can be very unhealthy for a cat to be overweight (just like human), I started to weigh her meals every day. She slowly lose weight now. And she is more active because the weather is getting better. I also try to play with her more often.

@Cat Pal  - this is exactly what  is happening to my kitty Gracie!  She has been a snorer for a long time, which caused only mild concern.  I wish I had done something then.  My other kitty, her son Nat, who has seizures,  also has a runny eye from time to time and has been a sneezer in the past until I switched litters.   He still has a runny eye every now and then.  

Because of the circumstances, I've been to vet after vet for help until I have maxed out my credit cards.  I'm desperate to help her.  I'm depressed over losing my mom a year ago and I want to give Gracie the best chance here.  She's my baby.  I even started a go fund me account and gotten some donations already, so if anyone can or will help, any help at all is much appreciated.  Let me know so I can give you the details  It's not posted on the site because donations haven't reached $500 yet and i do not have Facebook.  

Anyway, the last vet wanted to do all the diagnostics on her including CT and flex-scope to rule out polyps.  Today she is really having a lot of watery drainage.  Day to day it's different.  A few days ago it was thick green.  She has been on Azithromax for over a month now.  That's the only antibiotic that helped, but the snorting and drainage came back, but for two days after her five day run of Azithromax, she was almost symptom free (

I'm going to mention the cerenia today to my current vet when I pick up the 3rd month worth of Azithromax.  God help me.  Something's got to help..,

Ginny

A lot has happened with Willis since this post, had to go back and read it. Unfortunately by the time he got to the end of his 6 week course of azythromycin and continued cerenia his symptoms had returned and eventually worsened almost as bad as he had been - but not quite. This is the nature of chronic rhinitis-sinusitis in cats - it gets better and worse, first something helps and then it doesn't. Anyway, he has tried a couple of things since the antibiotic, most recently Atopica - brand name for cyclosporin. It's an immune suppressant, like pred. It is dosed by weight. Willis went on a smaller dose b/c it can cause stomach upset and he's pretty prone to that. It didn't upset his stomach at the smaller dose but did nothing for upper respiratory symptoms. So we doubled the dose, and presto! Symptoms drastically reduced! Just a couple of issues. It's very expensive - I've been paying about $60/week to treat  him.

And I've had to have his blood tested for "toxicity" from the drug at the higher dose. Still waiting for those results. He still takes Cerenia 2/wk at 16 mg but I may discontinue that, if he's ok to stay on a therapeutic dose of Atopica since previously it seemed to have stopped helping. A lot of folks will say Atopical messed up their cat. In my experience, however, it is the only thing that has given Willis lasting relief from symptoms in a year and a half.

good luck

Thanks for responding so quickly!  While I'm so glad to know your kitty is some better now, I'm really disheartened to hear that a very expensive immunosuppresant is the only thing that's helped him.  You had said you believed if your kitty had been on the correct antibiotic LONG ENOUGH that would have helped.  I believe so too.  Azithromax made Gracie's symptoms go away after the 5th day, but then it came back after 2 days of being almost symptom-free.  I asked my vet why they won't extend the period of treatment since it helped.  He gave me the standard vet answer about the recommendations.  Over the years, many antibiotic doses and course times have increased for human beings so why not for animals?  You can't just treat all animals (or humans) with a cookie cutter approach especially when they see time after time that treatment works but not for long.  Obviously she didn't have enough.  I'm so frustrated with the whole situation. I know you have been too!

I can't help wondering if there is some alternative treatment too.  I read that L-lysine helps, then I read somewhere else that it can't be given with protein so it can't be mixed in with a meal.  I had thought that giving her fortiflora would help but maybe it's making the symptoms worse.  

Let me just vent for a minute, if I may please?  I'm so tired of hearing that there is no treatment for this ailment and that disease.  That's completely unacceptable for a bunch of so-called professionals to throw up their hands and surrender to their own ignorance because they just haven't figured it out yet.  We wouldn't accept this kind of treatment for our cars or any other posssession we own, so then why do we accept it for our own health and the health of our pets? I am a nurse, so I do realize how much more complex the body is compared to equipment, but there are lots of very intelligent people in the scientific, medical, and veterinary professions that could figure out a better way to treat something like this than to just suppress the immune system.  Pharmaceuticals always have side effects and long term effects that concern me.  It doesn't help to see the slew of TV commercials nowadays from various law firms who advise suing the makers of yesterdays wonder drugs which have been taken off the market.  

If you decide to try Cerenia, tell them you want pills not injections - they may try to sell you pre-filled syringes to see if your cat reacts favorably to the drug. They are also Very Expensive, and a whole vial of the stuff in well over $100 closer to $200 I think. The pills are much less expensive and my clinic didn't even offer me that option until I read about it and asked them if they could get me pills. They can

Oh ya, and I remember now. Unlike some injections that the cat can't even feel (I give insulin to my diabetic cat twice a day and she barely notices) the cerenia shots HURT! and you cat will let you know! 

I read that Cerenia is for vomiting.  How did that help your kitty's symptoms?  It's hard enough for me to afford what meds she and Nat have now.  Her flovent is over $200.  It lasts for several months but it's a lot to spend at one time.  

Cerenia is for vomiting. It works by shutting down the "vomit center" in the brain so the animal doesn't get the vomit reflex. It is used off label for inflammation because it is believed to work in a similar way as an anti-inflammatory. It's actually not FDA approved for cats at all but is used all the time on cats with nausea. So it's use for inflammation is sort of double off label - some people say it helps their cats a lot.

I figured that might be the case.  I'd never heard of it before but I do know some drugs are given for their side effects.  I wonder why cats can use what humans use for symptomatic relief like Afrin to reduce swelling and just plain tylenol for the inflammation?  I know you can't use Afrin often but surely there is something that can help the nasal passages of a cat.  I never saw much progress while Gracie was on Prednisolone, to be honest.  It was the Dexamethasone shots that helped her so much.  After 2 shots at the vets office, she had no symptoms for an entire week.  But that was before the drainage started.  

I have Gracie's next run of Azithromax here and to be honest, I'm wondering about going ahead and giving her a 5 day run like before without asking the doctor, or even a 10 day run.   I hesitate only because I don't know how her liver function is right now after having had so much of the drugs she's had over the past several months.  Much more than any other time in her life.  But I'm really tempted to take matters in my own hands.  I won't.  But I am tempted.