How old is Bella? How long have you had her?

Bobby came to live with me at age 8 months. I had him about 3 months and he went crazy with itching to bloody sores. I did a thread about it, here:

http://petoftheday.com/talk/showthre...ht=Bobby+itchy

Page 2, post 18 has photos of some of it.

He wore an e collar for 4.5 months while we figured out what was causing the problem. Meantime we tried Benadryl, Cepha drops and several other things to try and stop the itch. None successful.

Bobby has food allergies. He is one a presciption food, Royal Canin Greens Peas and Venison and he is FINE.

I did take him to a vet dermatologist in the end. She explained that they have NO tests for food allergies. It is all trial and error, with YOU reading lables and eliminating items. The most common cat food allergies are wheat, grains, fish. Bobby seems also allergic to beef, chicken and lamb!

The dermatologist DOES have a test kit with 45 or so things for environmental allergies. It is expensive to run the test, and food allergies are more common.

At the start, I asked how old and how long you'd had her. Bobby did NOT show any of this during the 8 months he was living in the feral cat colony and being fed by the colony caretaker. Plus it took several months for it to show up once he came indoors and started living with me! No idea why.

I must have tried 8 or 9 foods before hitting on the 'right' one. It was a tough time; I can't imagine being itchy and not being allowed to scratch. But we couldn't let Bobby scratch as he would lick, scratch, etc to a sore that was bleeding. What a terrible time for him; I was frantic to find something that worked!

Oh, and the vet will say you need to test a food for 8 weeks. I didn't feel I had that long to try all those foods, so I only tried them 10 to 14 days. When I hit on the right one, I saw improvement on day 4!

Best wishes!