Crack Addict Retread...12 step?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Anonymous
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
A

Anonymous

Guest
As many of you know Tom has been, well, not eatting progressively for a few weeks to the point where I had to break out the syringe feeding and offer kitty crack.
Apparently I broke thru and this morning he woke with...an appetite YAY! :RAHCAT
So I gave his ff and he happily ate 2 bites. Then went into the kitchen, a clear sign that says I WANT FUD.
So I offered up hmmm, some smelly sardines (yummy) nope
Some raw rabbit (his favorite!) nope
Uh Oh....he WANTS the CRACK!
Oh NO!!! He has entered the dark world of kitty crack head again.
I got out the bag and he circled and purred. Now this behavior 2 days ago would have made me giddy with happiness...but now I know he is hungry and just PREFERS the crack.
I put some on his ff.
And hunter and master butcher that he is, he manager to seperate out the crack from the flesh.
Dear God, I've forgotten how hard it was to wean him the first time around. 5 years ago! He's been clean and sober allllllll this time.
What to do?????? Idea's, suggestions. He's been basically hunger striking for days and I do want him to eat.
Lori
I just edited and put out a prayer candle. It's all clear to me now...read down the posts. Please send love to my boy. Whether you like me or have had trouble with me in the past...please send love from around the world to my boy. All I want is he should not suffer. He is happy right now. Please dear lord let him stay with me for as long as you can, as it was meant to be. My boy TomTom, he needs your vibes.....
 
What's crack that you are feeding him? You know, Whitney says crack is whack...
I was speaking to some friends back home who have 2 kitties with kidney failure and it sounds like after 2 years one is about ready to go. My friend said someting about getting an appatite (crap I can't spell that right with the smell of fish here in my office - yuck!) stimulant to put on their food. I thought he said it was something the vet was going to give...wait it's a pill not a powder....
Sorry I am no help, but glad to see he's eating something.
Now I think you mean crack=kiddble/dry food?
 
Absolutely no clue hon, as mine are exactly the opposite they thought they hit pay dirt when mom pulled out the canned. Just glad he is eating, and not on his way to the evil, vile, nasty vettybean.

Mel, Maxwell, Musette & The Fur Gang
 
When Star went on a hunger strike for a week, her old high-carb dry food was ALL SHE WANTED when her appetite came back. We'd been in touch with the vet throughout the week, and he gave us a Purina DM sample (for free). I was skeptical, but she ate that just as well as her own high-carb stuff. So we bought some EVO lowest carb dry that our local store had. They suggested mixing it in with her high carb stuff in greater and greater percentages until she was on all EVO. Now, I didn't tell them that I didn't want even EVO, but I figured (1) something (even high carb!) was better than nothing and (2) EVO was better than her high carb stuff. Eventually she went back to the wet food, but it was the dry food she preferred when she started getting her appetite back.

I know you can mix them, but Star picked around the wet food too. We just put two bowls down and made both available. Eventually when she was eating the wet food, we took the dry food bowl away (a week or so later).

I know there are lots of other approaches, and you'll find what works for your guy. Good luck!
 
well he did manage to pull the crack out of the ff pretty well.
I can mix them up real good, and buy the lowest carb crack...he was really hard to wean the first time around.
so happy to see him volunteer to eat that i don't want to jinx it...but we were like just a hair away from remission and now this!
i guess remission is a far 2nd to having tom not eatting at all right? yep.
 
amps 74 on a belly full of kitty crack????? :shock:
baffled and confused and in denial.....
his last shot was .2 last night on a 125
i don't even want to know what you might be thinking.................... :roll:
 
ok, lets break it down.
tom is purring, preening, peeing and pooing...and as of yesterday ..playing.
he is NOT hurting apparently or it would reflect in his numbers right?
he is on a belly full of crack and has an amps of 74.
This is NOT a painful gastrointestinal issue or his numbers would reflect pain...not a blockage or he would be throwing up and/or not pooping.
An 'itis' of any kind I imagine would be somewhat painful or uncomfortable right?
Soooooo, Cancer is a definit possiblity and I don't need to KNOW if tom has cancer do I? I mean I have already as a chemo survivor myself decided to live out my years left if re-dx'd with cancer cause I'll be damned if I do THAT again.
He is not in pain, he wants his crack and his numbers are too good for comfort.
He also took a long walk this morning and chased something I could not see.
He had a big fight last night with the throw rug.
Do you all understand what I am saying....
I may not post about this again if you understand what I am saying...if tom is not eatting or is in pain I would go to vet...now, for what? cuz his numbers are good and he is only wanting crack?
Say it like you think it ok?
 
