# someone please help!!



## mindy (Sep 16, 2010)

i have recently posted here asking about bladder health for my cat. i have a 13 year old siamese cat with a uti. this is her second one in 6 months. the vet thinks flutd but as far as i know there are no crystals. i will take her in for a urinalysis when the antibiotics (orbax 14 days) are done. i don't know why the vet didn't suggest it when i was in last week to get the antibiotics.

anyway, she is currently eating go! grain free canned food. i am feeding the chicken, turkey, and duck formula and the fresh water trout formula. the info and ingredients for both are here.

i recently asked about this on a cat forum and have been chewed out for being a horrible cat owner. 

here is the thing, i live in a SMALL town. i have to order the food in and then drive 400 km round trip to pick it up. that is my only option for food unless i drive 500 km round trip and get vet Rx food.

i was thinking i would like to switch the cats to raw (i have tried numerous times already but maybe only half-heartedly since i was only new to it then) and in my last post someone here posted a great "system" that i am planning to try this time. (thank you!! :smile

well, i have been told on the other forum that feeding raw to my flutd cat is going to kill her. please help me!!

i feel that a raw diet is best. if she had crystals i would get the Rx food to dissolve the crystals and then go to raw but i don't think she does (she didn't before...i am going to get a urinalysis done)

does anyone have any experience with this? am i going to kill my cat?? 

i am really very upset about all of this. they are all talking back and forth there now about how pigheaded i am for not feeding food with corn, food with no grains, food with no veggies... argh! none of them agree on anything besides the fact that i am a horrible person and that my cat is going to die.

i love my cat very much and i want her to be as healthy as possible and if she does need the food from the vet to dissolve any crystals then i will feed that to her but i do not have the option to feed any other canned food besides what i feed her now and grocery store crap. the store i order from ONLY carries canidae, orijen, and go/now. i do not have a feed store and the next closest store to get "good" (not grocery store food) is a 600 km round trip.

i really want to feed raw. will this harm her in anyway, is there anything in raw that could possibly cause her to get worse?

sorry this is so long and rambling. i am just very upset/frustrated about how they are talking to me/about me on that other site. i believe that raw is best and if not raw canned is best.

what do you think?


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## RachelsaurusRexU (Sep 4, 2010)

Don't listen to those rude people! It's quite obvious that you love your animals and would anything for them, so tell those turds to take a hike!

From everything I've read raw is the best thing you can feed a cat with those types of issues. I don't know specifically about dissolving crystals (if they are present, but hopefully they aren't!) but raw is supposed to be great for preventing the formation of crystals. I've heard things about not feeding fish to flutd cats, but I'm not sure if that only applies to fish flavored cat food or if the whole thing is just a bunch of malarkey. If you do a google search for "raw diet flutd cat" you'll end up with tons of info to look through. Good luck!


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## SerenityFL (Sep 28, 2010)

mindy said:


> i recently asked about this on a cat forum and have been chewed out for being a horrible cat owner.
> 
> i am really very upset about all of this. they are all talking back and forth there now about how pigheaded i am for not feeding food with corn, food with no grains, food with no veggies... argh! none of them agree on anything besides the fact that i am a horrible person and that my cat is going to die.
> 
> ...


I think you need to quit that forum. Those people are extremely rude and entirely unhelpful.

I don't think I've ever seen a cat out in a corn field eating corn....

Cats are carnivores. They don't need those "fresh berries" and "healthy vegetables", (seriously....to me? fresh berries means just picked off the dang bush).

Raw is a very good diet for cats. However, I am not a vet. I do not have the expertise to advise you on a cat with health problems. So I will not do that. I will let others, who do have experience, some of them, from my understanding, work with animals every single day, (I do too but not the same way), and have more knowledge and more experience. 

What I will say is stay here, on this forum. Ask as many questions as you would like and no one is going to act the way those on the other forum have acted towards you.

I will also say, transitioning a cat to raw is not always easy. Some cats you get lucky and they take to it right away. Some cats are picky! and you will have to work at it. A cat definitely cannot go more than 24 hours without food, that I know, for a fact. It can cause all kinds of problems, more than you have now.

I would try to give your cat some raw, if your cat doesn't take to it right away, you will have to do some mixing. What I mean is you may have to feed it what it's getting now and put a tiny bit of raw in that dish. Slowly build up until it's eating entirely raw. 

But what is the best to feed while you're doing this? I can't tell you because I don't know. I just don't have the knowledge with the problem your cat is having. Others here can be very helpful, so please, use this forum-don't listen to the hatefulness you have received on the other forum. We will try to help you and we will not tell you that you are going to kill your cat and that you don't care about her.


