? Eating behavior changed and skin problem

Evey

Member Since 2024
Evey's eating behavior has changed since last December. In the past, she used to eat her meals on time (25g/meal at shot time, +2, +3.5 and +5) and finished everything up immediately. Since last December, she hasn't been finishing up all her food when we fed her and sometimes she skipped her +2 and/or +3.5 meal. But she would eat them up later. So about a month ago I change the feeding schedule to 30-35g/meal at shot time, +2.5 and +5. Recently, her eating behavior changed again. These are what I noticed:

1. She often won’t come out for her first meal in the morning without being gently prodded to go from the bedroom to the kitchen. Sometimes I put the food about a meter or two away from her, she wouldn't eat. Like she couldn't see it or smell it. I wonder if her eye sights or her sense of smell is bad. But when she wants food, she knows where the food is and her nose worked hard when I was cooking salmon (but not for her, for me).

2. When the +2 and +3.5 meals are provided at the auto-feeder when no one is home before lunch, she often won’t eat the +2 meal and has started to eat just part of the +3 meal. Sometimes she skipped both entirely. Usually she eats only 8-10g of the 60g food in the auto-feeder. Once in a while, she ate about 40-50g of the food. However, when someone comes home to give her food during lunch time, she will usually eat most of the leftover from the morning after it's been heated it up . This is usually around nine hours after her first meal in the morning.

3. If someone is home to feed her in the morning, she usually won’t come out of the bedroom to get her second and third meals on time. But if the food is brought to her directly, she will eat most of it on time. I wonder not eating on time would be a issue for her BG.

4. Although not common, there have been some times where she will go and hide underneath the bed for an hour or so in the morning before returning to the top.

Since mid-February, she started to have lots of dead skin around her neck and head areas and there are so much of it that her dead skin shreds all over the bed and the couch. And her skin gets dark like in this picture.
20260321_120644.jpg 20260321_120711.jpg

She is diabetic with Cushing syndrome and proteinuria and has been taking Trilostane (5mg, twice a day), insulin (1U, twice a day) and Telmisartan (5, once a day). She started taking Trilostane in July last year and her eating behavior has been changing slowly since then. I don't know if the Trilostane is related to her change of eating behavior. Sometimes I wonder if she is back to her pre-diabetic eating habit (free-feeding). It just seems she only eats when she is hungry. But sometimes taking her that long to finish her meal makes me worried because I'm afraid she might get low blood sugar. I keep giving her a safe dosage instead of following TR.

She also sleeps a lot. I don't know if she sleeps a lot because she is sick or she is just too old. Should I be worried about this change of eating behavior? Is there anything wrong with her? Besides, does anyone know what happened to her skin and is there anything I can do about it?

Thank you so much!
 
Welcome to FDMB
There’s a lot going on, but I am sure there’s an answer, cats hide illnesses very well, My other Cat Coco, also had a similar rash underneath her chin, They called it acne, I personally cured it by dabbing chamomile with a cotton 3-4 times a day, but she never stopped eating, I am goin to tag a member that has an incredible feline medical experience, she will probably be able to know what’s t going on. Hope your baby gets better😉
@Sienne and Gabby (GA)
 
Welcome to FDMB
There’s a lot going on, but I am sure there’s an answer, cats hide illnesses very well, My other Cat Coco, also had a similar rash underneath her chin, They called it acne, I personally cured it by dabbing chamomile with a cotton 3-4 times a day, but she never stopped eating, I am goin to tag a member that has an incredible feline medical experience, she will probably be able to know what’s t going on. Hope your baby gets better😉
@Sienne and Gabby (GA)

Thank you Maria! Yes, cats hide illnesses too well . especially when she is at such old age, it's really hard to tell if she is sick or just old. The black skin is all over her body, especially her belly. when Coco had a rash, what symptoms did she have?
 
Thank you Maria! Yes, cats hide illnesses too well . especially when she is at such old age, it's really hard to tell if she is sick or just old. The black skin is all over her body, especially her belly. when Coco had a rash, what symptoms did she have?
@Sienne and Gabby (GA)
Could you give some light on the symptoms tgis kitty is having?
 
