Veterinary diet vs actually eating stuff!

[crimesagainstwine]

Has anyone had their cat on a strict feeding regime and then reached the point of despair as cat will not eat anything within that "range" of foods?

For context our lovely boy was diagnosed with kidney failure 5 years ago - he is nearly 15 years old now. We have bought the requisite renal food but to be frank he is now bored stiff with it!

He will lick a bit of the juice (totally ignore dry food) and go days without engaging with it (we don't leave him hungry obviously or wet food out that long!).

In despair we have given him other food from supermarket ( so not renal/vet prescription) - he loves it and will eat happily. Licks the bowl and wants more. Think higher end stuff but not really appropriate for his "condition - Purina (melting hearts, Purina one etc..)

So question is ... at what age does a vet diet become secondary to cat eating and enjoying food?

If he enjoyed renal food (ad ate it!) it would be a no-brainer but at his age I think "just enjoy him being happy".

Anyone got similar experience please? I feel guilty when he doesn't eat renal food and bad when he eats "non-prescriptive" food)

For info he is doing well - urine/weight/bloods all good

Honestly Op at the age of 15 I would let your boy eat whatever makes him happy.

Ask your vet. Ours said it was better our very elderly cat in kidney failure ate anything than nothing but eating the kidney diet would reduce his pain and suffering . We shopped around until we found one he liked

Yes! I have exactly this issue. We compromise by giving Hills KD+mobility crunchies and then intersperse the kidney wet food (royal canin normally, as he now refuses the hills) with senior cat food of other brands - most senior (11+) formulations are low salt / kidney friendly but they aren’t low protein. Which of course is why they do t taker of cardboard, like the low protein kidney ones do.
Our cat was becoming very thin and since he’s 20 (twenty!) it’s quality of life not quantity . Readings are slightly worse but he’s not very thin any more and much happier

@Sooverthemill which one did he agree with?

Try different brands - mine won't eat Royal Canin or Hills but will take the Purina Proplan one. Buy online; much cheaper!
There is also some drops which you can get from your vet called Pronefra which you add to regular wet food to make it more kidney friendly.

We did the same thing at the same age. She had a good 6 months of eating whatever she wanted, knowing we were now in palliative care.

@AtillatheHun I had to look it up as my old boy died 3 years ago. Hills wet and royal canin dry but I used to get a German brand of wet that I can't find anymore on zooplus. Our vet told us to just buy small quantities of anything as he would probably get very fussy. We occasionally gave him poached chicken when he was very off colour. He was a total a star I still miss him now.

Oh and different flavours are often rejected. So do buy small amounts before committing £££. And don't buy from vet! Animed are good for foods

You can buy taster packs of the different types of renal food online to try some options which might be worthwhile. I think hills also do a stew now which sounds tastier. The renal foods have by far the best evidence around them but if they won't work then a phosphate binder (like the pronefra mentioned above) is the next best thing, you also want to avoid high protein foods ideally (the special diets are modified to have easily digestible protein but that's harder to work out with most foods).

I have exactly the same issue with my dog, I give her one renal packet food which she will just about tolerate but her evening meal I give her a meal she actually enjoys, I would rather she had a shorter happier life than a longer miserable one as that is only a benefit to me and not her so that would be selfish on my part, so long as she is not in pain (hopefully the masses of medication she is on helps this) I will give her food she enjoys.

Thanks all - great to know that I am not alone and some brands/products I've not heard of so will have a look for them too.

We had the same problem.
She was 13 and had stage 3 renal failure. She struggled to eat half a pouch some days. We tried every renal food you name it we bought it.
The vet did say to us that the important thing was to get some food down her so she had senior food from then on. She lasted 2 years from diagnosis.