Living With IBD
| Peekie Gouchie Greenwood, Nova Scotia Born October 20, 1999 Diagnosed with Suspected IBD in February, 2009 |
First Entry: May 1, 2009
Peekie was born into the world from a feral cat and out of her litter of four, she was the tiniest kitten weighing 7
ounces at 7 weeks of age. Over the span of the next 9 years she had multiply bouts of unexplained lack of weight
gain, vomiting and diarrhea. She was tested for pancreatic insufficiency, a liver shunt, viral diseases and
parasites as possible causes of her suffering. Every one of them were either negative or inconclusive. It was then
just accepted by her vets that she was just born tiny and sickly and she would possibly remain that way the rest
of her life.
She remained tiny and underweight although not really all that sickly except for the sudden bouts of vomiting
and diarrhea that would crop up without warning or reason. In February 2009 she became quite ill and her bout
lasted for two days. She recovered on her own after fasting herself and gradually getting back to eating herself.
Then 1 ½ months later she became extremely ill, stopped eating and had the worse case of vomiting and
diarrhea ever. At this time she was suspected to have IBD and treated with Cerenia for the vomiting and given
subcutaneous fluids daily until her appetite returned. She had lost almost a full pound and to a cat who weighed
maybe 5lbs on her best days that was a lot.
The food she was on for the majority of her life was Science Diet Kitten dry, because it was the only one she
tolerated and would eat that kept the weight on. She was fussy about eating canned food and would only eat a
lick or two every now and again. In December 2008, I had made a choice to change all my cats including Peekie
to ‘grain free’ foods with some raw food preparations. She was eating Nature’s Variety Instinct Chicken dry,
Orijen Chicken dry and Now! Turkey dry with Wellness Canned added to it. After this food change she started
gaining weight and looking better than she had in years. Since her suspected IBD diagnosis she is now eating only
Wellness Chicken or Turkey canned.
Treatments for her suspected IBD was initially a Cerenia injection and fluids. Then we needed to give her
famotidine (1/4 of tablets) to control nausea and get her to eat. She couldn’t tolerate the antibiotics she was
prescribed (amoxil), so we discontinued these but after a few days of bland food (Hill’s i/d canned only) her
diarrhea was under control and didn’t return. Because the antibiotics made her nauseous we kept her off of them
and treated her without them. On April 6th she started on B12 injections as per the TAMU protocol with my
vets instruction, without doing the testing for B12 and folate levels.
Supplements of bee pollen powder by Holistic Blend, folate 1mg pills and Eagle Pack enzymes and probiotics
were added slowly, and gradually to her food over the next couple of weeks. Now only three weeks into the B12
protocol and almost two weeks of the addition of the bee pollen, folate, enzymes and probiotics, Peekie is off all
other drugs... no more famotidine is needed. Her appetite has increased three-fold or more. She now eats the
equivalent to a 6-8 lb. cat in Wellness Turkey or Chicken canned daily, something that would have been out of
the realm of possibility her entire life. She was lucky to have eaten that much in two days in her best times over
the last 9 years. She has gained weight and looks the healthiest she has ever. Peekie is now as playful as she was
when she was a tiny kitten and just as active also. I’m hoping that she will continue to gain weight and remain as
happy and healthy as she is right now, but I do know that IBD is never cured it is just managed. Peekie so far is
managing quite well, better than she has ever been her whole life.
Update: September 18, 2009
Peekie had been going along swimmingly on her vitamin B12 shot protocol (she was on weekly, then went down
to bi-weekly shots and then was going to monthly. Well after a month and a half on bi-weekly shots, I had to call
the vet and ask if we could go back on weekly ones. Peekie wasn't doing all that well...losing weight, not eating all
that much, getting constipated. I could see her deteriorating slowly before my eyes. He said to put her back on
weekly vitamin B12 and keep her on them indefinitely as long as all was going well.
