I was speaking with the vet regarding my two elderly cats and their quality of life.
To be clear, they have designated their real estate, get twice daily food deliveries, stirred and “upgraded” as needed, directly under their noses. Towels are changed, pillows are fluffed, flea-combing is done daily. They also get plenty of lap time as requested. They’re retired, and deserving of all the pampering they can get. Even with all that, there is only so much I can do for their quality of life – how they’re feeling as they age. Much as they love sleeping in the sunshine, at times I wonder just how comfortable they are which motivated me to have a conversation with that special veterinarian who they will only meet once.
My main reason for concern is for Juno. He seems fine throughout the day, then promptly 10 minutes after I go to bed he starts squawking. The squawking continues at two hour intervals throughout the night. And for a barley 7 lb cat, he can really yell. In a former life my guess is he was a goose, his squawks sound rather like a goose honking. I was concerned that he was in pain…some sort of pain that only comes at night? I did suspect that he might be scared of being alone at night…though he refuses to budge off his chair by the window in the living room.<br /> <br /> After describing the late night/early morning antics with the vet, she said he probably has sundown dementia. He gets confused when the lights go out and no one is in the living room “where did all the activity go?” is what he may be feeling. His regular vet prescribed something to “take the edge off.” It works with some success, in order to give him enough so that I can get a good nights sleep, he tends to look like he’s on a bad trip – eyes get dilated and he just looks like he’s upset.
This vet suggested I try the cannabis oil which is now legal for pets in California (I don’t know what the laws are in other states). I made calls to my local gourmet pet food stores and both of them had a cannabis oil for cats and dogs in a coconut oil base. So I’m off to pic some up, and will follow up with the results. It takes about 2 weeks for cannabis oil to really work, so I want to record any results.