Fatty liver disease can occur after only a few days and by few I mean
2 or 2 days of not eating or 3 or more days of not eatin enough,
overweight cats are in more danger of this but it can happen to any cat
not eating enough
I know this for a fact it happened to Buddie, and she was fighting
cancer and had a tube for 2 months, she actually loved getting fed that
way and would run to the couch and wait when she heard me getting her
syringes ready. She got sick with sepsis, quit eating and needed a tube
after 4 days of hardly eating. She lived a very good quality of life
for 5 months after she had her tube removed, which she wasn't happy
about, she was eating alittle on her own even as soon as two days after
she got her tube but not near enough and would have been in bad shape
had I not got the tube when I did. When I was weaning her off the tube
feedings she was not a happy camper but did start eating enough and
after 2 weeks of making sure she was maintaining her weight we took the
tube out.
She second time she got sick and we were going to put a tube in (this
was 5 months after the first tube, we thought she had sepsis again), she
decided she had enough and in recovery went into heart failure. I had
talked with her the night before and told her if she decided to leave it
was OK, but I wanted her to have the chance if she wanted it. She
decided she didn't and upon autopsy it was discovered her cancer had
spread and plugged her bile ducts so she didn't have long and she knew
it. She was originally diagnosed with liver cancer and lived a year and
a month after she was diagnosed.
She did get chemo for 3 weeks but stopped eating and got very nauseated
so I stopped the chemo, it took me three weeks of holding a bowl in
front of her every 15 minutes to get her eating again. I slept in the
living room on the couch and fed her every 15 minutes for 20 hours out
of the day, she ate enough to not get fatty liver but it took the 3
weeks for her to eat normal again. She didn't get a tube that time she
did start eating, but it took three weeks.
I know I'm rambling but when they told me Buddie had cancer I was
petrified, Buddie was not your friendly lap cat and did things on her
terms, I was so afraid she wouldn't put up with any treatment and she
really surprised me. We bonded in that year like never before, it was
very special. She became very lovey and put up with alot, in fact early
on when my vet mentioned the feeding tube maybe being a possiblility in
the future I told her I didn't think so. But after seeing how hard
Buddie was fighting the cancer I decided I would give her every chance
and always told her when she had had enough it was OK to go home, and in
Buddie fashion she did just that.
--
Belinda
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