Her response to the first weekly shot was immediate. She was eating, had a bowel movement later that day, first
one in almost three days. Her energy level picked up considerably and she was more like herself, after the
second weekly shot. Now all this happened in the end of June, the 27th to be precise. She is now on weekly
vitamin B12 shots, getting 250mcg. She eats Wellness, grain-less Turkey canned and Nature's Variety Instinct
Rabbit dry. She eats roughly 1/4 of the large tins/day plus 1/8th of a cup of the dry. She weighs a healthy 5lbs.,
(no fat). Not like when she was 5lbs other times in her life. She had a pocket of belly fat, now she has more
muscle. She has a large bowel movement everyday or every other day, it depends on how close to her next shot
we're getting. If she just got her shot she has daily bowel movements for about 3-4 days then she goes to
alternate daily bowel movements but she's comfortable and not irritable.
If she has no food for a bit, which happens rarely, (we try to make sure she doesn't go long without having food
in her bowl), she starts licking plastic which denotes she's getting nauseous. But as soon as she eats the nausea
seems to disappear. We have not seen any vomiting, except for car-sickness (she travels with us whenever we
travel for weekend stays in the big city (Halifax). She also has had the odd hairball, but I try to keep them down
to a minimal by brushing her. She loses an unimaginable amount for such a tiny cat, LOL! Peekie is not on any
supplements or other additives to her food. We slowly took her off the Bee pollen granules(but keep them handy
if her appetite dwindles...not likely to happen with the B12...right after her shot every week her appetite goes
into hyper-mode and she eats like she can't get enough. With her bowel movements doing so well she is also off
of the prebiotics/probiotics/enzyme mix as well. But we have it around just in case.
So all in all Peekie is holding her own and next month will be 10 years old on the 20th, her being diagnosed with
IBD has changed her life, and I hope that it will help her live happy and comfortably for many years to come.
Update: February 7, 2010
Everything has stayed pretty much the same except that I was having trouble getting the Nature's Variety
Instinct Rabbit dry, so I had to switch her to the Go Natural Turkey, Duck and Chicken dry. I was hesitant and
scared because she'd been doing so well on the rabbit for 7 months now. Well we switched her over with no
consequences, I'm happy to say. She has been doing really well, with no setbacks, or episodes of vomiting or
diarrhea. Her appetite is great and she's still on her weekly B12 shots, eating Wellness turkey canned and getting
nothing else in the way of medication or supplements. Her weight has peaked at 4 1/2 pounds and hasn't
changed in months.
Update: June 15, 2010
Peekie is doing quite well although in Feb/Mar she had another relapse of sorts. Not sure what caused it, but she
went off her food. There wasn't any vomiting or diarrhea, just not eating. She got quite thin and lost a lot of
weight, then she developed ulcers in her mouth. I was concerned about kidney problems but after a visit to the
vets the only thing he found was her ALT was even higher than last year. This worried me as I lost a cat in 2000
who had the same symptoms, (inappetence and liver enzymes up), and it turned out he had pancreatic cancer.
So I still have not stopped worrying totally about Peekie. She did rebound after this episode and at first we had
more to be worried about because she was eating like MAD, drinking and urinating like she never had before.
She was eating enough for a 8-10 lbs cat and she is barely 4lbs!! We had changed her dry food which is now GO!
Natural Chicken, Turkey and Duck. It's higher in calories so her canned food consumption has decreased. But I
was even more convinced she had some sort of pancreatic episode with her ravenous appetite and PU/PD, much
like a cat with diabetes.
She has since levelled off her eating habits again and eating like she had before. Although I think it is a bit more
than before this episode began. Through everything she has still had great spirits, even when she wasn't eating.
Although she was weak, she was not completely off by herself and still wanted her loving and cuddles...LOL!!
She is now eating GO! Naturals Chicken, Turkey and Duck dry and the Wellness Turkey canned, she's on no
drugs at all BUT still gets her Vitamin B12 shots weekly, and is once again healthy. Our vet feels that if she
should have another relapse we should check her liver further but right now maybe ignorance is bliss. So until
she gets sick we're just living one day at a time and hoping we have her for many years to come. She'll be 11 this
October.
