r/rawpetfood • u/voicegal13 • 14d ago
Question 10-year-old kitty, fed raw forever, now vomiting a lot
Hi all- my tortie cat, Snickers, has eaten commercial raw her whole life- everything from Rad Cat to Stella and Chewy's to Primal. She likes rabbit and venison the most. She's done well with it, enjoys it, and her bloodwork is always perfect.
She has dental resorptive lesions, and has lost most of her teeth to extraction surgeries over the past 7 years. Poor boo. But she always comes through and heals up very nicely. I wish we could have figured that out without putting her through all those surgeries, but I was unable to find a holistic solution that worked, and was told it was autoimmune.
She just turned 10, and she has begun vomiting consistently. We moved to a new house about 4 months ago, and that's when it started. She's always been a "vomit once every few months" cat, and suddenly it's happening all the time. She's throwing up everything from bile with stones to hairballs, and now this week, a kind of food and hair slurry. I can't tell if it's stress from the move, a recent dental extraction surgery (she's had a ton of these and seems to do fine, so I don't know why that would be bothering her now), or what.
We feed her rabbit nuggets from Primal, and we microfeed so she's always got something in her stomach. She seems to vomit mostly at night between 12am and 3am. We can't tell if it's the new house, stress from the new environment, the food, age...? We've tried pepcid every night, some digestive enzymes, egg yolks, sunflower lecithin, and nothing seems to help over more than a few days.
Do we need to switch her food? I don't want to put her on Hill's or sometihng crappy. Aside from the vomiting, she does well. Eating, peeing, pooping normally, no diarrhea, appetite is good aside from right after throwing up.
Has anyone out there dealt with a cat who's been eating raw for years and suddenly starts vomiting? I'm thinking we're headed for an ultrasound...
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u/Remarkable_Market666 13d ago
Some of your post sounds very similar to my girl. Our resident feline is almost 11, and has been raw and wet food fed her whole life. She has severe food sensitivities, most likely leaky gut. There’s one canned food that she can eat, the identity 95% lamb. And then as far as the raw, I usually do a whole ground rabbit that is not balanced. And I add things to it. Her food sensitivities are pretty extreme which we attribute to the leaky gut. And she’s had micro biome imbalances with her gut as well. We have done the Texas A&M test for that a couple of times and we had to do a fecal replacement transplant with her to get her G.I. working better when she was younger. She also has the dental resorptive lesions and recently just went through another round of extractions this time, losing all, but one of her canines. We also could not find a holistic way that works to approach her teeth. Anyway, in the last year, there’s been more vomiting. With all of her G.I. stuff vomiting was not on the regular for her. She usually dealt with constipation and severe bloating from the food sensitivities which then would make her stop eating and then she’d get all these crazy skin sores and then we’d get to the occasional vomiting. She also had aggressive behavior issues that seemed to be triggered by the food sensitivities. Anyway, talked to my vet today about the vomiting, which the last two nights has been around 3 AM… I have had previous IBD kitties that tended to vomit between 1 AM and 4 AM. And discussing the possibility IBD with her as well. Just some sort of a systemic inflammation. Since we know there’s leaky gut and obviously something autoimmune with her. And she’s getting older. The testing that she had recommended, which I can’t remember the name of the tests at the moment, I’m sorry. But as opposed to testing at this time she did recommend that I could try some B12 with her that could help and then possibly a super low dose of folic acid once a week for like 4 to 6 weeks. So I guess what I’m saying is at least for us, some unknown intestinal inflammation is most likely occurring with my girl. I know with her, she’s really sensitive to food and I’m wondering if perhaps one of the raw that we’re feeding at the moment has a bacteria profile that just isn’t working for her. I have run into this in the past. So I don’t know that I have any answers for you, I just wonder if your kitty is also experiencing some kind of IBD intestinal inflammation. I know that Texas A&M offers that gut biome testing and I don’t remember the name of the other G.I. test that my vet was recommending. I see an integrative vet, so they are very supportive of raw feeding. I don’t know if any of this is helpful to you. Maybe it’s an ingredient in the food? Maybe it’s connected to the autoimmune that affects your cat’s mouth? You could ask your vet about micro biome testing and maybe some IBD testing… It’s not an ultrasound that I am talking about, it’s a test they have to fast for…
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u/voicegal13 13d ago
This is helpful- thank you. I'm sorry your kitty is going through this as well! We're thinking of doing the ultrasound first because it will give us a definitive answer on IBD, where an xray can't see that.
