Cat doesn't eat reliably

[Timewarpcat]

My kitty wth diabetes is 6 years old and in good physical condition. She got diabetes from an infection.

She won't eat regular meals. I have to sit by her and watch how much she eats. Then she doesn't want that food anymore. So I have to change it. Then she vomits and doesn't want the new food. The food is very expensive. I have the young again zero carb dry food also. Doesn't want that anymore. She had always been offered wet food and doesn't like it. She was a stray from some farm.

I wonder if I just have to give her a small dose of insulin like 1 unit and give up on optimizing the dose? This is not sustainable. My husband got cancer and will start chemo soon.

I'm in this bad cycle with the cat. She doesn't like wet food. Then she gets in the vomiting thing. I can't keep track anymore. I have nausea pills, but she became frighteningly sedated because she takes phenobarbitol for seizures. So my vet gave me something else, mirtazapine, but I will be gone today.

2.2 units of prozinc would be about right for her if she's eating and not vomiting. Today she won't eat, then puked, and I have to go to the oncology appointment that is over an hour away.

Is it reasonable to give up on optimizing the dose, give say, 1.5 units, and it's just not going to be the best? I can't give her the best. I'm out of low carb food options too.

She's only 6.

I am not on board to do even more. Wondering if someone has a way to just break out of this cycle. Her medical saga starting with the seizures has been going on for 8 months.

She has a freestyle libre on for 5 now days.

Tx 4 ideas

 

[Sienne and Gabby (GA)]

It's not normal for a cat to be vomiting on a regular basis. It seems like it would make more sense to figure out why she's vomiting than to give her an appetite stimulant which might cause a food aversion. There's a good chance that after she vomits from a food, she is avoiding eating it again. If you give an appetite stimulant to a cat that's nauseated or vomiting, a food aversion often results.

One very common reason for a cat to vomit is irritable bowel disease (IBD). The gold standard for diagnosis is a biopsy but an ultrasound may tell you if there's thickening in your cat's gut. Given what you're currently going through with your husband's health, you could try feeding Esther a diet of novel proteins preferably with foods that don't contain gluten or carrageenan or gums. Cats can have what amounts to a sensitivity or allergy to certain food and will vomit or have diarrhea. You can look for rabbit, venison, pork, lamb or other varieties that she's not eaten before. (Poultry and beef are notorious allergens for cats.) I have an IBD kitty and I feed him ZiwiPeak venison or rabbit and lamb. You can also feed a raw diet. Most supermarkets stock ground pork or lamb. You would need to get a pre-mix that contains all of the necessary supplements to make the food nutritionally complete. FoodFurLife makes a very good product if you choose to go that route.

 

[Veronica & Babu-chiri]

I agree that it would be best if you could find out what's causing the vomit, but given the circumstances I may not be so bad that you are runing out of mirtazapine since giving her an appetite stimulant while she's nauseous may end up causing the oposite effect that you are looking for.

I get it is not a good time so you may not be able to address her problem right away but maybe you could use some simple and not very expensive remedies to try and help her, one could be to give her Slippery elm bark powder, it is not expensive, and once you make a kind of syrup with it (it is very easy to do you can prepare it in the microwave or on the stove) is quite easy to give it to the cat 2 ml with a syringe two or 3 times a day ( depends on how she's doing ) you could also sprinkle it in her food but since she's not eating I would not recommend that method and it really does helps them a lot I've been using it for a long time with my CKD cats it really doesn't have contraindications other than you have to give it separated from other meds

Here's some information about it and the instructions on how to make the syrup from Tanya's web page http://www.felinecrf.org/holistic_treatments.htm#slippery_elm_bark

There are other med options like omeprazole that is also not very expensive and is usually given once a day or Ondansetron or cernia, you would need to discuss this meds with your vet specially given her preexistent conditions but they all work very well in helping with the nausea and stomach acid