A Path With Paws

What do they eat you ask?
My cats like a variety of different foods. Contrary to what many vets will say, I think it is good to mix and match at least flavors, if not brands. It makes it less likely that your pet will develop allergies and gives them something to look forward to. Some animals do need to be on one constant diet and animals who have been on one food for a long time have a harder time with a sudden change.
Here are some brands of cat and dog food I really like
Felidae/Canidae, Wellness, Evo/Innova, Merrick, Evangers, Weruva, California Natural, Honest Kitchen
There are many other good food choices. If you are in the Seattle area, we have wonderful natural pet food stores with great food to choice from. Always read the label before buying anything and make sure meat is the first ingredient for cats and dogs. Home cooked meals and raw diets are also great options for most animals. Darwin’s is a local raw food company with delivery in the Seattle area.
Things to avoid
1. Science Diet. This is not a high quality diet but many vets still recommend it because it is all we were taught in nutrition during veterinary school.
2. Iams/Eukanuba was bought out by Proctor/Gamble many years ago. The quality of this food has gone straight down hill since plus P/G is the worst company when it comes to animal testing.
3. By-products aka beaks, blood, infection, sawdust, fur, etc By-product can be any part of an animal or anything that animal fluids have touched.
4. Animal or Meat by product This is any animal that ends up at rendering including euthanized pets. It doesn’t get any worse than this, not only are you making your animal a cannibal but you are also feeding them small amounts of euthanasia solution. Yuck!
5. BHT/BHA These are nasty preservatives linked to liver problems and cancer. These can also be in human food.
6. ethoxyquin- bad, bad, bad They used this stuff to preserve telephone poles. It is also a rubber stabilizer and a pesticide. Monsanto conducted research years ago, but the results were so inconclusive due to unprofessional conduct and documentation that the FDA demanded another study which was never done. This stuff has been linked to just about every disease you can think of.
7. corn-this is a filler and not a very good one. It also is a common allergen
8. Most foods you buy in a normal grocery store. Almost all of these are poor quality.
Also remember: No onions or chocolate for cats or dogs. No grapes or raisins for dogs.

Rudy paused on my partner Adam’s shorts, looked at me and opened up his bladder. I sat in disbelief for a moment, staring at him, and then jumped off the bed screaming, “stop, stop, stop.” I scooped him up as urine dribbled down my leg and onto the floor. He frantically jumped from my arms and raced down the stairs out of sight. I was so frustrated, why did the cat have to pee on everything?

Ok, so at least the shorts could be washed easily, he had already ruined three meditation cushions, those being his preferred target. For nine years of his life he had never urinated anywhere but in the litter box and then suddenly he was peeing on Adam’s things and most importantly the meditation cushions, leave him alone with one for a minute and it would be ruined.

We had recently moved to a new house but Rudy really liked the house and the urinating hadn’t started right away. I had also done a whole work up on him and nothing was wrong physically that would cause him to urinate.

We had a theory that he was objecting to a new meditation practice that Adam was doing but we weren’t certain. Until we figured it out, Adam had stopped doing that practice, but it was something he really wanted to do and had rearranged his schedule in order to have the time for it. As it turned out he had done a few minutes of that practice when Rudy urinated on his shorts. Our theory had been proven correct, the new practice literally scared the piss out of him.

We often meditate in our household and while this was the most extreme reaction we had seen from one of our cats, it did not surprise me that he had responded so strongly to meditation.

Our other cat Melody had been very timid when Adam first moved in with us. At the time Adam was starting a meditation practice called Werma, which was about confidence among other things. She loved to go into the meditation space when he was practicing and would sit with him every day. Slowly we saw her change and become much more confidant. She no longer would back down to anything or let anyone push her around. Our cat Ziggy, who used to bother her, would now get an ear boxing and she would chase him out of the room if he upset her. She also would come up to anyone who came in our home and gently tap them on the leg while looking up at them with her big blue eyes until they would give her pets. That confidence has stayed with her even though Adam no longer does that practice regularly.

In my own work, I treated a beautiful collie dog a couple years ago who would only let me work with her if I would sit and meditate calmly between needles. If I tried to make her sit still against her will she would get sick from the acupuncture and if I followed after her with needles she would only move faster. However if I only put one needle in at a time and sat quietly between needles she would let me treat her. After all the needles were in place, she would only relax if I would sit and meditate. She taught me more about patience than any other being I have worked with.

