Happy New Year from Mr. Flame!

He is doing so good now! No signs of kidney failure, etc. No more mats, no more crying, no more nothing! I'm so very proud of my new old fella (for those not familiar with Mr. Flame, he is 10 years old and was very sick last year and things weren't looking so hot for him). With the help of a fantastic veterinarian, he is all fixed up now and feeling grrrrreat!! :D

He rules the house, doesn't he...just that royal expression he's got...



Ummm...what was going on with him? I missed it...:blush:

I have an older cat that rules the house (she is 17 now).

He was very sick and had cancerous lesions on his head/face which are no longer visible as they were surgically removed. He also had an extensive teeth cleaning job done on him (which may have been much of the problem I think). He also had some sort of an infection and they could not pin it down. The blood tests came back abnormal and I was told he had the beginnings of kidney disease.

However, I modified his diet and with lots of care, he has recovered to this! It is truly amazing as he was all matted up (his coat) and looked just awful. :(

He feels very good now and has his happy meow back again and he is no longer hiding out all of the time.

I was very worried that he might not recover as if was rather iffy it seemed to me.

It seems good to post a positive thing here on this forum - too many sad stories! This is a happy story and we sure need more happy stories everywhere I'm sure you'd agree!

He is back patrolling the yard again (his job) and doing just great and even eating up that new food without hesitation. :)

Thanks for your comment and yes, he is a beautiful boy, all 17 lbs. of him (he is a HUGE cat that stands almost 2-1/2 feet high). We had to trap him to get him to the vet which was not an easy task to say the least ... :scared: :rofl:

and looks so mellow in that picture. So glad to hear he is doing well and back on the job. Yes, it is nice to read good, happy news! Thanks for posting his picture and his recovery story.

Here's to many more years of cattitude for you both to share! And he's DEFINITELY got some cattitude goin' on!!! What a face!

really handsome cat!!! What a face!!!!

I hope he doesn't retire too soon. He's in his late 70s now. When I took Mr. Flame in, my vet picked him up and sat down on the bench in his office with Mr. Flame alongside him. Mr. Flame just sat there and allowed this while being examined! :wow:

After the exam was over the vet said to me, "Now this is what you call a BIG CAT!". I told him that yes, he is solid muscle and I that I had lots of hope for him as I believe he is very strong. Luckily I was right.

During his daily patrol he likes to climb up on the fence outside and spy around. He always has this shocked look on his face which makes the neighbors laugh.

He can be a real menace when he wants to be (however he is not a hunter nor a fighter luckily) but now that he is feeling so much better he is behaving himself. :)

because I had a cat who died of kidney disease 3 years ago (my avatar, Tiny). He was only 16, which isn't that old for a cat.

My vet gave me several different samples of food both canned food and dry food. Mr. Flame normally eats just dry food.

He did not like the one made by Purina (and Old Kitty (my other cat who is 17) did not like it either). So, I tried out the Hills K/D dry food on all cats. My vet recommended feeding this type of food to all of my cats (one is a bit overweight).

What I've been doing is mixing the Hills K/D dry food with Life's Abundance which has a phosphorus level of .9. The Hills is at .4. You average these two out and you come up with a phosphorus level of about .6. This mixture seems to be going over pretty good and it isn't too expensive as there is another vet nearby that gives out a discount to customers. However, I personally do not like this other vet (he recommended basically giving up on my old kitty :( ).

He also recommended that I not feed him too much protein as he said the kidneys have to work twice as hard on a high protein diet. I didn't know what to think but my vet has 3 cats and one dog himself and I know he wouldn't steer me wrong.

He told me that most of the older cats he sees are dying of kidney disease and he blames it on the food they eat.

He also recommended various ideas re: canned food. None of these ideas worked as my cats simply don't like canned cat food.

As you can see, Mr. Flame is doing really good now and luckily those lesions from the cancer on his head are barely visible.

This same vet has been Old Kitty's vet since I got her and he has done a good job keeping her going as well (she also has the skin cancer problem as she is a white cat).

I have water all around the house and in the backyard. All of my cats drink a lot of water and the water they get indoors is all filtered with a Multi-Pure water filtering system.

I am sorry to hear about your cat. I think that is a good age for a cat to live personally. The oldest one I had lived to be just over 17 so Old Kitty is just about the same age now but shows no signs of dying soon and has no signs of kidney failure/kidney disease luckily.

I hope this helps. :)