Did you know that cats can get something called “Cat Flu”? It’s nothing anything they catch from people, so don’t worry about you passing your cold to your cat; rather it’s caused by a virus that only attacks cats, resulting in a totally miserable cat – a cat that won’t get up, walk around, or eat their cat food.
How did I find out about Cat Flu?
I happened to adopt two kittens from a shelter several months ago and brought them home with me to live with my other two older cats. Unfortunately, I did I know that my cute little kittens were harboring the makings of cat flu that would soon spread to my other healthy adult cats, wreaking havoc on my household for about ten days.
I noticed it suddenly – both older cats, seemed unusually lazy. Actually, I would characterize them as looking quite miserable. All in all, this was quite odd for them, especially their new lack of interest in their cat food. By the way, one thing that can help to stengthen their immune system to prevent this from happening in the first place is to obtain a good premium cat food like Life’s Abundance from Dr. Jane Bicks. A premium cat food can really help over the long haul and may save you vet’s bills down the line as well..
Now back to the story: The bigger male feline had it worse. Prior to this, he would lie in the middle of the kitchen floor, his front paws crossed in front on him casually, while his back legs were generally flat out behind him, making him look like a he was in the middle of a gigantic leap, but we soon noticed that when he got into that position, he could not get up. He struggled to get his back legs up underneath his body, and my husband and I grew extremely worried, as he only seemed to get worse. We took him to the vet, but the vet told us she didn’t know what was wrong.
Over the next few days, we noticed that while our older female cat was still quite miserable, she’d get up and eat cat food, and use the litter box while the male cat would just lie in one place for hours. My sister-in-law, a nurse who has cats herself, warned us that the cat needed to eat and drink or that his kidneys would fail.
It wasn’t until this strange illness had passed that we came across “cat flu” on the internet – the symptoms of which matched perfectly what our cats had gone through.
So words to the wise: if you adopt a pet from a shelter and bring it home to other pets, segregate it for at least two weeks to make sure any germs the new pet may be incubating are gone before it gets exposed to your current house pets. It may be a bit inconvenient, but it could save you a lot of unnecessary stress to both you AND your pets.