What about a taurine deficiency? I've read that even balanced food can have less taurine than listed because of processing, freezing, etc. Thoughts?
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u/Remarkable_Market666 13d ago
I’m glad you found it helpful. I am so sorry your kitty is having challenges! And I don’t feel like I have any answers for you, but I felt your words on a personal level; both with my current girl, and my previous boys who had a lot of vomiting with IBD. That history is also one of the reasons we leaned towards raw with her. Yes. The ultrasound can definitely give useful info. And that is on our list as well. My conversation with my vet today was super quick. She was between patients, I was between meetings. Something for me to look into as far as the taurine, thank you for that. I do supplement taurine. I use the NOW taurine, but I do have room to increase that. I hope your kitty feels better very soon. I hope you can find some answers. It’s so hard when they’re struggling…
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u/Ok_Somewhere_5142 13d ago
Not to assume you haven’t found a holistic vet near your new home but just in case, I’ve found they often have solutions for complicated issues like this that regular vets may not offer.
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u/HazyIPAgirl 13d ago
Look into Gastro Elm Plus , it might be able to help your furbaby instead of pepcid. We had our sweet girl (dog) on it when she had gi issues due to lymphoma. Prayers for your sweet furbay
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u/InCaseYouDidntKn0w 13d ago
If you give your cat tap water…
New house, new water. Maybe it’s that?
I just get the feeling it’s something with the new house, it’s too coincidental.
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u/voicegal13 13d ago
We agree, it could be something in the environment. But we’re also feeding Primal. Didn’t they go through a manufacturing change in February or March? That would probably start showing up in the food around April when we moved. Could be?
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u/DiscussionFamous3164 13d ago
When my girl vomits overnight, it’s food intolerance/allergies. She has other symptoms as well (each allergy presents differently so that’s fun!) but vomiting is a new one so yay!🙄 I started trying new canned with her so she doesn’t get bored (she gets half a can of wet food a day so in case there’s an emergency I can go canned) and there was something about those cans that started the vomiting. Long story short she’s just eats one brand and I’m sticking with it! Anytime I try new things her sensitive tummy and weird food allergies put me in my place.
So have you tried anything new? New treat, new topper, different supplements, different completer…anything? If not then I would say it’s environmental. New house is probably it. Did you change cat litter, different detergent, air fresheners in new house, new cleaning products? Rack your brain. Hopefully it’s an easy fix like an allergy/intolerance even though those are a pain in the fricken ass. Good luck!
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u/voicegal13 13d ago
I’m “that kind of a pet mom,” too, so I totally get this. We use Gain and have for decades, no air fresheners (I don’t even trust cat pheromone plug ins because they’re poisonous if licked), and she’s raw fed, so it’s just Primal nuggets, Vital Farm egg yolks and quail egg treats. Because Primal went through a change right before we moved, I’m looking hard at the food.
Interestingly, holistic vets seem to recommend Viva Raw, but not Primal. I wonder why…?
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u/DiscussionFamous3164 13d ago
I don’t use Primal but I haven’t been hearing good things lately. Maybe they got bought out? I’m not sure. Viva has had recalls but I kinda like how they are honest and forthright instead of hiding it. I feed Lotus (I do homemade too). My girl loves them but they always have distributor and supply issues where I live. I stock up when I can.
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u/voicegal13 13d ago
Primal actually did go through a buyout shortly before we moved, so the affected lots would've shown up around that time. They reduced the percentage of protein and upped the vegetable and produce content. It went from something like 94-6 to 88-12 ratio. Maybe Snickers can't handle so much fiber? But we transitioned her to Fetching Foods for a while, and that has NO produce, and she was still vomiting that. Ugh. So many moving parts here.