Its more important that he eat.

If he is getting enough calories to be stable, and the only thing that may need managing is the glucose, and you think something else is going on where you wouldn't put him through the treatment for it ...
its called palliative care and I think it is an acceptable choice.

{hugs}
 
I think I need a xanax....I'm suddenly looking at tom with my heart in my throat. I thought...pictures..should I take a bunch of pictures. No no no, I don't want to start memorializing him now...He does have cancer does'nt he? Is there any OTHER explanation? Is there?
:cry:
 
My opinion is, if knowing wouldn't change what you do with your kitty, then don't worry about the unknown. Maybe it was just a tough bug that Tom finally kicked. Maybe it's cancer. Maybe it could be something I couldn't even imagine (I couldn't have imagined diabetes a month and a half ago, so my imagination isn't the best!). I'm obviously not a vet, but if Tom is happy eating then leave it at that. And you can be happy that he's happy.

On a side note, my mom's kitty got cancer, and once the appetite was gone it never came back.

Other ideas -- I've heard the fortiflora but haven't tried it. I'm interested in the idea though. Someone also suggested putting the kitty crack in a food processor and grinding it up and sprinkling it on the wet food. Maybe a little harder to sift through and sounds to me like a homemade fortiflora trick. Also, I noticed Star licking her wet food the other day, and added some water when she was done licking -- she came back for more because it was juicier/soupier. Maybe Tom's just looking for variation and a 5-year break makes the kitty crack seem so new and enticable. :)
 
Becca Tom is a diabetic cat on a bunch of crack with a +15 77. Do you know what thay implies? I'm sorry, I don't mean to be sharp. The number itself....along with other symptoms is indicative of cancer more than anything else. Not a bug...bugs don't bring bg's down. If anything they bring bg's UP.
 
it could also mean that his pancreas is just working. it'd be working it's butt off. and who knows, it could burn itself out again for that matter if that's the case. or yes he could have cancer. i wouldn't put the cart before the horse though. without testing there's no way to know he has cancer or if anything else is/was wrong with him.

just thinking of losing one of mine can bring tears to my eyes so i know it's horrible to consider things like this but you're going to work yourself right into a stroke if you don't catch your breath and just enjoy that tom is eating again and wrestling and guarding his grounds.
 
Lori, you need to remove that candle. Do you have a vet visit in store? FWIW, Hope went off insulin after 4 1/2 years and was dx'd with RCM. Over 4 years, close to 5, later she is still of insulin and doing great. Of course she gets a lot of pills every day ;-)
 
REALLY HOPE, tom has just started a diet of crack! do cats go otj when they just start a diet of crack?????
does no one here know about bg's and cancer?
and i want his candle up.
he and i both need it up.
we are candle people and tom is sick ok.
 
+15 77. go tom go,,,,this should be a happier moment. just ate more crack. yay. not.
 
yes we know about bg's and cancer but it is not always the case either. pain and discomfort we know to raise BG's too right? but that's not always the case either. remember when Mousie had her vestibular episode? her world was spinning something horrible and from my own experience with vertigo, i can firmly say it is not a pleasant feeling. yet her BG's didn't climb at all during that. tom looked like he was on his way off the juice right? maybe he has succeeded in getting there. how long he's going to stay there though may be dependent on how long he eats the kibble. but if it keeps him eating i wouldn't necessarily pull the kibble either.

you said he doesn't appear to be in pain right? and he's eating again? and going potty? and beating up the rugbeast? seemingly back to his normal self so far?
 