My large twenty-pound cat Basil also likes helping with meditation and I have found that on the days I am feeling particularly ungrounded, he will sit in my lap when I meditate. There is nothing to help ground you like twenty pounds of Zen cat.

I think animals like the calm energy that we create when we meditate, if you have ever been in a meditation center you know how calm and good it feels. That being said some meditation practices that are designed to stir up energy can agitate our furry friends as in Rudy’s case.

In the end it took a Shamanic journey with a local Shaman back to another place, for him to stop being afraid of Adam’s practice. However that is story which I will share at another time.

We are always connected to those in our home, including our animals, who pick up on our stress or our calmness and respond to it. Sometimes looking at our animal companion is like looking in a mirror at ourself. My dog Jake is often my emotion detector, if he is stressed often I am and when he is calm I am usually as well.

Last night it looked like we would all be snowed in again, after getting another four inches, but luckily the rain came this morning. Here are the local Chill dogs enjoying the snow. Nicole from Chill is not only a human massage therapist but also does dog and cat massage.

Angus with his dog sled

Armi in full howl

I came across this great story, Night of the Hunter, about Homer the three pound blind wonder kitty. Quite incredible, check it out!

Nick has the most beautiful toes. They are white as snow and super fuzzy and every time I see them I just want to touch them. Of course he hates that. Part of the reason that his toes are so beautiful is that he doesn’t walk on them. Five years ago a car hit Nick and his pelvis was badly broken. After consulting with a surgeon, who was quite certain that there was no permanent nerve damage, his family decided to do the difficult surgery to put his bones back together. As he healed it became apparent that there was something wrong with Nick’s nerves and he was not able to control his legs or support his weight below the knees.

This doesn’t stop Nick from getting around however. He just pulls himself with his front half and bulging biceps and lets the back half come along. If you try to catch him it becomes clear that he can move incredibly fast and can even scale a fence. His litter box is a little shorter than the normal ones but he uses it like a normal cat and is clean and proper. Although he can’t jump he is able to pull himself up on furniture or use stairs to reach where he wants to be.

If you ask Nick, he’ll tell you he’s just fine and wonder why you are looking at him strangely. After a moment though he will decide that you must be admiring his beauty. He is a beautiful cat with perfect stripes and deep big eyes. He wears his confidence well and is clearly the keeper of the house making sure that no other cats are allowed in.

I met Nick while treating the two dogs of the house and we had no intention of treating him initially. He of course thought this to be plain wrong, after all the cat is clearly the most important member of the house. One day while I was there he walked over and grabbed my box of needles between his front feet and stared at me, “excuse me but you seem to be forgetting the cat.” From that point on he started getting acupuncture treatments as well but only if he was given proper notice. If he was not told the day before that I was coming for his treatment he would disappear or hide under the bed.

Shortly before I started coming to his house he started to push off on one of his back legs which was amazing considering how much time had passed since his injury and the fact that he had shown no improvement up until that point. We started off treating him to try to encourage this improvement but also had the added benefit of getting him off of the steroids that he had needed for a very itchy neck. He’s still a little itchy these days but only to the point that he really, really likes it when you rub his neck. Which by the way helps to keep him still while he has needles in.

While most people who don’t know Nick would see him as disabled, in Nick’s mind he sees himself as perfect and whole. He doesn’t dwell on the past when he could use his legs normally and jumps into life with excitement and attitude. Sometimes I wonder if Nick is here to teach us all that being whole has nothing to do with the physical body and all about the way we see life.

Christmas lilies are extremely beautiful but also deadly to cats. Every year cats die from nibbling on lilies and once they become sick it is too late. Just a couple bites of lily will destroy the kidneys of a cat and send them into renal failure. Usually they die within 24 to 72 hours. Please do not bring lilies into your home if you have cats even if you think they will not eat them. It is heartbreaking to have to tell a cat’s person that there is nothing you can do. If your cat does eat a lily call your veterinary clinic or emergency hospital immediately and get instructions to induce vomiting.

In the mind of kittens, the world is a constant source of excitement forever being full of new and amusing things. Anything that moves should be chased after and pounced on as hunting skills are developed. “I have slain the fuzzy catnip octopus! I am the mighty hunter!” our kitten Raven seems to say. Moving toes are fair game and anything that can be climbed should be. Plants are a natural source of entertainment and are a nice place to rest one’s bottom. Although the humans sure get upset when you knock them over.

Raven being an indoor only cat has a smaller choice of prime hunting. Lately his victims have been the Lego people that my son keeps in his room. One day he took out a large number of the clones in his star wars battle and just the other day I want down to feed the cats to find that the conductor of the Lego holiday train had been slain, carried down two flights of stairs and left by the food dish.

