Meme Monday
I saw this meme the other day, and it made me laugh. Giving cats medication can be extremely difficult. Ted is deathly allergic to cats, so I haven’t had to deal with this particular problem in almost 40 years. When our sweet dog, Genevieve, was elderly, she had to take a lot of medication. One of the medications she had to take was a particularly nasty tasting powder…I accidentally got some on my finger once and licked it off in a moment of stupidity. Horrible. So she hated it. I worked so hard to get them in her…I used to buy capsules and fill them with the powder, then wrap them in peanut butter and bread, and if she swallowed quickly and didn’t bite, she would take them. I don’t remember what other tricks I tried, just that nothing worked for long, and once she figured out that was what was happening, she would not be fooled again. She would shake her head and fight it and the nasty powder would go everywhere.
Unlike giving pills to a cat, though, I never suffered any injuries.
Any pill stories for me?
7 Comments
J
Mulder takes benedryl daily for allergies. I just put a little peanut butter on the tip of a spoon, put the pills in, and he licks it off of the spoon. I wonder if that would have worked with Gen? I wish I had thought of it then.
NGS
Our dog requires so many pills every day and her diet is extremely limited (no hotdogs or peanut butter because it causes GI issues), so there’s lots of wrangling to get her to take them. I’ve started paying extra to get one of her prescriptions through a veterinary lab so that they’ll add delicious flavoring. Gotta love having a special needs pet, I guess.
J
NGS, I had no idea you could do such a thing. I have bought ‘pill pockets’ in the past, and tucked pills in there. That worked for a long while with Gen.
nance
What a terrific meme. And so very true.
It’s not just pills that are impossible to give to cats. ALL meds are. I’ve had to administer liquid meds via a dropper, eye ointment that was supposed to be dragged across the eye surface, chews that they are *supposed* to love, and powders. Most of the time it has involved Rick holding the cat in a hammerlock of sorts and me doing the medicating as best I can whilst the sick cat produces all sorts of protest sounds and writhes and spits. I doubt that they ever get a full dose of anything.
I wonder if the pharmacist formulates cat medicine with all that in mind and makes it much stronger. You’d think injectibles would be the answer, but apparently not all meds can be effective that way.
J
Oh gosh, now I’m remembering having to give one of our cats medicine via a dropper, which she HATED, and took 2 people and was risky indeed. I wonder what people do who live alone? How to get the medication inside the damn cat?
Ally Bean
We had two cats. One didn’t fuss much about taking a pill but the other one was vehemently opposed to pills. I eventually had to crush her pills, dampen my finger, dip it in the pill powder, then grab her by the scruff of the neck, force her mouth open, and rub my finger on her rough tongue. It got the med in her, but what a morning ritual!
J
Ally, that’s a LOT of work, especially every day. Ugh.