Peekie was born into the world from a feral cat and out of her litter of four, she was the tiniest kitten weighing 7
ounces at 7 weeks of age. Over the span of the next 9 years she had multiply bouts of unexplained lack of weight
gain, vomiting and diarrhea. She was tested for pancreatic insufficiency, a liver shunt, viral diseases and
parasites as possible causes of her suffering. Every one of them were either negative or inconclusive. It was then
just accepted by her vets that she was just born tiny and sickly and she would possibly remain that way the rest
of her life.
She remained tiny and underweight although not really all that sickly except for the sudden bouts of vomiting
and diarrhea that would crop up without warning or reason. In February 2009 she became quite ill and her bout
lasted for two days. She recovered on her own after fasting herself and gradually getting back to eating herself.
Then 1 ½ months later she became extremely ill, stopped eating and had the worse case of vomiting and
diarrhea ever. At this time she was suspected to have IBD and treated with Cerenia for the vomiting and given
subcutaneous fluids daily until her appetite returned. She had lost almost a full pound and to a cat who weighed
maybe 5lbs on her best days that was a lot.
The food she was on for the majority of her life was Science Diet Kitten dry, because it was the only one she
tolerated and would eat that kept the weight on. She was fussy about eating canned food and would only eat a
lick or two every now and again. In December 2008, I had made a choice to change all my cats including Peekie
to ‘grain free’ foods with some raw food preparations. She was eating Nature’s Variety Instinct Chicken dry,
Orijen Chicken dry and Now! Turkey dry with Wellness Canned added to it. After this food change she started
gaining weight and looking better than she had in years. Since her suspected IBD diagnosis she is now eating only
Wellness Chicken or Turkey canned.
Treatments for her suspected IBD was initially a Cerenia injection and fluids. Then we needed to give her
famotidine (1/4 of tablets) to control nausea and get her to eat. She couldn’t tolerate the antibiotics she was
prescribed (amoxil), so we discontinued these but after a few days of bland food (Hill’s i/d canned only) her
diarrhea was under control and didn’t return. Because the antibiotics made her nauseous we kept her off of them
and treated her without them. On April 6th she started on B12 injections as per the TAMU protocol with my
vets instruction, without doing the testing for B12 and folate levels.
Supplements of bee pollen powder by Holistic Blend, folate 1mg pills and Eagle Pack enzymes and probiotics
were added slowly, and gradually to her food over the next couple of weeks. Now only three weeks into the B12
protocol and almost two weeks of the addition of the bee pollen, folate, enzymes and probiotics, Peekie is off all
other drugs... no more famotidine is needed. Her appetite has increased three-fold or more. She now eats the
equivalent to a 6-8 lb. cat in Wellness Turkey or Chicken canned daily, something that would have been out of
the realm of possibility her entire life. She was lucky to have eaten that much in two days in her best times over
the last 9 years. She has gained weight and looks the healthiest she has ever. Peekie is now as playful as she was
when she was a tiny kitten and just as active also. I’m hoping that she will continue to gain weight and remain as
happy and healthy as she is right now, but I do know that IBD is never cured it is just managed. Peekie so far is
managing quite well, better than she has ever been her whole life.
Update: September 18, 2009
Peekie had been going along swimmingly on her vitamin B12 shot protocol (she was on weekly, then went down
to bi-weekly shots and then was going to monthly. Well after a month and a half on bi-weekly shots, I had to call
the vet and ask if we could go back on weekly ones. Peekie wasn't doing all that well...losing weight, not eating all
that much, getting constipated. I could see her deteriorating slowly before my eyes. He said to put her back on
weekly vitamin B12 and keep her on them indefinitely as long as all was going well.
