He's Leaking
We have been having problems with Vito's pee schedule. He is great about going to the door most of the time, however he usually asks to go outside about x2/hr, sometimes up to x4/hr. Now that he is 13 weeks old this can't be happening. He also drinks excessively. Vito often breaks when he is working for his dinner to get some water and then runs back to me. If we are gone for a while and he doesn't get any water, his stomach expands after we get home and he drinks drinks drinks.
When he was 11wks and went in for his shots we thought he had a bladder infection, but the vet didnt think so because he wasn't licking himself and because he was drinking a lot of water. So we waited a week and monitored his water intake more closely. This past Monday we went in and had a urinalysis done because he was still drinking,peeing, repeat 20 billion times. Unfortunately the results showed that he did not have a bladder infection. However, his specific gravity was very low. So, we go some other tests done to see if it was a kidney problem- it was not. That left as an explanation diabetes insipidus, a really rare disorder. But since it is so rare I decided to heavily monitor his water intake and record every single time he drank and peed. I took 3 days worth of data into the vet this morning. He peeed an average of 19 times/day and was limited to 12-14oz of water/day (what should be normal h20 for his weight). The deprivation did cause his pee rate to go down to 1 trip/hr, but Vito was constantly wanting water and was even resorting to eating snow.
The vet said that he really thinks this is not a behavioral problem, but that Vito does indeed have diabetes insipidus. Lucky us. The only way to tell for sure is to do a really costly and dangerous water deprivation test, but starting him on the medication can be a cheaper way of telling. So hopefully the meds will be in next Monday and we can see... Basically diabetes insipidus (not the same as the more common type of "sugar" diabetes) is when ADH is not being produced, or very little, so his body can't concentrate his urine= peeing lots, and drinking lots to keep up with his pee rate.
I'm still hoping he doesn't have it, but there's no way else left to turn since his bloodwork ruled everything else out. So we will see if the meds help. On the plus side, I decided to get health insurance for Vito a couple of weeks ago after a lot of debating. So while this is becoming very expensive, we have some relief even if he has to be on insurance with this company for his whole life.
And in an ironic turn of events, Luke was rushed to the emergency vet clinic at 10pm Monday night. I came home from work to find blood all over the ferret's newspapers (who had been sleeping in their cage). Luke is pissing blood. Since a bladder infection in male cats can quickly lead to a blockage which can kill them in 24hrs I went to the vet right away. Luckily they didn't find any blockage, but they couldn't do a urinalyis since his bladder was empty. They sent me home with meds, but I had to take him back to the vet today since they weren't sure if the meds would help without seeing the results of the urinalysis. So today we spent more money on Luke and came home with some more meds as well (anti inflamatory). And Luke is one grumpy kitty. He's yelling at any ferret or dog that dares to even look at him. And he is not using his litter box since he associates it with evil. Thankfully he is at least going on the ferret's newspapers instead of somewhere else. The one thing that Luke is happy about though is eating presciption canned food for the next 2 weeks (more money).
Oh, and Vito is leaking again. Since we decided to get the meds this afternoon we put Vito back on unrestricted water (he's happy), but that means he ocassionally leaks pee. It looks like he's writing a message to us on our carpet.