Lori, we can say the same for steroids, when a cat starts steroids, BGs will be higher, for Tucker when he started Prednisolone for his brain tumor, his BGs actually went down.

Maybe you should take Tom to the vet and get some bloodwork done. Maybe that could tell more of a story.
 
yes cindy, all those things are true.
his coat looks back tho'
dandruff and not so shiny now.
his coat and his appetite are not great. i still syringe him water...and some baby food.
his coat is dull.
 
we had a 5:15 app't for the vet (we hate him) yesterday. at exactly 5pm tom started eatting from each bowl on his rug. hungrily.
and i was sick from inhaling too much feliway. (i know, we sound like dumb and dumber) so i called vet and asked if we could put it off due to tom eatting right now. he was eatting tuna, sardines, kibble and ff chicken and beef. he was hungry for the first time in days. i thought it was all over.
 
LORI, YOU NEED TO TAKE THE CANDLE OFF!!!! Every time I see it I think something has happened .... you need to breathe and calm down! you don't know anything and 90% of the things we worry about never happen!
 
Nancy are you yelling at me?
This is not the flaming ga candle.
This candle is the candle of love and prayer.
sheesh, if it bothers you that much I suppose it will be REMOVED but I wanted to give Tom that.
and please don't think what is happening to tom is just Nothing....Cancer is a better than 90% chance of what he has.
I think I've ruled out the other issues
Thank you for understanding this sad state of affairs I find myself in with Tom just when I thought we were doing so well.
He is sick...is that ok with you?
I just syringed him again.
This is how cancer presents.
I know I am too emotional and even angry to be rational....so maybe just have this whole thread taken down ok.
My cat is sick and I'm a mess and you just don't know all of the extenuating circumstances with us.
 
I wasn't yelling ..... we all care about Tom, you know that. Do you remember when Tom brought in a live mole and killed it in the house and there was blood everywhere?? You were mad at Tom and didn't think you could get your loving feeling back? We go from black to white with our babies.

Sometimes we just obsess over them because they are so special to us. I watch Payne sometimes and I think what will this accomplish? and I know it won't help anything .... but I still catch myself.

We care about you and Tom .... nothing was meant harshly, you know that.
 
Lori, that candle, the other candle and the rainbow are all used to signify a passing of a cat. You need to calm down. Few years back Hope also went off her food and refused to eat anything but DM dry. So, I fed her the dry, worked the insulin around it, and when she was ready she went back to her canned food.
 
Same with Simba, when he got so sick in January, and I rushed him to the animal hospital, he lost interest in food, couldn't even find it in the kitchen as if he gone blind and lost his sent. I syringe fed him KMR milk replacer and water, then I tried to see if he was interested in raw beef and after a while he responded to that, and ate raw beef. I had to take him to the animal hospital again, because he got a severely inflammated pancreatitis and they put a tube in him and feed him throught that. Then he came home and we continued with the syringe feeding and raw beef as above until I decided to give him the m/d dry food (comparable to evo) ---- which made him start to eat again. Eventually he also started to take interested in his wet food also.
 
In September of 2008, about 3 days before hubby and I were to go on our 2nd honeymoom/25th wedding anniversary cruise, we came home and I found Thomas looking like a rag doll. He registered LO on the glucometer. I was a basket case. Anyhow, from that day on he has never been given more than one shot a day, and he gets no insulin if he is under 10. Yesterday he got probably the teeniest amount of levemir I could give him, and today he got none. I too have read the it must be cancer idea, but he seems happy enough. So he is now over 18 years old, and has been on insulin for over 10 1/2 years, so I know that there is no damn way we are looking at remission, or a sputtering pancreas or whataever. What I do know that I have always done well by Thomas. I also know that you have done well by your Tom. I think that is all we can do. And I have also warned everyone I know that I will be inconsolable when his time comes, but I won't rush that thought.
All in all, it always seems that your Tom enjoys his life, so if he eats kibble for a while so be it. You are doing what you can and what feels right to you.
If his time is near, enjoy what you can. Our civvie Furball, died of lung cancer 3 years ago this week, and we have decided that when it is Thomas' time we will not embark on any heroics. Furball absolutely hated his pills etc, and for weeks after he had passed I found his little pills that obviously he had squirrelled away in his mouth till he could spit them out unseen.
Prayers for both you and Tom.
Dana and my Thomas
 