Her response to the first weekly shot was immediate. She was eating, had a bowel movement later that day, first
one in almost three days. Her energy level picked up considerably and she was more like herself, after the
second weekly shot. Now all this happened in the end of June, the 27th to be precise. She is now on weekly
vitamin B12 shots, getting 250mcg. She eats Wellness, grain-less Turkey canned and Nature's Variety Instinct
Rabbit dry. She eats roughly 1/4 of the large tins/day plus 1/8th of a cup of the dry. She weighs a healthy 5lbs.,
(no fat). Not like when she was 5lbs other times in her life. She had a pocket of belly fat, now she has more
muscle. She has a large bowel movement everyday or every other day, it depends on how close to her next shot
we're getting. If she just got her shot she has daily bowel movements for about 3-4 days then she goes to
alternate daily bowel movements but she's comfortable and not irritable.
If she has no food for a bit, which happens rarely, (we try to make sure she doesn't go long without having food
in her bowl), she starts licking plastic which denotes she's getting nauseous. But as soon as she eats the nausea
seems to disappear. We have not seen any vomiting, except for car-sickness (she travels with us whenever we
travel for weekend stays in the big city (Halifax). She also has had the odd hairball, but I try to keep them down
to a minimal by brushing her. She loses an unimaginable amount for such a tiny cat, LOL! Peekie is not on any
supplements or other additives to her food. We slowly took her off the Bee pollen granules(but keep them handy
if her appetite dwindles...not likely to happen with the B12...right after her shot every week her appetite goes
into hyper-mode and she eats like she can't get enough. With her bowel movements doing so well she is also off
of the prebiotics/probiotics/enzyme mix as well. But we have it around just in case.
So all in all Peekie is holding her own and next month will be 10 years old on the 20th, her being diagnosed with
IBD has changed her life, and I hope that it will help her live happy and comfortably for many years to come.
Update: February 7, 2010
Everything has stayed pretty much the same except that I was having trouble getting the Nature's Variety
Instinct Rabbit dry, so I had to switch her to the Go Natural Turkey, Duck and Chicken dry. I was hesitant and
scared because she'd been doing so well on the rabbit for 7 months now. Well we switched her over with no
consequences, I'm happy to say. She has been doing really well, with no setbacks, or episodes of vomiting or
diarrhea. Her appetite is great and she's still on her weekly B12 shots, eating Wellness turkey canned and getting
nothing else in the way of medication or supplements. Her weight has peaked at 4 1/2 pounds and hasn't
changed in months.
Update: June 15, 2010
Peekie is doing quite well although in Feb/Mar she had another relapse of sorts. Not sure what caused it, but she
went off her food. There wasn't any vomiting or diarrhea, just not eating. She got quite thin and lost a lot of
weight, then she developed ulcers in her mouth. I was concerned about kidney problems but after a visit to the
vets the only thing he found was her ALT was even higher than last year. This worried me as I lost a cat in 2000
who had the same symptoms, (inappetence and liver enzymes up), and it turned out he had pancreatic cancer.
So I still have not stopped worrying totally about Peekie. She did rebound after this episode and at first we had
more to be worried about because she was eating like MAD, drinking and urinating like she never had before.
She was eating enough for a 8-10 lbs cat and she is barely 4lbs!! We had changed her dry food which is now GO!
Natural Chicken, Turkey and Duck. It's higher in calories so her canned food consumption has decreased. But I
was even more convinced she had some sort of pancreatic episode with her ravenous appetite and PU/PD, much
like a cat with diabetes.
She has since levelled off her eating habits again and eating like she had before. Although I think it is a bit more
than before this episode began. Through everything she has still had great spirits, even when she wasn't eating.
Although she was weak, she was not completely off by herself and still wanted her loving and cuddles...LOL!!
She is now eating GO! Naturals Chicken, Turkey and Duck dry and the Wellness Turkey canned, she's on no
drugs at all BUT still gets her Vitamin B12 shots weekly, and is once again healthy. Our vet feels that if she
should have another relapse we should check her liver further but right now maybe ignorance is bliss. So until
she gets sick we're just living one day at a time and hoping we have her for many years to come. She'll be 11 this
October.
Copyright © IBD Kitties 2008-2010, all rights reserved. Contact us at info@ibdkitties.net
Peekie G.
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