I went through IV therapy with an older cat, but he just wasn't responding well. I stayed with him until he fell asleep at the vets. Thank goodness for other cats. Great photos. Take care.


You look experienced, so do you have any suggestions on how to bring two older adult cats into my house with my introverted 7 year old who is scared of most things?

we're starting this now, and not when she's really having problems.

As for your 7-year-old, never had to try and do that...can you bring one in at a time, maybe one is a quieter cat...I also wonder if keeping that cat confined to a room or two at first might help...that way your seven-year-old would have to go and see it, instead of it being able to approach the child...is he/she at all curious? Good luck.

And also my other two old ladies..but now that he's 2 and has 4 little kittens running around, he treats India really nicely.

Keep us posted on the progress,

but I see you appear to have plastic food bowls for them. Could you pick up some cheap china dishes at a thrift shop and use those instead? I've read that plastic bowls could leach chemicals into food and water.

Ever since I lost a 7-year-old dog to a fast-growing throat cancer, I've been paranoid about keeping chemicals away from my critters. No lawn or garden chemicals ever. I give our 2 cats and 2 dogs water filtered through a Brita pitcher, and feed and water them out of china bowls.

Good luck with your kitty!

They just get their morning and evening wet treats in them. I think I lucked out. Your poor doggie...that sounds like a really bad type of cancer.

I always enjoy reading posts where someone, such as yourself, talk about taking in a animal and give it a very good home.

And meowing about me not getting it to her quick enough!

Again, thank you so much for caring.

So sad!

I hope she does okay with treatment. I've told you before, but you're a good soul (even if you are a Red Sox and Irish fan).

AMerica's Team!!!

One lived to 20, four years after starting fluids, the other to 22.

ONly a year each for the other two...hopefully India will get another good year!

for kidney disease. I got one to cooperate by giving her treats while the fluids were going in. She figured it out and would stop eating so I would panic and give her more.

You had a smart kittie!

her name was Tyler. I only had her maybe a year and half. This person I adopted her from had rescued Tyler as a kitten from the Long Island Expressway service road. She had Tyler 12 years and then met the love of her life who was allergic. I got an email from my supervisor about Tyler and wasn't interested at all (I had 2 other cats) but kept going back to look at the photos. Then I felt bad for this cat who had no idea she was about to become homeless. Long story short Tyler did well on the sub-q fluids until she developed congestive heart failure. The problem was the treatment for kidney disease is give fluids and for heart disease, reduce fluids (e.g., with Lasix). She did ok for about 2-3 months after this diagnosis then I had to have her PTS.
P.S. - re: "sub-q" - short for subcutaneous. I got that abbreviation somewhere else, maybe a website or the vet -Which reminds me, there is a website you may find helpful: http://www.felinecrf.org/

This was after he kicked pneumothorax. He made it past his twentieth birthday.

Best wishes for your pal.

CRF sucks. Azodyl might buy her some more time, and will probably make her feel better, at least for a while. You might be able to get it from your vet, but EntirelyPets.com and other online sources sell it, as well. I think you can even get it via Amazon.com. It bought my boy an extra year.

http://www.vetoquinolusa.com/CoreProducts/RenalUrologySupport/RenalUrologySupport.html

She might not let me give them to her...I have given her clavamox now and again because she gets urinary infections, and the only way she'll take it is if I crush it into her food...she tries to eat around, but eventually eats it all. When I tried the liquid via dropper, she fought like crazy!

It comes in a gelatin capsule, which can be pulled apart.

I find that a "pill gun" helps get pills down. Immobilizing them with a towel, or by pinning them between you and the arm of the sofa works with some kitties, too.

But I guess maybe they mean it's best that it isn't...I'll see how she does with the fluids right now...thing is, she also has ear mites, which you would think she'd gotten from the feral kittens I adopted, but none of them have it...I told the vet she must have gotten it from me!

Our CRF kitty is almost 22 and is almost 2 years into her diagnosis. We did sub-q fluids for most of the first year. When she started resisting, then refusing fluids, we figured that her biting/scratching/struggling was her way of saying she was ready to be done. So we decided to go on a hospice model of care for her, given that she was then 21.

That was most of a year ago. Since then, her numbers have remained stable, her appetite is good, and she's maintained both her weight and her mental acuity. Her sole treatment is 1 capsule of dasequin split between her 3 meals a day and abundant water, both in bowls and mixed into her food. She's our Timex.

It's not advised to take a cat off of fluids unless you're ready to say goodbye, so this is absolutely not a (lack of) treatment to be considered lightly. CRF is manageable, and it's pretty common in geriatric cats. While old age is not a disease, it is the natural consequence of aging. Every day you get is a bonus day. And listen to her -- she'll tell you what she needs. If fluids make her feel better, she'll take them very well and come to want them. If they don't, she'll tell you.

One other thing -- dry food is really hard on CRF cats. If you can possibly get her to take most of her calories through canned food, you'll both be better off. It does not have to be the vet prescribed kidney diet. A lot of cats don't consider that stuff to even be food. The best diet is whatever your cat will eat. (Ours has tried everything -- as far as she's concerned, the only actual foods in the world are the mammal-based Fancy Feasts, rotisserie chicken breast, and bacon. So that's what she eats.)

Hopefully she will tolerate the fluids. She already gets most of her calories from wet, because she hadn't been taken well care of by whoever left her behind, and she has on a few teeth left, so she has been on wet since I got her...she will crunch a few day now and then, but basically she gets wet morning and night, and then loudly demands it more frequently on the weekends!

Good luck with her!

But she's forgiven me!

I believe we are kindred spirits. But because I could not say no and accumulated too many cats (all healthy), I have no capacity to take in special needs cats. Thank you, thank you for doing so.

I gave her the IV this weekend...she screamed bloody murder and the other cats, especially Ashley came rushing to see what was wrong. She was mad but it really helped because she's very hydrated now.

It hurts.

My advice is don't let the sweet kitty go on too long with discomfort. It's a kind thing to end suffering.

So its not too bad...both Melanie and Scarlet went last year...had the same thing...India fought like crazy this weekend when I gave her the IV...you'd think I was trying to kill her!