tales from the litter box

Ah, the ongoing saga that is Jasper's health.

Back around Christmas time (when I was in Michigan visiting my family), Jasper started having random, unexplained bouts of diarrhea... all over the house. Poor Jason could barely get one mess cleaned up before there was another one stinking it up someplace else.

I took Jasper to the vet when I got back to California, they checked him (and his, ahem, donations) out, and they found nothing. We switched him to a new brand of insulin (because of concerns about the old kind's efficacy) and opened a new bag of food, and the diarrhea tapered off.

A week ago it started up again in full force for no apparent reason. He was waking us up in the middle of the night because he'd go pour his insides out in the corner of our bedroom, complete with sound effects. You can probably imagine... Needless to say, we've spent a fortune on carpet cleaner.

We took him back to the vet on Friday. We had to get his blood sugar tested anyway since he's on the new insulin, and I wanted to revisit the diarrhea thing. The veterinarian wants to try prescription food (a different kind than what we had him on a year ago that gave him such a horrible allergic reaction, although it is the same brand), so I've been introducing that and phasing out their normal food. Feeding our cats different foods doesn't work very well; we've tried it before and it's just easier to give all three of them the same thing. Luckily, they all seem to love the prescription food. As long as Jasper isn't allergic to it, I think we have a winner. And he hasn't had diarrhea since yesterday, so at the very least, the prescription food isn't making it worse.

On the plus side, he's no longer having trouble with clumsiness. He's even lost enough weight (he's down to 17.1 pounds, from 25.9 two years ago) that he can jump onto the bathroom counter, which he hasn't been able to do since he was a kitten.

Despite the sick tummy and constant poking and prodding, Jasper is the happiest, most loving cat you could imagine. He's leaning against me as I type this, purring contentedly. I can't imagine our little family without him.