It has been almost nine years since I have had a baby animal in the house and the joy that this little guy gives me is immeasurable. In the evenings he goes crazy running around the living room, scaling the scratching post in one leap and trying his best to get the other old fogy animals to join in. He has a habit of jumping onto your shoulder in a single leap that can be quite shocking and also make it very hard to get any work done. Of course to him loving him is my most important work.

After my sixteen-year-old cat Ziggy passed away, I realized that all my animals were aging fast and I really wanted some young energy in the house. I however had to find a cat who would fit in with three other old cats, two old dogs, and an eleven-year-old son who often has other kids over. We slowly began looking for a kitten or young cat and I hoped that we would be able to recognize the right one.

A few months into our search we made a trip over to the Seattle Humane Society and spent some time looking at young cats. I had worked at the Humane Society at the beginning of my career and was happy to run into one of the volunteers I had known who was working in adoption that day. After looking in the cat rooms we made our way over to the kittens, which were in smaller cages in the lobby area. There was one kitten who another couple was looking at, and he grabbed our attention. He was batting through the cage bars and climbing up the sides of the cage trying to get attention and he was all alone. The other cages all had multiple kittens yet he did not have the benefit of having others to snuggle or play with. He was the most beautiful kitten with solid black fur, big amber eyes, and a white spot on the very tip of his tail. On his cage was a sign which read, this kitten is testing FIV positive and cannot go to a home with other cats. Because he was a little under six months there was still a slight possibility that he would convert back to being FIV negative.

The other couple decided that they could not adopt him because they had other cats in their house but we were still very interested. Part of me thought, this is a crazy idea taking on another cat who may have health problems, but I knew this was the one who would fit into our home. When I picked him up he climbed up my shoulder and purred and clung to it for dear life. When we put him back in the cage to fill out the paperwork to adopt him he went crazy batted and calling out and saying “Please, please take me home, don’t leave me here.” The poor little guy had been found as a stray two months ago wandering the streets and he was ready to finally have a home. Because I was a vet and I knew the risk of him passing FIV to my other cats they let me adopt him even though I had other cats in the house.

While my intention was to keep him in the bathroom separated from our other cats for the first week, within 24 hours he had full run of the house. Not only was he fearless but he also liked our other animals and they liked him. Our dog Mel would follow him around, fascinated by his every move, and our oldest cat Basil would take him under his arm and groom him. Our most playful and youngest cat Melody spent the whole first day playing with him and was so worn out by the end that she had to spend the whole next day in bed resting. We even had to bring her food because she wouldn’t leave to eat.

We are so happy and blessed to have Raven in our lives and he makes each day better with his excitement over life and his love of sitting on shoulders and purring loudly. I know that because of his FIV positive status that he will most likely have more health issues than another cat but like most FIV positive cats he will probably live a normal length life.

Feline Immunodeficiency Virus positive cats are more prone to dental problems, are more likely to get infections, and have a higher risk of cancer than normal cats. Traditionally most shelters have euthanized all FIV positive cats but now some shelters are trying to adopt them out. FIV is transmitted much like HIV although the most common transmission is from deep puncture wounds in fighting. Because of this it is most common in unaltered male cats. It can also be passed from sexual intercourse and from mother to kitten. Kittens born to a FIV positive mother will test positive for FIV for up to six months even if they are negative because the test is for antibody against the virus and not the virus itself. Because of this it is very hard to adopt kittens from FIV positive mothers.

Additionally there is a new vaccine for FIV and a huge controversy that surrounds it in the veterinary community, mostly against the vaccine. There is no way to distinguish a FIV vaccinated cat from a FIV positive cat with our current testing. A vaccinated cat and her kittens will test positive for FIV. Most shelters still euthanize for FIV so if a vaccinated cat comes in she/he will be killed. In addition most veterinarians feel that the vaccine is not highly effective, and since the disease is not highly contagious, it is not advisable to give it. If veterinarians do give the vaccine a cat should be microchipped so that they will not be euthanized if they end up at animal control. There is a slight possibility that Raven is from a vaccinated mother and is not truly positive but there is no way for us to know this.

Raven has become an ambassador for FIV positive cats among by family and friends who have also fallen in love with him. If you are considering adopting a cat please consider helping one with FIV. The Seattle Humane Society has a whole room of adult FIV positive cats and often kittens, as do many other rescue groups.
Here is a link to The Seattle Humane Society.