Still having diarrhea

[Tubby & Peanut's Mom]

Diarrhea can be very difficult to get rid of - trust me. I've been fighting CJ's diarrhea since we got him in January, and we're finally now starting to get answers.

Yes, I've heard rice and pumpin is good, also yogurt. What I've been told is that once the "natural flora" of bacteria in the intestines is off balance, it can be a long time before they get back in balance.

The acidopholus (sp?) can help and maybe your vet can give you some idea of where to get some, but it can also be found in yogurt like someone mentioned in another thread. My problem was getting CJ to eat any of the pumpking, yogurt and acidopholus. He is such a picky eater that he turned his nose up at everything, and he is not an easy cat to use the "open up and shove it in" technique.

My vet gave me some stuff.....can't remember the name of it....but it was in a syringe type of tube and it was supposed to promote the growth of the "natural flora." He also said that it takes time, sometimes lots of time, so starting and stopping different techniques will only confuse the intestines, thus promoting the diarrhea more instead of beating it. He said you have to stick with one regime for awhile to make sure it's not helping.

He also said that usuall the diarrhea is harder on us than it is on the kitties, so not to worry too much. Yeah, right! was my answer to that comment.

Hopefully the vet can give you something to try so you at least have hope. Not to dash that hope, but with CJ, it seemed that everytime I tried something new, it worked for about a week, then it was right back to the ol' diarrhea again, so if you noticed my thread in Cat General, he finally had the allergy testing done. It's quite expensive and a last resort, so hopefully your vet will have other things to try that will work before it comes to that point.

Good luck and let us know what he says. Seems diarrhea is a somewhat common problem and it's highly likely that others will be able to benefit from what you learn out of this.

[lv4dogs]

Thanks for sharing your knowledge!

My vet just called me back. She suggested that I try Science Diet W/D. I'm sorry but I hate that stuff. Corn gluten meal is the second ingredient and it's also used as a weight management diet. My cats are on the slim side. Not skinny, they are healthy but they sure don't need to be on a weight management diet.

She also wants me to give them 1 teaspoon of metamucil (sp?) to their food twice a day.

Since I was just researching this & the only reasone she's wanting me to try it is for the fiber content I think I'm going to call her back & see if I can try something else. Like just adding a supplement thats high in fiber to their diet?

I am kind of upset as all of this just sounds like a cover up to me. Sure I don't want diarrhea but I don't want to make it go away by adding supplements & the such that just cover up the problem. I want to get to the bottom of it. I want to know what is causing it & treat the cats for whatever it is.
Sure I understand that not much else can be done, we've done tests, tried meds etc... and cats can't talk but still.

Does anyone know of an over the counter feline diet that is high in fiber BUT one that is NOT low in fat?

[Tubby & Peanut's Mom]

Try the hairball formulas. I tried that with CJ and it helped immensely! Even now that he's taking the pred. he still gets major diarrhea if I give him regular food instead of the hairball formula. He gets Science Diet Senior Hairball formula. He loves it and it really helped.

Like I said, sometimes these issues take awhile to clear up. I don't think that your vet is trying to mask the problem, just giving you some ideas to try to help them get back to their normal "cycle." If there are no parasites present, it's really difficult to figure out why cats experience diarrhea and a lot of times it will just go on the record as "idiopathec diarrhea" which means they haven't got a clue why it's happening, so getting an absolute definite reason why your two are experincing this might never happen.

Also, it's not unheard of that cats develop an allergy to foods they have been eating with no prior problems. I know Jenluckenbach was also experiencing this same frustration with one of her kitties, so you could do a search to see what finally worked for her.

Like I said, it takes time. We humans are always so impatient and we want to see immediate results. Unfortunately, these diarrhea problems don't cooperate as fast as we humans would like them to, and it's so very frustrating for us, but we have to learn patience.