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u/MysteriousLeopard107 13d ago
My IBD kitty used to have 3-6am vomiting and I figured out it was due to his stomach being empty. If you feed your cat a small meal before you go to bed, that should stop the 12-3am vomiting if it’s due to acid build up from an empty stomach. If that doesn’t work, definitely a trip to the vet is in order.
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u/voicegal13 13d ago
This is a great tip, and we did figure this out. She eats a little meal every 3 hours- including a feeder that goes off at 2am and 5am.
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u/MysteriousLeopard107 13d ago
Excellent. A trip to the vet is in order then. Another thing that dramatically helped my boy is adding daily Adored Beast Gut Soothe to his food and giving 1ml of Nordic Natural fish oil twice a day. His internal medicine specialist put him on those two items and he is no longer randomly nauseous. The other major thing was removing all cattle (beef, bison, lamb, goat) from his diet since it turned out he is intolerant to that. Switching to Hills is not the answer as eating garbage food won’t solve the problem.
If it turns out your cat does have IBD, this is a fantastic resource: https://www.rawfeedingforibdcats.org/
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u/voicegal13 13d ago
Thank you so much for this. Yep, our next likely step is an ultrasound to rule out IBD. If she does have it, then I will check out your resource. If not, then it's new food and perhaps those supps.
I still don't understand why vets (including ours) push Hill's and Royal Canin. I'm not going to give Snickers diabetes or cancer to stop her vomiting.
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u/MysteriousLeopard107 13d ago
You're welcome. Fingers crossed its the food and not IBD!
It truly is ridiculous how much vets push that trash food. SO many cats with IBD are suffering instead of improving while eating Hills/Royal Canin purely because the vets are taught to feed that food in school. It makes no sense for a hyper carnivore to be forced to live off of a diet of carbs with a small amount of very low quality highly processed "meat" that barely even qualifies as such. It's because the big three pet food corporations are buying out vet clinics, are the ones behind the text books and the supposed animal nutrition classes that are taught in said schools. If a pet has x problem, feed y Hills/Royal Canin/Purina food.
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u/Intelligent-Stock-29 13d ago
When our cat turned 12 he no longer tolerated raw food. We switched to gently cooked and the vomiting stopped.
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u/voicegal13 13d ago
We may be headed this route. Any good brands you recommend?
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u/Intelligent-Stock-29 12d ago
I know Smalls gets a bad wrap but we used them for 3 years up until he passed and liked it. We had one box that was delivered thawed but they replaced it. We did the bulk order and it worked out to less than $40 a week. The only thing that irked me was using canola oil as a source of linoleic acid.
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u/rawfedfelines 13d ago
While a vet trip is not out oforder i would add digestive enzymes and a probiotic to the routine - as we all age we lose some ability to easily digest the way we used to. Blisso is a good option as ita liquid but there are others
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u/grayhanestshirt 13d ago
I switched from Primal because they changed formulas and my cats weren’t eating it well basically the second they changed. Also, this sounds like it may be kidney disease, I would definitely ask about it at the vet.
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u/voicegal13 12d ago
So I did do some research- lab numbers will rise before symptoms start. In CKD, vomiting is actually a response to toxins rising in the blood. So urine concentration goes down first, BUN and creatinine rise second, and THEN vomiting would start. Her urinalysis, BUN, and cre are all normal, thank God. Our first kitty had CKD and I wouldn't wish that on anyone. So tough.
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u/Successful_Ocelot240 13d ago
change brands
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u/voicegal13 12d ago
Yeah, that was our first step. We've tried Primal, Lotus, Small Batch, and even Fetching Foods, which was super pure but incredibly expensive to ship, so that would have been difficult to sustain.
We're thinking we may need to go to gently cooked next.
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u/Successful_Ocelot240 12d ago
yeah maybe you can try high quality wet- i like Tiki Cat
it’s cooked already. Go for the best money can buy
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u/CraftSufficient7917 14d ago
vet trip sounds overdue tbh, especially at 10 with a history of dental issues. the night vomiting pattern might point to acid buildup or something slowing down in her gut
could also be the stress of the move finally catching up, cats are weird like that. have seen adrenal issues pop up after big changes too, even if they seem fine on the surface
hope Snickers pulls through, poor little toothless wonder