cats

[aroraborealis]

My cat takes two medications each day, twice a day, in pill form.

It been like chasing the red queen to find ways to deliver it into her body without a giant fight, because I'm really not up for the poke it down her throat method.

I used to be able to use pill pockets, but then she bit through one when she was on a different extremely unpleasant tasting medication, and now she rejects all pill pockets completely. Her normal dailies aren't so flavorful, so for a while I was able to crush them and mix them with a tuna slurry, which is also good because she gets extra water.

But one of them is flavorful enough that over time, she's stopped being so into tuna, so she'll often leave about half of it still in the bowl, which is a real problem for dosing.

I can tuck the pills into a little slice in a chunk of chicken or steak when I have one of those, but I don't always.

Recently I've been packing a little tuna pocket around each pill, which worked pretty well for a couple of weeks, but she's cottoned onto that and started licking the tuna off, leaving the soggy pills on the floor.

Over the weekend, I got some ground beef to pack little meatballs around the pills, and that worked well a couple times, but then she figured out again to lick off the beef and leave the pills, again, in a tiny soggy pile.

SUPER ANNOYING

As of this evening, I've escalated once again by popping the tiny pill-stuffed meatballs onto the tip of a toothpick and toasting them over the gas flame on the stove, since cooked meat is more coherent.

It worked! But this leads to a few questions:

1. Am I really going to toast tiny meatballs twice a day for my cat??
2. How long will this work?
3. How do I explain this to pet sitters when I'm away???
4. What do you mean "crazy cat lady"?

Comments

[amber_phoenix]

um... can I just roast her a chicken? somehow that seems simpler

[aroraborealis]

Totally. That IS simpler! Plus, roast chicken!

[amber_phoenix]

so new plan: roast chicken twice a week. we have to do it for the cat! (plus, roast chicken!)

[coraline]

I also worry about the effect of the heat on the medication, although better all of slightly toasted medication than not getting it into her at all...

[aroraborealis]

Yeah, I thought of that, too. I think since I'm only toasting the outside, it's not TOO bad, but ... yeah.

[eestiplika]

This both hilarious -- because of course, OF COURSE, how we get to be "crazy cat ladies" is in these kind of increments... one day you're just dosing tuna and that seems legit and then the next thing you know you're making and toasting tiny meatballs over your stove twice a day or and that also seems legit because every step between now and then was completely logical, obviously ... (or you know, you've resigned yourself to living with plastic covered furniture for the foreseeable future, ask me how i know) -- and indeed super annoying.

... does the vet have any suggestions? (e.g. can the meds come in non-pill form? which admittedly will likely lead to different challenges...)

[aroraborealis]

EXACTLY.

I'm planning to ask the vet on our next visit in a couple of weeks.

Also, sorry about the plastic :/

[blk]

No helpful replies, other than to laugh in extreme empathy.

(also, the finagling of meds longterm is one reason I'm opting for radioiodine therapy instead of meds for mine, soon)

[dilletante]

I strongly sympathize-- especially having fed your cats!-- but mostly I just love everything about this sentence:

1. Am I really going to toast tiny meatballs twice a day for my cat??

[sparkleworker]

4. What do you mean crazy cat lady? Oddly, my roommate asked me the same question at dinner time when I got done setting up a fuzzy blanket for my anxious cat to snuggle next to the speakers playing cheetah purring sounds... on the breakfast counter.

[muffyjo]

I had this problem with Ms. T in the last 10 years of her life (as well as her adopted brother) and found Animal Pharm. Which put the pill in treat form. It's pricey but I found it was worth it.