It is so so hard to see that happening. It is so so painful to know you have to make the decision of when their quality of life is no longer there.
The only thought I have ever found that helps even a tiny bit is that if they didn’t have you, and were in the wild, their time would have been much much shorter.
When the bad days outnumber the good days, do what is right by them.
RichVR
3200
Thanks for the kind words, folks. It really helps.
Matilda loves bacon fingers.
Frodo reclines, surveying the neighborhood.
So guys, something is going on with our 13 year old boy, Harry. We just had him at the vet and he apparently has early onset kidney disease and is a bit dehydrated. We’ve dealt with kidney kitties before, but he doesn’t seem interested in water. I’ve gotten him to eat some wet food, but he just isn’t interested in drinking. He also seems…a bit more lethargic than he’s been. He’ll eat if I feed him directly, so I think it might be a mental thing (he’s not been the same since our last cat died last year).
We’re taking him in Monday to get his urine checked, but until then we wanna try to hydrate him. Might any of y’all have had a problem like this and, if so, might possibly have any potential solutions?
Thanks so much.
You can buy pouches of soup for cats (or make your own?). High water content obviously and it might be tasty enough to make him ‘interested’.
Same thing happened last year to my cat. He would not eat food, but did eagerly drink some lactose free skim milk when I proffered it. (Of course he had diarrhea afterward…)
I did not know about the soups. Not sure if it would have just been delaying the inevitable though.
Gendal
3207
Subcutaneous fluid for cats. Not fun. I managed to handle two Persians by myself for a short period of time. Two people is much easier.
Yeah I’m hoping we don’t have to do that just yet. I found some broth at Petco we might try.
We did sub-cu water with one cat for three years. Definitely doable, honestly it isn’t even difficult.
That’s good to know. Thank you!
RichVR
3211
I’m hoping that this fits here. My dogs have been eating soft canned food for a while. Lately they have teeth issues. According to the vet they need to eat hard food. Kibble basically. But they will not eat it. They will just ignore it.
So I started to do some research. First I saw this.
Then I found this.
The first time I used it with hard food they both sucked it up. Lots of crunching. Food finished. Licking of bowl.
I’m sold. Great stuff. Recommended highly.
The only thing I would add is that if your cat or dog eats primarily dry food, they will need more water. The broth may be enough, but make sure to keep water available for them.
RichVR
3213
Of course. Always a full bowl available.
Gendal
3214
This is highly dependent on the cats. One of ours wasn’t much of a problem but the other took quite awhile to adjust to staying still while being poked with a needle. Needles and anxious cats are not a fun combination.
We would wrap her up in a towel first. Then expose just her back and needle in near the backbone. You can gently squeeze the water bottle to speed it up a bit. And this was a relatively aggressive cat.
Gendal
3216
The towel is an interesting idea, as is the water bottle?! We used an special saline IV bag from the vet.
Never thought of squeezing it! My first thought would be air bubbles, but it’s not like it’s intravenous. I can’t imagine air bubbles under the skin is going to do anything negative.
This morning we put a tiny bit of cream in some water and he lapped it right up. We’ll be doing this until his vet visit tomorrow afternoon so we can keep him as hydrated as possible. This is definitely better than the baby syringe method we used last night, which we all hated and took forever.
By “water bottle” I meant the saline bag. Sorry to confuse.
We got the bags, tubing and needles at the vet, by prescription.
But you can squeeze the bag while holding it above the pet to increase the flow speed a bit. You don’t want it too fast, but just letting gravity do the work can be really slow. There shouldn’t be any danger of air bubbles.
I can’t say I have looked, but I would get there would be video of it on You Tube.
I cant speak for pets but air bubble taken intravenously, is a Hollywood myth. I am on chemo and get the intravenous treatment often. I actually had a fairly detailed discussion with my doctor about that. He said that you would need to actually pump air into the line for it to have any kind of ill effect. A few air bubbles wont hurt you at all.
