What a story! I truly feel your pain.
My cat is going on a year with IBD although her diagnosis was only reached upon blood work and symptoms. The vet said it could be cancer though and we will never truly know unless we do a biopsy. I can't afford that treatment so we just opted to treat her for her symptoms.
Having an IBD kitty has no doubt caused me a lot of personal stress. Watching your cat feel horrible, not eating, not wanting much human interaction, and just all around feeling not happy can make for one stressed out cat momma. I am there! I have lost much sleep over it all many times and I often wondered if there was anything I could do to help my poor kitty.
My cat had the opposite issue as you know, because she was having chronic diarrhea, her insides were so inflamed that she just spent so much time in the litter box, most of the time covered in her mess and she was in pain, she would not eat much if anything at all. This whole thing just started to become her life, and I was totally distraught over it knowing that not too long ago she was a happy healthy cat then all of a sudden this awful life sentence!
Of course the vet prescribed her prednisolone and tylosin to start. At first things started to get under control. Her diet has always been canned anything she wanted, from Friskies to Fancy Feast. She was formerly a stray cat, and seemed to have an iron gut before all this. Anyway, to make a long story short, the meds only kept things under control for so long until the flare ups started. She would go sometimes a week to a month of having reoccurring diarrhea and the meds could not seem to truly help her. I tried different foods, upped the meds, tried everything but to no avail. I can't even begin to tell you how much money I have spent at the vets over the last year, it's truly insane!
Well during all this, I was heavily researching the raw diet. I have to admit I was a bit of a skeptic. I never in a million years thought that feeding raw could be the answer too all my cats issues. I did put raw feeding off for a long time, simply because I was afraid of it. I had been told by my vet too that it was a bad idea and to not bother. So we continued on as we always did and for a while forgot about the raw idea.
A few months ago I started looking into raw feeding again. Kitty was still not doing well and I was so frustrated over the situation. I had searched the web for possible solutions to this un-ending issue and the only thing I kept being turned to was the diet being the issue. I read that so many others were having so much success with feeding raw, that I figured, what did I have to loose in trying it. I finally went out and bought her a trial sized bag of Nature's Variety Raw chicken. I only started out by giving her a little bit at a time, and lucky enough for me she really liked it! It took about 3-4 weeks before she was eating 100% raw and as soon as she was on 100% raw she for the first time had a normal poop!
I was so thrilled I almost cried. Things were good for a while on the raw. We were finally having a normal life again. She had a normal appetite, and was not having issues in the littler box. I will admit though that we did have the occasional set back. But this time things seemed to get better much faster than it did before. So far feeding raw has been the best thing I have done for her.
I will be honest and say that feeding raw has not been a fix all for my cat. Others have reported that this diet has cured or resolved their cat's issues, but unfortunately this has not been the case for my kitty. I can honestly say though that since feeding raw to my cat that she is 80% better than she was. She has less problems, and is overall much better. I will never feed her anything else now since seeing that she has truly regained some of her quality life back. Even my vet was happy that she was doing better.
I do add a human grade probiotic to her raw daily, which seems to really help, and with the help of the people over on the raw forums I have been given many helpful tips and suggestions to aid in our quest for healthy living. So far life seems good for my kitty and we have less of a battle now. It is worth a try, even as a skeptic I am glad I did it. It is not as scary as I thought it would be.
Oh and if you do think you want to try something else to help your cat but are afraid to go with frozen raw or homemade, there is always Freeze Dried raw you can get too. For some reason my cat really loves it!
Just another suggestion for pilling your cat, does he like treats? I found my cat really loves pill pockets, she eats them up like they are a really yummy snack. Now pill time is much accepted by her and she even comes running for pill time. If you haven't already tried this, maybe it could be worth a shot.
Sorry about the long post, I just wanted to share my experience, as I really understand what you and your kitty are going through.
I really hope your lovely cat feels better, it is never an easy thing to deal with but it can get better.
Having an IBD kitty has no doubt caused me a lot of personal stress. Watching your cat feel horrible, not eating, not wanting much human interaction, and just all around feeling not happy can make for one stressed out cat momma. I am there! I have lost much sleep over it all many times and I often wondered if there was anything I could do to help my poor kitty.
My cat had the opposite issue as you know, because she was having chronic diarrhea, her insides were so inflamed that she just spent so much time in the litter box, most of the time covered in her mess and she was in pain, she would not eat much if anything at all. This whole thing just started to become her life, and I was totally distraught over it knowing that not too long ago she was a happy healthy cat then all of a sudden this awful life sentence!
Well during all this, I was heavily researching the raw diet. I have to admit I was a bit of a skeptic. I never in a million years thought that feeding raw could be the answer too all my cats issues. I did put raw feeding off for a long time, simply because I was afraid of it. I had been told by my vet too that it was a bad idea and to not bother. So we continued on as we always did and for a while forgot about the raw idea.
A few months ago I started looking into raw feeding again. Kitty was still not doing well and I was so frustrated over the situation. I had searched the web for possible solutions to this un-ending issue and the only thing I kept being turned to was the diet being the issue. I read that so many others were having so much success with feeding raw, that I figured, what did I have to loose in trying it. I finally went out and bought her a trial sized bag of Nature's Variety Raw chicken. I only started out by giving her a little bit at a time, and lucky enough for me she really liked it! It took about 3-4 weeks before she was eating 100% raw and as soon as she was on 100% raw she for the first time had a normal poop!
I will be honest and say that feeding raw has not been a fix all for my cat. Others have reported that this diet has cured or resolved their cat's issues, but unfortunately this has not been the case for my kitty. I can honestly say though that since feeding raw to my cat that she is 80% better than she was. She has less problems, and is overall much better. I will never feed her anything else now since seeing that she has truly regained some of her quality life back. Even my vet was happy that she was doing better.
I do add a human grade probiotic to her raw daily, which seems to really help, and with the help of the people over on the raw forums I have been given many helpful tips and suggestions to aid in our quest for healthy living. So far life seems good for my kitty and we have less of a battle now. It is worth a try, even as a skeptic I am glad I did it. It is not as scary as I thought it would be.
Oh and if you do think you want to try something else to help your cat but are afraid to go with frozen raw or homemade, there is always Freeze Dried raw you can get too. For some reason my cat really loves it!
Just another suggestion for pilling your cat, does he like treats? I found my cat really loves pill pockets, she eats them up like they are a really yummy snack. Now pill time is much accepted by her and she even comes running for pill time. If you haven't already tried this, maybe it could be worth a shot.
Sorry about the long post, I just wanted to share my experience, as I really understand what you and your kitty are going through.
I really hope your lovely cat feels better, it is never an easy thing to deal with but it can get better.
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