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## MollyWoppy (Mar 19, 2010)

I'm afraid I can't give you any advice re the medical issues but please just do what you feel is best for your cat. Like you said, the other people can't even agree amongst themselves what the right diet is, so whatever you feed is going to piss somebody off. 
What I did want to add is that if your cat doesn't take to raw, don't give up. 
I've been trying for nearly 5 months to get my cat to eat raw instead of Nutro. She ate chicken fairly quickly but wouldn't touch any other meat even though I offered it to her every second day or so. Then, just this week, for whatever reason she started eating pork, turkey and gizzards. 
I would have given up months ago if I hadn't followed advice given on this forum - people here really do know what they are talking about.


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## mindy (Sep 16, 2010)

thank you guys. i know that raw is best and i don't understand how it can kill her (unless i royally mess it up!) but being told over and over that i will hurt her more if i feed her raw is really disheartening. and, the person who is being the most adamant about it only knows of ONE cat that had flutd and was fed raw and it died. she said the owner is positive that it was because of the raw. she didn't say anything about any testing being done (necropsy?) or anything about proof that it was the raw diet.

i can't remember who it was (i would have to go back to check) but someone here described their method for switching their cats by mixing ground raw into canned and then just upping the raw until it was eventually all raw. she (?) said that she started with 1/3 raw and 2/3 canned but i think that i will start even smaller with the raw just to be on the safe side.

oh, RachelsaurusRexU, i did look up flutd and fish and i found out that fish used to be a problem when they were using really poor quality fish meal with lots of bone because of the magnesium levels. now they know that and keep the magnesium levels down so it shouldn't be an issue. i think that feeding raw fish should be ok because there should be the correct level of fish to bone in a whole prey, i think? i will check into a lot more before i add raw fish to their diet.

thank you again guys! :smile:

we posted at the same time mollywoppy. :smile: thank you for the words of encouragement!


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## RawFedDogs (Jun 16, 2008)

The raw diet is absolutely beyond any doubt is the best way to feed a cat. There is no arguing that fact. I suggest you join the yahoo rawcat group. You will get TONS of information there about any problems with your cat and raw feeding. You can find it at rawcat : Raw Cat


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## RachelsaurusRexU (Sep 4, 2010)

mindy said:


> i can't remember who it was (i would have to go back to check) but someone here described their method for switching their cats by mixing ground raw into canned and then just upping the raw until it was eventually all raw. she (?) said that she started with 1/3 raw and 2/3 canned but i think that i will start even smaller with the raw just to be on the safe side.


That is my system and just to update, it's still working out awesome! I made a new batch last night with chicken necks, liver, kidney and heart. I coarsely ground one of the hearts with the bone and organ, and chunked the other by hand. This morning was their first meal of that batch and they ate all of their breakfast! These are cats that would look at me like I was poisoning them if I threw a boneless chunk of anything in front of them before! Oh, and I also didn't add a can of sardines to this batch and they still gobbled it! 

Start slow and stick to it! Let your kitty set the pace. I never though mine would EVER be on 100% raw! You can do it!


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## mindy (Sep 16, 2010)

thanks guys!!

rawfeddogs, i will join that group now. thank you! i am not really good at working group things since they are not really like forums but i will definitely give it a shot. 

rachelsaurusrexu, thank you!!! i am flying home tomorrow and have a super busy week ahead of me so i plan to start grinding on sunday. i can't wait to get things going on this. thank you so much for sharing your method. i really am going to get them to make the switch this time! 

you guys are just the greatest! i have been doing more research about this and i really feel that raw is the way to go. i will get the urinalysis done so i can make sure there are no crystals and then hopefully keep her bladder bacteria free from now on. :smile: you guys definitely make me feel like i am doing what is best!


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## Higgins (Nov 1, 2010)

Sorry a little late but want to share these sites:

Feeding Your Cat: Know The Basis of Feline Nutrition Dr Lisa Pierson, Feline Specialist, covers everything. 
Feline Nutrition Renowned Feline Specialists and Veterinarians (including Dr. Pierson) contribute here.
Cat Nutrition.Org 
They have recipes and everything. Best of all, are the foremost Feline Experts.


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## mindy (Sep 16, 2010)

thank you for giving me those links. i will have a look at them now.


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## vigornj (Nov 4, 2010)

Not sure if this helps, but I'm fairly sure my Vet tech friend mentioned Orijen is UTI friendly.


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