Cat over grooming all his fur out

[Upallnightsndallday]

Know I need a vets visit but in the meantime looking for shared experiences

my cat about 8 yrs old has started over grooming can see him pulling out his fur legs and belly getting bald…
had a lot of stress in the house this year he lost his brother In May and now a new baby added to the mix so may be stress caused

anyone else had this and how did they resolve it / other cause ideas

thanks so much

Is there any chance he has fleas - that can cause over-grooming?

Can you get a cone on him temporarily? Maybe stress try feliway? Or fleas as suggested above

Steroid injections totally stopped mine

The 2 usual causes for this are either behavioural, down to stress etc, or allergies. Have you changed anything like food, or not kept up to date with flea treatment?

It sounds like a lot has changed at home so could well be stress. You could try feliway or zylkene to help calm him down. The vet will probably check him over for any physical causes, injury etc. He could be doing it if in pain, and if they don't find anything they might offer a steroid injection which would help ease any itching down to allergies etc.

Thank you I’ll flea treat him again tonight and see if I can get a cone for a bit thank you all

If it's stress I'm not sure a cone will help matters. If his skin is looking raw or sore night be an idea but if he's just bald it might best to just put up with it for now.

If you do want to try and stop him, a babygro might be less restrictive for him?

Personally it's not something I would use a cone for as he'll probably find wearing one even more stressful and that's likely to cause issues elsewhere.

Edit: One of mine is an over-groomer. He's very anxious in general and I think the over-grooming is just a symptom of that. We've tried Feliway with no success and the vet has recommended trying that Stinky Stuff for cats.

One of mine over groomed, the cones made it worse. We had pet rescue and feliway plugged in, special anti allergy food, and in the end steroid injections, which worked.