05/12/2024
Who remembers Fig?! (most days we call him Figgy-Pudding. Lol) Big update!
Fig was a tiny newborn kitten when he was found at a colony with his siblings and feral mama. Once they weaned, mama was TNRd and returned to her colony. Fig was not well from a very young age. We thought mama had passed on a parasite of some sort, he had chronic diarrhea. Nothing helped though and f***l test after f***l test showed up negative. As they grew, his siblings all went to licensed rescue and were adopted but Fig stayed with us, the vet could not figure out what was causing the horrible diarrhea. His belly was huge!
We treated him for FIP, 84 days of shots and still he didn't get better. We tried every special diet and finally we found one food, Biome, that stopped the diarrhea...after a YEAR of this mystery! Yay! BUT... After quite a few months on the Biome, his belly was still enlarged, he still was not gaining weight, he acted starved all the time and his hair was falling out. We were at the point where we were trying to decide if his quality of life was suffering so much that we should let him go.
One day when discussing his mystery issues with a vet tech, she remembered a dog who had Exocrine Pancreatic Insufficiency, a fairly rare disease, and he had chronic diarrhea and weightloss. Our vet was on board with starting treatment immediately to see if it would help, we were grasping at anything at this point! Now 3 months later we are positive the mystery is solved, Fig has Exocrine Pancreatic Insufficiency! It is fairly easy to treat too! He can eat ANY food now, but it has to be sprinkled with a Pancreatic enzyme powder. That's it! He is finally gaining weight, slowly, and is doing great! He has spots of fur that may never come back, they look almost like scars, and we aren't sure if he will ever be fully healthy, but he is happy, not struggling with diarrhea, and seems healthier by the day! Thanks to everyone who followed his story, donated for vet visits and have been so supportive!
