Sassy cats — Hazel is back on the wagon

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Where is dinner?

Or the diet as the case may be. She pudged up when I wasn’t looking. She snarfed up every spare kibble she found even if it wasn’t intended for her.

Sneaking some chow.

Now she has to lose two pounds. That’s a lot for a cat. It will be more painful for me as she is a drama queen when it comes to food.

She has also learned to jump onto the dresser that contains the forbidden (to her) dry kibble. There is good news in that message as prior to her last weight loss she wasn’t able to jump that high.

There is always something going on at this cat house!

Everyone here wishes everyone out there a happy and festive Cinco de Mayo! (Hazel wants to know what we are serving for that event. She has her sombrero ready!)

No, this is not Hazel! Source: cutecatsinhats

56 thoughts on “Sassy cats — Hazel is back on the wagon”

  1. I empathize with Hazel. Two pounds do present a problem and Being cut off from the kibble is cruel and unusual punishment. Maybe you could let her eat as much as she wants and inn a few years get her kitty liposuction? Please send her my best, Roxie Dammit aka The Other Cat

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  2. Cats are such divas about food and eating habits. Weight control is a real problem a cats are crafty and not into dieting suggestions
    RC Cat gets real grumpy if staff is slow/limiting with food. (She only gets a few small bites at a time as (1 )she has always gulped food way too fast and them throws it up immediately – and then demands more food as she is starving, obviously. And (2) she loves salmon and Molly’s bowl is right there full of high dollar breed specific malamute/husky food heavy on salmon. Molly is a grazer and it’s available…only RC gulps it down and then walks out of the room and throws it all up – to emphasize if only Staff had fed her on time, there would be less floor cleaning necessary.

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  3. Does Hazel ever try to eat more than her own food? I wondered if cutting back on her supply ever contributed to finding her trying to sneak and steal from one of the other bowls. Hope she didn’t party too hard!

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    • She absolutely seeks out more than her own. Most of the other cats are grazers so if they leave a dish with food in it to come back later, there is none. I started feeding the others in places that Hazel couldn’t access (tops of cabinets). That worked but she has managed to jump on top of the kibble cabinet the last couple of months. I thought that would be self-limiting (one day she couldn’t make it up there because of her weight) but so far, I still catch her up there.

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  10. How do you do that? It is hard enough for me to lose weight, let alone the cat. We lost our first cat to obesity and its complications. We are trying to be more careful with this cat (who looks a bit like Hazel by the way), but she is a wanderer and goes outside – how do we know she’s not supplementing her diet with the occasional mouse?

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    • I had a chubster a decade ago that went outside. If I cut back on food inside she caught more stuff so she never did lose weight. She had diabetes and at that time, even with daily injections, it was hard to control. She suffered from peripheral neuropathy (leg and mobility issues). It was so hard to watch and she passed at 15 (earlier than most of our cats). Hazel is 12. I don’t cut back on her food but on her ability to eat the food of the other cats, hence the kibble on the cabinet (which worked for a long time) and then picking up any food that the other cats don’t finish. She has gained weight since these pictures were taken and is walking slowly. I want to keep her healthy but I’m not setting the expectation too high. Slight weight loss and keeping that stable will do. She will still be overweight. She also has issues keeping clean when she puts on weight.

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    • I have set my expectations lower. There must be some cycle where if she gains too much she loses access to the cabinet. I would like to see her about 4 lbs lighter but I know that’s not going to happen unless I lock her up.

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  16. Don’t be so popish about numbers. As long as you can feel her ribs while you are petting her, it’s ok. Things demand action when you can either see ribs (then she would be underweight, I understand that is not a prob with Hazel) – or you cannot even feel the ribs anymore. Then it IS time for a diet.

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    • It’s hard to find her ribs. She should be a 9lb. cat (small boned). She’s at 15 lbs and that’s down from her all time high of 18 lbs. She gets fatigued and because of her former high weight she carries a lot of excess skin (more so than a normal cat). I don’t want her to gain as she had issues breathing and walking but I have lowered my expectations. If I can get her under 14, I’ll be happy and she will be too. She will never be thin. She is a semi-feral cat and is terrified of not having another meal although she’s lived here 11 years. We haven’t missed a meal yet.

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            • I don’t know. The vet didn’t use that word. The back two teeth (one on either side) had the roots showing. I took it to mean the gum was receding and making it sensitive or painful. We couldn’t touch her mouth at all. Or pill her. She would scream and fight (and I can handle cats pretty well even uncooperative ones). That’s when I thought something was wrong with her teeth. She wouldn’t let the vet check her. She had to be sedated and prepped for a dental procedure before the vet could check her teeth. After her recovery, she was different cat. Bad teeth make a huge difference.

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  17. Your first picture had me laughing and then the one at the end is just too cute!
    Good Luck to Hazel and to you. 🙂
    Dewey should probably go on a diet too…. but Ssh… don’t tell him that. 🙂

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