Problems with back legs.

[Athene]

Now I have heard of dogs having problems with their back legs but never a cat. Sibyll who you see here is 22 years young ( - yes real years! Her mother is 2 years old and still with us!)She has over the last two months gradually lost the muscular strength in her back legs and often they collapse under her when she comes off her chair. She also plods very wonkily and does not have a cat-like gait! We are wondering if it is her diet. A couple of months ago, she had gastric trouble and the vet said we were to feed her mostly boiled chicken or turkey. We have gradually added in some of the little Solitaire Gourmet tins as  a meal change, they still have the boiled poultry mostly. The cats only have half a tin per meal. I give them 3 tiny meals now instead of the 2 ordinary size they used to have. The other thing the vet banned was Whiskas Milk and I wonder if the vitamins in this that she no longer has are causing Sibyll problems. We will be out in France this weekend and Monday will find me at the vet's. I wonder if steroid injections would boost her? What do you all think?

[mossie]

Either way, she definitely needs to see a vet.  However as to steriods, I would be very reluctant given my experience.  I had an elderly siamese who I lost a couple of years ago.  For the last year of his life he was pretty poorly but retained his iron will.  A couple of months before he was finally put to sleep, he was put on steriods.  I will never do this again.  The poor animal was so disorientated and actually seemed more sick, I nearly had him put to sleep then, I had even called the vet to come round and do it.  However, fortunately for my much loved cat, she couldn't come that day.  Anyway as it was (what I thought) the end, I didn't give him his steriods that day and he perked up.  He then kept going for another couple of months.  I ended up feeling terrible for what I had put him through.  The side effects were, I thought, worse than his array of ailments.

[Athene]

Thank you so much for sharing this with me! It was the English vet who had suggested steroids a while ago for Sibyll's mother who is really  really old and I thought then that I could see the bill shining in his eyes! You know a bit like a fruit machine when all the cherries come up in a line!  Do not get me wrong he is a good vet! But he knows how to charge, you rarely come away with a bill for less than three figures regardless of whether drugs are needed or not! ! It is for this reason that lots of not so well off people do not take their animals to the vet and will go miles to the nearest PDSA clinic. In France, if an animal is ill, the people do not think twice as the prices for treatment are so much more affordable! And if I think about it, he probably makes the same amount of money as our English vet as he treats so many more patients! (Probably works more hours though!) I feel sure that if you were truly without money our vet in France would treat the animal for free as he does all the castration of street cats found roaming regardless of whether there is enough money in the C.A.T.S. charity box!