To give up and assume my cat is just mental

[FloatingObject]

Two rescue cats. One completely normal. The other they believe was not weaned, poor thing.
When I adopted him (6 months) he didn't know about grooming. He never washed himself. He then learnt from watching my other cat and became obsessed. He now massively overrooms to the point where he has stripped his hind legs.

He has a great life in a big house, lots of cuddles, rural so he spends about 6 hours of the day wandering the fields. He gets on well with the other cat.

He eats a high quality grain free wet food diet.

I thought it might be a flea allergy but it's not. Tried an elimination diet but it doesn't seem to be a food allergy.

The skin is perfectly healthy, no redness. He just seems to really like licking himself.

The insulting thing is I went away for a week and left him with a pet sitter and his bloody fur grew back! Don't know what to make of that :-/ Maybe he secretly hates me?

So my AIBU is do I stop wasting money on ever more convoluted foods and ideas and just assume that he is indeed "mental" and just let him get on with it? He's otherwise a very spritely curious outgoing cat. It's just that my friends have nicknamed him Chicken Run....

You could try a little suit so he can't get to the bald spots. Once the fur regrows and its no longer sore it may break the habit. Unfortunately the habit might get progressively worse so better to address now really.

Cbd oil may help for the anxiety as its probably an anxious habit- do you know what routine your pet sitter was following?

My friends' cat does this and he eventually got prescribed kitty antidepressants, which helped a little bit, and Feliway helps in bursts of a few weeks at a time, but it's a real illness in cats with a fancy name (that I can't remember) and it's hard to treat :( your poor boy!

@JasonPollack
She followed the exact same routine as me :-/ I asked her if she did anything different but she couldn't say. She said she just followed my instructions.

I've tried petting him much less in case the attention actually stressed him out but it wasnt that. I've been adding Yumega oil to his evening meal but that hasn't made a difference (although his fur is now very glossy!).

All I can think is maybe I could try playing with him? I dont currently because hes been roaming so I thought that would do him for stimulation. But how I'm wondering if the cat sitter played with him maybe? I'll send her a text and ask.

@JasonPollack Also the skin isnt sore or irritated l. It's perfectly white and clear.

@honeyloops same as ours!

OP, take kitty to the vet and get some calming tablets. Our eldest girl had this combined with a flea allergy. My DP went away for a month and she totally ruined herself.

Now it tends to go away with Advocate but we keep a stash of her happy pills which we mix with cat milk every now and then.

@honeyloops Yeah I think it's called something like psychopathogenic alopecia or something like that. Apparently grooming is soothing for them so I get it, it's probably like humans biting their nails. It's just looks awful, but if it's what gets him going, then fair enough. It's just the fact that it grew back when I was away that's upsetting me a little. I wonder if I stress him out in some way

@JorisBonson Are you thinking of Zylkene? I might give that a go

Over licking can be a sign of stress. The fact that the fur manager to grow back while the cat was away, would definitely suggest the environment could be triggering the overlicking

Is he on a totally wet food diet or does he get some biscuits too? Cats need hard food to crunch otherwise their teeth will suffer. Also, and I mean this in the absolute kindest way as you clearly love your cats and want to do the absolute best for them, but if the cat sitter didn't do anything differently (i.e. give different food or something), then perhaps he is picking up on your anxiety..? I am guessing the cat sitter came in, checked on them, fed them and pretty much left again. Maybe try actually being less hands on for a while.

The only other thing I can think of is does he sit on your lap much? Could he be getting perfume or skin cream or something on his legs that either irritates him so he licks it off, or he maybe even likes the taste of? (I say this because I have a friends dog who goes nuts for the cream I put on my legs so I don't use it when I go to visit anymore! And no, it's not fish paste! ;) ).

Good luck!

@FloatingObject yes that's the one. They come in huge capsules so we break them into cat milk.

Is your cat on Advocate flea treatment too?

Our old boy had this too. It's anxiety, poor thing. Take him to the vet.

@JorisBonson No, he takes a pill that does both fleas and mites (but I have tried advocate before).

The pet sitter was live in, so I doubt she was less hands on than me. I'm going to try playing with him for half an hour every night and see if that makes a difference!

@SoundsAboutRight You could be right (re anxiety). I am quite an anxious person. Maybe he can sense something?

Try Zyklene on his food. It's the human equivalent of a mug of horlicks and really calms them down.

@Toddlerteaplease Thank you, I think I'll give this a whirl

We have an overgroomer that started initially with fleas (the stuff we were paying the vet did clearly didn’t work). The fleas are long gone (3-4 years) but she still does it.

We think it’s because she hates her ‘sister’ but short of rehoming one of them, we are stuck with the situation and just try our best to minimise the stress. It’s been worse this week due to the rain as the outside sister has been inside on stressy cats patch far more