Dana, thank you for your story, especially about finding the pills.
I have tom on pepcid a/c
last nite i'm on the phone, sitting on the couch and i feel a little pebble? so i'm just rolling it around between my fingers while gabbing. looked at it eventually, tom's pill! :lol: i looked at tom sitting right next to me and had to laugh. i thought for sure i had held onto him until he swallowed it every single time.
they sure know how to work their way around the system don't they?
 
Fortiflora worked magic for my cat. He was a lifelong dry food eater and transitioning him to wet food was successful by adding fortiflora. We had to use Cypro, an appetite stimulant at first. But now, he is eating all wet food, sprinkled with the fortiflora.
 
Just getting home and settled in.
Tonights line up....bowl of soupy turkey and gravy baby food, along side a dish of raw rabbit, along side a fresh bowl of water, along side of a bowl of crack, along side a bowl of tuna in water juice.
Tom is amused just looking at it and is hugging his banana from Althea.
No food that I can tell has been eatten since before 2ish.
C'mon Tom EAT!
 
Dearest Lori, and, of course, you too, precious furry wild man, Tom Tom,

We all know Giz taught me to be a food survivor. Whatever it takes was her mantra... I mean, she and Chet's ClaraKitty had special dry food dispensation from Dr. Lisa!

And, yes, we know what low numbers can mean. Doesn't mean they mean that. Just, don't go there. They can just be low numbers. Nikki's throwing some interesting numbers lately; but, I'm not thinking it's anything other than she's a cat. She has her own agenda. She doesn't speak English as I know it. Okay, except for NOW! Although, tonight when she woke me up for her middle of the night meal and bun rubbing, I swear she responded with a Betty Boop "Hey" after I sleepily put out a fresh can of food and patted her furry buns and said "Hey, Nikki"...

She's currently sprawled on a piece of paper she's commandeered. I don't know why she loves this particular piece of paper. She just moves it around wherever she feels like sprawling. I've offered her a fresh piece of paper which she wants nothing to do with. She's a cat. She has her own agenda -- and apparently it's printed on this one particular piece of paper.

It is what it is, Lori. It could be, it is what it isn't. My most humble suggestion is to stay in the moment. Projecting fears is never good...

Tom is a glorious, fearless cat. Take his lead...

Much love and countless fearless hugs for you both,
Deb and Nikki -- and, Giz, who taught me all about fearlessness...
 
Loving prayers and vibes to you and Tom, the cat with attitude! Could part of the problem be heat? My kitties didn't eat much on our hot days. Then the cool air came yesterday and they were working overtime at eating me out of house and home yesterday and this morning.
 
Thank you so much for your encouraging words and love Deb and Kathy.
I think I have a good report:
:RAHCAT :RAHCAT :RAHCAT
woke up this morning and after loving on tom for like a second i ran to the food bowls laid out last night...
Crunchies----gone
Rabbit------gone
Baby food-----still untouched
Tuna-------half eaten
Swear to god first thought was....did a rodent get in here and eat all this????
Tom's +11 100
his pmps last night (+26, i got home late) 140 (which i was actually HAPPY to see :-D and he got .2u

