16 year old cat not eating or drinking and hiding

[thatsmyhouse]

I spoke to the vet this morning and have an appointment booked for Monday morning but now I'm wondering whether I should see the emergency vet sooner. She ate yesterday morning, but not her usual amount, and then disappeared until my bedtime -she is usually in most of the time. She went straight upstairs without even looking at her food and went under a bed - again, unlike her. I've taken food up there but she's not interested. She has now come out from the bed and is sitting up on the windowsill looking out, but still no interest in food.

I don't know what to do for the best.

Do you think your mog could be being bullied by another cat? Stress can put them off their food and make them want to hide.

Is she drinking at all? I wouldn't necessarily take her to the vets now, unless she's showing signs of stress / is in distress.

Mine are 16 and one occasionally has an off day and will hide under a blanket sleeping and not interested in food.

It is worrying when they're not themselves, especially at this age. Hoping she's just having an off day 🩷

Former veterinary receptionist - I'd have offered you an emergency appointment today, & if my own 15 year old DCat was presenting like it I'd want her seen today. It may be a case of sit & wait rather than an appointment slot.
She could become extremely dehydrated by Monday & hiding is often the main indicator of pain or illness in cats

Edit - maybe try offering some particularly smelly food first (tinned fish or warmed up cat food) as if she has a stuffy nose and cannot smell the food it can discourage them from eating.

My 14 year old cat stopped eating and went and laid under a bush all day. I went and offered food but she wasn't intrested and as it got dark I picked her up and brought her into the house and she just sat on my lap (she wasn't a lap cat).
I knew it was time and took her to the vet next day and she was PTS a few hours later when DD got home from her BF's
It it had been a weekend I would have got an emergency appointment

Oh that's sad @Hoppinggreen . I'm going to try the heated/smelly food thing and then potentially see a vet tomorrow. It will be the emergency one as mine shut at midday for the weekend.

It was very sad and I still miss her BUT I have had lots of cats and in the past made the mistake of keeping a very sick cat going too long so now we (with vets advice) PTS rather than prolong suffering
It might not be the end for your cat but if it is please try to be brave and give her the end she deserves

Oooo poor cat. Maybe she has eaten something she shouldn’t of outside. If you really need a vet pets at home have a walk in vet not sure if you have one there. It’s only really liquids they need until Monday . Does your cat like cat milk? Tuna etc but don’t squeeze the water out of the tin give it straight from the tin so it’s like water tuna - that’s what we had to do when our cat was poorly just needed a bit of fluid. It just licked it up the flavour so at least it had a few ml of water in him.

(just to give you hope we had very similar - spent £1200 on vet bills / stomach scan / iV) literally couldn’t find nothing but 7 days later fit as a fiddle personally I think ours was poisoned as time was the healer as didn’t want to pay another £400 for bloods but try to keep water up that’s the key)

Hope the cat feels better soon

She's just eaten a small portion of warmed tuna - sat up straight away as if to say, 'why didn't you bring me this in the first place?' So I'll offer her a bit more in a bit with cautious optimism.

Oooooo that’s brilliant news!
below is also what the vet gave us at the time but I bet you can buy it from a pet shop.

hydro care from purnina - pro plan (hydration packet) thought I’d mention that too. Just keep as much wet food as possible and no dry / hard biscuits

Hopefully tom the cat will feel a bit better tom x

Have you checked her for wounds/abscesses? Those can often fester but they aren't always obvious. I hope she rallies.

Different circumstances but when we brought our rescue cat here he was very reluctant to eat/drink so I was in a mad panic. I contacted the CP lady who coordinated his adoption and she suggested tuna in spring water, and draining the water out into a bowl as a drink. Not only did it do the trick in terms of enticing him to eat, it got him out of his hidey hole.

I'm in a similar boat with my youngster (2). He's not hiding though, and stopped eating and drinking on Thursday. Vet check was Friday and I've been basically hydrating him with Lick-e-Lix!
He finally started asking for food again today (thank heavens) so hang in there.
(Dotting nosetip with a wet finger gets a tongue lick reaction so can get a bit of liquid in that way. So can wetting fur as they often lick it dry, but not if you think it's a hairball issue as we suspect!)

Best wishes and hope your little lady is soon back to normal

It's her teeth! She started this grinding noise and pawing her face yesterday and the vet confirmed today. So she is booked in for Wednesday for assessment, tartar removal and may be some emergency extractions. It will be expensive and is not covered on her insurance but at least it should be fixable. It was mentioned in the summer at her check-up but I didn't take it further, which obviously I feel shit about now.

In more good news though she has had 3 pouches of Felix soup stuff, which meant I got the painkiller into her, so hopefully she can be a bit more comfortable while waiting for the op.