Goodish news for Jackie Cat

I'm glad for Jackie and you. Maybe you should get one of those flea combs if
you don't already have it. What about brewer's yeast in her food? I always
heard that deterred fleas but maybe it's an old wives' tale.

Candace
(take the litter out before replying by e-mail)

See my cats:
http://photos.yahoo.com/maccandace

"One does not meet oneself until one catches the reflection from an eye other
than human." (Loren Eisely)

I'm glad for Jackie and you. Maybe you should get one of those flea combs if
you don't already have it. What about brewer's yeast in her food? I always
heard that deterred fleas but maybe it's an old wives' tale.

Candace
(take the litter out before replying by e-mail)

See my cats:
http://photos.yahoo.com/maccandace

"One does not meet oneself until one catches the reflection from an eye other
than human." (Loren Eisely)

I'm glad for Jackie and you. Maybe you should get one of those flea combs if
you don't already have it. What about brewer's yeast in her food? I always
heard that deterred fleas but maybe it's an old wives' tale.

Candace
(take the litter out before replying by e-mail)

See my cats:
http://photos.yahoo.com/maccandace

"One does not meet oneself until one catches the reflection from an eye other
than human." (Loren Eisely)

On 16 Jun 2004 04:00:44 GMT, itter (MacCandace)
wrote:

I'm glad for Jackie and you. Maybe you should get one of those flea combs if
you don't already have it. What about brewer's yeast in her food? I always
heard that deterred fleas but maybe it's an old wives' tale.


I don't think I can take the chance. If she can't take the Frontline
now, getting her a flea bath isn't even a possibility.

My cats (all three, including Jackie) are officially on strike. They
are snubbing their food. Yes, even Jackie looks at me like "you think
even I'm going to eat this?". She then does, but the others are
holding out.

Wellness, Nutro, Triumph, Maxcat. We won't eat that stuff. We WANT
9LIVES!


They always have the dry stuff.

On 16 Jun 2004 04:00:44 GMT, itter (MacCandace)
wrote:

I'm glad for Jackie and you. Maybe you should get one of those flea combs if
you don't already have it. What about brewer's yeast in her food? I always
heard that deterred fleas but maybe it's an old wives' tale.


I don't think I can take the chance. If she can't take the Frontline
now, getting her a flea bath isn't even a possibility.

My cats (all three, including Jackie) are officially on strike. They
are snubbing their food. Yes, even Jackie looks at me like "you think
even I'm going to eat this?". She then does, but the others are
holding out.

Wellness, Nutro, Triumph, Maxcat. We won't eat that stuff. We WANT
9LIVES!


They always have the dry stuff.

On 16 Jun 2004 04:00:44 GMT, itter (MacCandace)
wrote:

I'm glad for Jackie and you. Maybe you should get one of those flea combs if
you don't already have it. What about brewer's yeast in her food? I always
heard that deterred fleas but maybe it's an old wives' tale.


I don't think I can take the chance. If she can't take the Frontline
now, getting her a flea bath isn't even a possibility.

My cats (all three, including Jackie) are officially on strike. They
are snubbing their food. Yes, even Jackie looks at me like "you think
even I'm going to eat this?". She then does, but the others are
holding out.

Wellness, Nutro, Triumph, Maxcat. We won't eat that stuff. We WANT
9LIVES!


They always have the dry stuff.

dgk wrote in message . ..
Jackie is the 5 pound 12 year old (or more) cat that I adopted last
month. After more than three weeks on antibiotics she has gained 7/10
of a pound. The vet was very pleased and thinks that there is no need
to try to get more blood out of her for testing. His thinking is that
if she had any of the prime suspects (thyroid, diabetes, cancer) she
wasn't going to gain any weight, much less almost a pound, without
treatment.

Jackie does have bad gums and they will be prone to infection, and it
is likely the infection that caused her to be so light in the first
place. She had serious mouth ulcers when I got her and that is why she
went on antibiotics in the first place.

Unfortunately our choices on that aren't so good. Cleaning the teeth
and gums would be great but that involves putting her under and he
will not do that at this point. So I just have to make sure she keeps
eating like a little horse and bring her in if not.

I can't tell from your post whether your vet is saying she just needs
to gain some weight before she can get a dental or whether he is
saying she will always be at too high a risk for anesthesia because of
her age. If it's the latter, I would suggest getting a second opinion
from a vet that handles a lot of older cats. I just had a dental done
on my 12 YO cat, but he is a Cat Of Substance (:-)) without any
serious medical problems. They can put older cats under now for a
dental with much less risk than used to be the case using Isoflourene.



She also can't go on Frontline or such, which is bad because she won't
be able to go outside in the back with the two boys (Espy and Nipsy).
It is apparently a VERY bad flea season. She did go out back for the
last couple of days and it will tough to stop her now but I have to.
He says to bring her back in two or three months and if she is up to
seven pounds he will ok Frontline.

The vet says that she walks funny because she has very little muscle
mass, mostly because she is old and that sort of thing happens.

This characterization gives me a little pause because while nowadays a
12 YO cat is considered a senior cat, cats are living healthy lives
for a lot longer than they used to and AFAIK it's not usually until
they get to be something like 15+ before they start losing significant
amounts of muscle mass due to age as long as they are otherwise
healthy.


All in all, about the best that could be hoped for.

It's such a nice thing that you took her in. It sounds like she
doesn't have any health problems that won't clear up and I'll bet
she'll look a lot different after being pampered for a few months.

dgk wrote in message . ..
Jackie is the 5 pound 12 year old (or more) cat that I adopted last
month. After more than three weeks on antibiotics she has gained 7/10
of a pound. The vet was very pleased and thinks that there is no need
to try to get more blood out of her for testing. His thinking is that
if she had any of the prime suspects (thyroid, diabetes, cancer) she
wasn't going to gain any weight, much less almost a pound, without
treatment.