Sorry if my behavior yesterday got a little weird. I finally stopped staring at Tom and being rude to you guys about 2ish and took the trolley into town. Went to the main beach and checked to see if they found the drivers license I lost there last week was there and they found it but it was now in police CUSTODY? and i have to wait until Tuesday for it to be RELEASED :shock: what am I a terrorist, what is this a freakin military state? What happened to 'oh yeah, we have your license, sure let me get it for you?
Well not only did I mosey around the beach for an hour or so but I also went to the vet (right across from the police) and asked for a sit down with Dr. Levin. I had never worked with him before. I told him about Tom....he HUGGED me. I never get that! We talked about what it would be like when I put him to sleep. And what I would need to do to get him bupe, or an appetite stimulant. Bring him in of course. I cannot PAY for an office visit, describe the symptoms, bring my diabetes notes, take a video of Tom and get what I need. Tom has to man up and come in, peeing on himself and all.
The vet talked more than he listened of course, and he did NOT believe I was managing tom's diabetes on .2u He said it was likely tom did not need insulin as .2u is not a dose. ohmygod_smile
ummmmm, I do have the complete note taking of numbers to prove it. But I did not say that.
I have learned not to disagree too much with Vets. I am overprotective enuf of tom as it is when I am in the office, I am sure I am trouble enuf. He hugged me again as I left.
That was more than I ever get when I have Tom with me. Nobody has patience for me when Tom is actually with me at the vet. He clings to me and I to him.
So, on that note,
My apologies dear friends,
and thank you again for the well wishes.
Lori
(lets not get tom messed up in this)
 
Glad things are looking better! And you've gotten a little breather. The Animal welfare league said that the foster, Mr. Peabody, need l-lysine every day. So after day one, when I saw he was "willing" to do clean-up for all the kitties, I decided I'd put it in with all the food I usually mix a can of ff with a bigger can of Friskies, so now everyone gets it. I actually think it's improved my kitties appetite and Vinney is sneezing less - he has always been King of Snot rockets. If you'd like to give it a try, I'll mail you some.
 

Attachments

Hi Lori-

I'm glad you talked to a vet with no Tom. What a great idea.
I DO beg to differ with him regarding .2 not being a dose of insulin. Hah! Let him come to this board and say that....he'll get killed. I gave that dose too and smaller ones. In fact for a while I think I may have been shooting vapors of Lantus. :lol:
Vets aren't as detailed about this stuff as the caregivers IMO.
And I do the stuff you do with the mixtures of foods. That made me chuckle because I know the frustration. How nice that you came out in the AM to find most of it GONE!
 
Lori,
Just found this post.
Of course, i have nothing to offer but love and support.
I send the well-est wishes I can that Tom will get better. Just keep thinking postitive, and never under estimate the power of prayer.
Many ((hugs)).

Callie Mae said to tell Tom
Meew, mew, meow. Meow meeowwwwa, mew.

Guess he'll know what that means.
cat_pet_icon
 
Glad Tom Tom is eating better.
You just have to take one day at a time and enjoy the days when they are eating and feeling good and deal with bad days when they happen.
I will send reiki to Tom and keep him in my thoughts and prayers.
Angela
 
Dearest Lori -- sorry, Tom Tom, mom talk,

I haven't been on The Board much lately due to Mom issues and other personal stuff. But -- and, yes, sometimes Buts are good -- I don't think anyone has any problem with a worried FD cat parent. So, just push that notion right out of your brain, okay?

We all worry. Some days/nights more than others. It's because we love and dance with sugar cats. It's because we give insulin, no matter the dose. It's because they rely on us to at least pretend we know what we're doing...

Sometimes, I honestly wonder if Nikki is truly glad she adopted me. Then other days, when she does her 3-floor poop speed dance, and whizzes by me smiling? I know she's happy!

Rock bottom, Lori, is we love our precious furries. We do the very best we can each and every day/night. I think, on some level, they understand that. Giz, who I was simultaneously smitten and cursed with since 8 weeks of tiny age, completely understood the whole sugar dance when she was diagnosed at 14. Nikki arrived in my heart extra-sweet at maybe age 8. I'll never know what happened to her in the previous maybe 8 years.

Tom walked a few blocks to personally pick you. Nikki was transported a few states to pick me.

For whatever reason, they chose us...

I'd like to think that in their own quirky way, they chose well...

Holding you both close in my heart and prayers. (Sometimes they just go nuts because it's summer and they want A/C...)

Much love and countless hopeful, healing, hungry hugs for you and Tom Tom,
Deb and Nikki -- and, Giz, who figured out how to reach the thermostat...
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top