For over a year, Ozzy has been obsessively pulling out his fur. I’ve taken him to the vet several times as we tried to find a physical problem that might cause him to do that. We tried a number of remedies. None of them worked.
A few days ago, he pulled an entire patch of fur out on his shoulder, leaving bare skin. I hauled him to the vet’s yet again. Getting him there turned into a comedy routine. I had no trouble putting Ozzy into the carrier. I secured the gate. But as I walked down the hallway, the gate popped open and Ozzy flew out and immediately went into hiding.
With Randy’s help, we managed to corral him and got him into the carrier with a bit more struggle this time. I checked to be sure the gate was securely latched, then I went to get the car warmed up and back up into the driveway where it’s easier to get the carrier into the car. Randy came down to say that Ozzy had gotten out again.
This time we looked closely and discovered the problem. One of the front latches was missing. Ozzy is so heavy (19 lbs), that when he’s in the carrier and the carrier is lifted, it deforms the carrier to the point where the gate no longer stays in place. We quickly grabbed an older carrier and wrestled him inside with a bit more difficulty this time.
I finally got him to the vet’s. She checked him over, even checked his blood pressure. I think that was a first for me, having a cat’s blood pressure checked. She put a cuff around his tail to do it! Anyway, it was high because he was stressed, but not high enough to be a factor.
I already suspected and the vet came to the same conclusion that it isn’t a physical problem, but some kind of stress reaction, most likely due to his continuous problem with Kelly. The vet figures there are confrontations happening that are too subtle for people to see, something only cats register between one another.
The upshot of all this is that we’ve started Ozzy on the kitty Prozac, so Kelly and he are on it together. She said in this type of case, it doesn’t usually work to have only one of the cats on Prozac, rather than both of them.
I’m not seeing much of a difference yet, but he’s only had two doses. One odd thing he’s started doing is getting inside a much smaller carrier that I have sitting out with the gate held open. I’m putting that carrier outside on the woodbox during the day, then bringing it back inside at night. I’m putting food just inside the front of it to gradually get Smokey relaxed about putting his head into the carrier. The end goal, eventually, is to get Smokey to go all the way inside, close the door, and take him to the vet. We’ll see how that goes.
Meanwhile, Ozzy loves the small carrier because he’s a cat and he’s weird.