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Thank you Maria! Yes, cats hide illnesses too well . especially when she is at such old age, it's really hard to tell if she is sick or just old. The black skin is all over her body, especially her belly. when Coco had a rash, what symptoms did she have?
Actually I found it by coincidence, I always rub her chin when she’s y lying on her bed, and I noticed it felt funny I looked at it and it looked like she had been scratching it had like little scab pimple like and hard so I boiled the tea bag of chamomile and put it in the fridge when it got cold I just would wet tge fusion on her chin 3-4 time a day on a week it was gone. Could it be soñé food allergy?
 
Actually I found it by coincidence, I always rub her chin when she’s y lying on her bed, and I noticed it felt funny I looked at it and it looked like she had been scratching it had like little scab pimple like and hard so I boiled the tea bag of chamomile and put it in the fridge when it got cold I just would wet tge fusion on her chin 3-4 time a day on a week it was gone. Could it be soñé food allergy?
I never thought about food allergy. I did add a new brand of wet food into her diet. I will change it back to her normal food and see if her skin changes.
 
good, that may be the issue, keep checking the affected area once you switch that new food to see if you begin to see an improvement, good luck, the Chamomile ointments(fusion) won't hurt either, is cool on the skin and avoids the scratching too, and is safe
 
A couple of thoughts...

Please always get a pre-shot test. At this point, there's no way to know if your kitty is in safe numbers when you're giving insulin. In addition, Lantus dosing is based on how low the dose brings the numbers. There's no way to know whether Evey is on the correct dose of insulin. We encourage members to get a minimum of 4 tests per day -- the two pre-shot tests and at least one other test during both the AM and PM cycles.

When a cat is first diagnosed, the cat is often starving all of the time. As numbers improve, a cat may not be as hungry. Is your cat losing weight? That is also a good way to know if there's an issue with how much or how little your cat is eating.

Is your cat drinking enough? More water in your cat's diet may help with the dry skin.

Cushings also effects the skin. Dry skin is very common. You may want to discuss this with your vet. I don't know if anything topical will help but it's something to ask about.
 
A couple of thoughts...

Please always get a pre-shot test. At this point, there's no way to know if your kitty is in safe numbers when you're giving insulin. In addition, Lantus dosing is based on how low the dose brings the numbers. There's no way to know whether Evey is on the correct dose of insulin. We encourage members to get a minimum of 4 tests per day -- the two pre-shot tests and at least one other test during both the AM and PM cycles.

When a cat is first diagnosed, the cat is often starving all of the time. As numbers improve, a cat may not be as hungry. Is your cat losing weight? That is also a good way to know if there's an issue with how much or how little your cat is eating.

Is your cat drinking enough? More water in your cat's diet may help with the dry skin.

Cushings also effects the skin. Dry skin is very common. You may want to discuss this with your vet. I don't know if anything topical will help but it's something to ask about.

I don't test her on a daily basis anymore because of her fragile skin. Her skin was torn when I was holding her to test her blood sugar and she tried to get away. It was a nightmare and it took more than a month for her skin to heal. I check her BG once in a while. Pre-shot numbers have been under 162 and nadir numbers have been 54-90ish (green and blue). I know this is not the best to monitor her sugar. But I'm really afraid her skin will be torn again especially when her skin looks like this now.

She lost a little bit weight, like 0.2kg. That should be normal?

She drinks about 65-100g of water everyday. I think she has been drinking enough.
 
good, that may be the issue, keep checking the affected area once you switch that new food to see if you begin to see an improvement, good luck, the Chamomile ointments(fusion) won't hurt either, is cool on the skin and avoids the scratching too, and is safe

She doesn't scratch the black skin area. It seems that area doesn't bother her. I will try the chamomile and see if it helps. Thank you Maria~
 
She doesn't scratch the black skin area. It seems that area doesn't bother her. I will try the chamomile and see if it helps. Thank you Maria~
Good let me know! You’ll be surprised, make sure you keep it in the cold preferably in a covered jar , dab it every time you remember, good luck!
 
Checking in, how’s the rash?
I changed her food back to the old one. Her skin hasn't changed. But she eats her food more often now. She hides underneath the bed a lot these days. And she bit me while I was trying to test her blood sugar yesterday and she drew blood. She has never bit me before! Tit for tat i guess.
 
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