Jackie does have bad gums and they will be prone to infection, and it
is likely the infection that caused her to be so light in the first
place. She had serious mouth ulcers when I got her and that is why she
went on antibiotics in the first place.

Unfortunately our choices on that aren't so good. Cleaning the teeth
and gums would be great but that involves putting her under and he
will not do that at this point. So I just have to make sure she keeps
eating like a little horse and bring her in if not.

I can't tell from your post whether your vet is saying she just needs
to gain some weight before she can get a dental or whether he is
saying she will always be at too high a risk for anesthesia because of
her age. If it's the latter, I would suggest getting a second opinion
from a vet that handles a lot of older cats. I just had a dental done
on my 12 YO cat, but he is a Cat Of Substance (:-)) without any
serious medical problems. They can put older cats under now for a
dental with much less risk than used to be the case using Isoflourene.



She also can't go on Frontline or such, which is bad because she won't
be able to go outside in the back with the two boys (Espy and Nipsy).
It is apparently a VERY bad flea season. She did go out back for the
last couple of days and it will tough to stop her now but I have to.
He says to bring her back in two or three months and if she is up to
seven pounds he will ok Frontline.

The vet says that she walks funny because she has very little muscle
mass, mostly because she is old and that sort of thing happens.

This characterization gives me a little pause because while nowadays a
12 YO cat is considered a senior cat, cats are living healthy lives
for a lot longer than they used to and AFAIK it's not usually until
they get to be something like 15+ before they start losing significant
amounts of muscle mass due to age as long as they are otherwise
healthy.


All in all, about the best that could be hoped for.

It's such a nice thing that you took her in. It sounds like she
doesn't have any health problems that won't clear up and I'll bet
she'll look a lot different after being pampered for a few months.

dgk wrote in message . ..
Jackie is the 5 pound 12 year old (or more) cat that I adopted last
month. After more than three weeks on antibiotics she has gained 7/10
of a pound. The vet was very pleased and thinks that there is no need
to try to get more blood out of her for testing. His thinking is that
if she had any of the prime suspects (thyroid, diabetes, cancer) she
wasn't going to gain any weight, much less almost a pound, without
treatment.

Jackie does have bad gums and they will be prone to infection, and it
is likely the infection that caused her to be so light in the first
place. She had serious mouth ulcers when I got her and that is why she
went on antibiotics in the first place.

Unfortunately our choices on that aren't so good. Cleaning the teeth
and gums would be great but that involves putting her under and he
will not do that at this point. So I just have to make sure she keeps
eating like a little horse and bring her in if not.

I can't tell from your post whether your vet is saying she just needs
to gain some weight before she can get a dental or whether he is
saying she will always be at too high a risk for anesthesia because of
her age. If it's the latter, I would suggest getting a second opinion
from a vet that handles a lot of older cats. I just had a dental done
on my 12 YO cat, but he is a Cat Of Substance (:-)) without any
serious medical problems. They can put older cats under now for a
dental with much less risk than used to be the case using Isoflourene.



She also can't go on Frontline or such, which is bad because she won't
be able to go outside in the back with the two boys (Espy and Nipsy).
It is apparently a VERY bad flea season. She did go out back for the
last couple of days and it will tough to stop her now but I have to.
He says to bring her back in two or three months and if she is up to
seven pounds he will ok Frontline.

The vet says that she walks funny because she has very little muscle
mass, mostly because she is old and that sort of thing happens.

This characterization gives me a little pause because while nowadays a
12 YO cat is considered a senior cat, cats are living healthy lives
for a lot longer than they used to and AFAIK it's not usually until
they get to be something like 15+ before they start losing significant
amounts of muscle mass due to age as long as they are otherwise
healthy.


All in all, about the best that could be hoped for.

It's such a nice thing that you took her in. It sounds like she
doesn't have any health problems that won't clear up and I'll bet
she'll look a lot different after being pampered for a few months.

On 16 Jun 2004 12:15:46 -0700,
(CajunPrincess) wrote:

..
I can't tell from your post whether your vet is saying she just needs
to gain some weight before she can get a dental or whether he is
saying she will always be at too high a risk for anesthesia because of
her age. If it's the latter, I would suggest getting a second opinion
from a vet that handles a lot of older cats. I just had a dental done
on my 12 YO cat, but he is a Cat Of Substance (:-)) without any
serious medical problems. They can put older cats under now for a
dental with much less risk than used to be the case using Isoflourene.


I'm not really clear on that either. I think perhaps we can get to a
point where it might be worth doing, but she is going to have to
improve much. I was thinking that I could take her to the specialty
vet if I really wanted to have this done, but for now I will just keep
an eye out and make sure that she is still gaining weight.


The vet says that she walks funny because she has very little muscle
mass, mostly because she is old and that sort of thing happens.

This characterization gives me a little pause because while nowadays a
12 YO cat is considered a senior cat, cats are living healthy lives
for a lot longer than they used to and AFAIK it's not usually until
they get to be something like 15+ before they start losing significant
amounts of muscle mass due to age as long as they are otherwise
healthy.


Yes, but she really wasn't a very healthy cat, to say the least, and
we don't know her actual age. It isn't surprising that she would be
short muscle mass when her total body weight was five pounds. I was
more concerned that she might have arthritis or some kind of bone
damage. She does walk funny, with the big end sort of swaying, and she
seems a bit unstable somehow.

Something else to keep an eye on.