Tabby

Sat, July 22, 2006 - 6:33 AM

When I woke up Friday evening, I found Tabby (my old grey cat) had thrown up everywhere. I mean everywhere: on the floor, on the bed, on the chair, in the back room. It took me almost an hour to clean it all up.

I assume it's Tabby, but I have two other animals and it could have been one of them. But Tabby is the cat that tends to throw up.

I decided it was time for Tabby to visit the vet, and I got off work early and off we went. Tabby knows what "the box" is for, and as soon as I took it down he ran to hide. I scooped him up and tried putting him in the cage, which took some doing as he fought the whole time.

The trip to the vet was very "pleasant". Tabby cried the whole way. I was a bit sad, as Tabby is very old (15 years) and I feared that if he was very sick he wasn't coming home.

The vet looked him over, did two x-rays (and gave me copied on a CD) and some lab work. The x-rays came up negative - no obvious tumors or anything, except that Tabby is very fat.

The lab work will take a day or two. Until then I took Tabby home, let him loose and watched him walk away. He walked as if to say, "how dare you shove me in the box!"

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Comments

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Jennifer (Sat, July 22, 2006 - 10:38 AM)

bwechk...

Richard - just adding a hairball to the mix for you...
Does Tabby get hairballs often? (Something to consider).
But my cat has the same problem. My husband and I decided that there are a few factors that goes into her "bwechk"ing on a-more-than-"nornmal"-infrequency. 1) She WOLFS her food down. Burping her helps. I know sounds rididculous, but it does help.
2) A little over a year and a half ago, my cat started losing a LOT of weight quickly (she was always pudgy too) which alarmed me. Took her to vet, they kept her, did X-rays, everything like you are saying, and a few days later her bloodwork came back and her liver was failing - she had jaundice (picture it - black cat, yellow skin - yick.). We rushed her to Tustin to a specialist and they continued some tests, some supportive care, treated her with antibiotics to make sure she she didn't get a secondary infection, and when all was said and done, one feeding tube later, lots of rest and care and love, she's fine. Their best guess? (That's right - guess, since I had paid enough to clone her by this point I wasn't going to pay for more optional tests) IBD. Inflammatory Bowel Disease. Most likely brought on by food allergies. We have her (but not my other two cats) on a special diet food (available through vets) of a soy or duck protein diet with either rice or pea as the carbohydrate. In other words, a food that her body had never seen and therefore couldn't be allergic to. (Some people will actually boil and chop up fresh chicken and rice in place of a commercial diet - talk to your vet first though.) We have had GREAT success with this. We also isolate her during feeding time in a small room so even if she does wolf her food, she can't run around or be harassed by another cat and therefore hopefully has time to let the air out - burp!

I didn't write this to scare you btw, just as someone who's been there and one possibility. I used to work in a vet office so I have seen a few more variations than this. Oh, and to let you know - my kitty was 8 years when this happened, and she was brought to me at age 1 ish after living on the streets, probably eating anything she could fit in her mouth. She's like a bullfrog that way!

Good luck with your brood!

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