Cat drinks too much - common medical causes ruled out

[ladymcts]

I got a new kitty two weeks ago. Her medical history is unknown, approximately 12 years old. I am aware from the former owner that she had issues with peeing outside the litter box, and I was taking the risk that we can make things work here (in spite of the fact that I just moved into a new house and really don’t want to ruin it - yes I’m nuts).

Another thing that I knew before taking her was that she drinks a lot of water. And pees a lot. Since getting her, I’ve had her isolated in a bathroom so I could monitor food and water. She’s a 7lb cat and taking in 32 oz of water a day. In two weeks of scooping litter every single day, she’s gone thru an entire 30lb bag of clay litter.

Part of the reason I took her in was that I already have a cat who’s in moderate Kidney failure, and gets a prescription diet. He was also a huge drinker until he went onto the Kidney care diet, and his drinking went way down.

But on our first trip to the vet with the new girl, her bloodwork came back all good! No kidney problems, no liver problems, no diabetes, no thyroid issues, all normal normal normal.

So … I googled excessive drinking and found suggestions that some cats may not like dry food and thus overcompensate with drinking water. Maybe it’s been a learned behavior for some reason. But has anyone on here ever run across the problem of too much drinking when it doesn’t seem to have a medical cause? (Or maybe had a cat with a weirder medical cause than what we’ve already tested for?)

Thanks in advance!

[pony_baloney]

Most cats normally don’t get enough water. My neighbor had an older cat that did the same. He ended up having…I’m thinking congestive heart failure??? I can’t remember exactly but they did drain the fluid a few times but eventually had him euthanized.

I’m sure your vet has ruled this out; my first thoughts were diabetes or hyperthyroidism. My late cat from years ago had hyperthyroidism but didn’t drink THAT much water.

What if you fed wet food? A quality dehydrated food like The Honest Kitchen will provide water in his diet and he may not need so much outside of his food.

[Rackonteur]

Kudos to you for taking this kitty in and caring for her. I wish I had advice to offer but since your vet has ruled out kidney disease and hyperthyroidism, I don’t have a clue. I do suggest switching to canned food (slowly, so as not to upset her tummy), because cats can get a lot of water from canned food (if they will eat it; my 12yo prefers dry).

And pouring an entire 20-lb. jug/box of litter into your litterbox all at once. Deep littering helps with all that peeing (a little).

Best wishes to you and kitty!

[horsenut_8700]

Kidney issues don’t show in blood work until something like 70% of the kidney function is gone FYI. I would also switch to a wet food only diet. Is the dry food she’s eating high in sodium or anything that may be making her drink this much?

[syreino]

I have a now 6 year old who about 2 1/2 years ago started drinking way too much. Urine sample didn’t show diabetes, but did show a bladder/kidney infection. So we treated her with antibiotics, and the heavy drinking seemed to lessen. Then it started again, we treated her, it lessened. This cycle went on for the better part of a year (three times treating), so I finally went to a different vet for further diagnostics.

The urinalysis was negative as were the definitive tests for FELV and FIV (she’s vaccinated, but they were questioning anyways), blood work was normal, thyroid normal - all the tests were normal. So it appears that the antibiotics were useless previously, but I did see a reduction in her drinking, so a placebo effect I guess? They suggested an ultrasound - which showed a lot of abnormalities in her kidneys, spleen and I forget what else at this point. They did a biopsy for lymphoma, which was negative thankfully! They referred me to an internal medicine vet - who tested her for every possible infectious disease (she’s my barn cat). She came back positive for several of them, we treated for mycoplasma and toxoplasmosis and the drinking has come and gone still. The internal medicine vet says it is “probably normal for her”.

Her half brother had an acute episode of pancreatitis and they did an ultrasound to confirm - same specialty hospital, and low and behold, his kidneys had many of the similar abnormalities as hers. And their mother, who was a feral barn cat that I finally was able to trap and fix after rehoming a few kittens and keeping 4, would have bouts of not eating, one of Riley’s issues with the increased drinking, and now I haven’t seen her in 10 days - I believe she went off to die because she didn’t trust me enough to help her (she lived with me for 8 years and never let me touch her, never ate food in my presence, so I honored her wish and didn’t try to trap her when I felt she was failing and it really hurts my heart, but it is what she wanted) - so I don’t know if she had the same abnormalities or not, but I suspect since she was the link to Riley and Cinders. The two others (Morgan and Hope) - they appear to be healthy with no excessive drinking issues and if I had all the money in the world, they’d also have ultrasounds so I could check them out.

The three failed barn cats in the house have normal drinking and urinating; while Riley drinks a lot, and when she urinates in her box overnight (not always), it is really big, like three times the size I would expect for her. She appears healthy now and there are no plans to follow up by the internal medicine vet because she’s healthy.

So that’s a long story to say, I feel your pain and wish we could know what is the cause of their excessive drinking. Good luck and thanks for taking her in. If she’s happy, and “appears” healthy, most vets will think you are nuts (I have three different practices that think I am at this point), but we are their only advocates.

[Ruth0552]

Did they check a urinalysis for bacteria, crystals, etc? That wouldn’t necessarily cause essescive thirst but might explain the peeing a lot/outside the box.

My PU/PD cat turned out to be diabetic.

[ladymcts]

Thanks everyone - I’ve come back here to reply a couple of times and each time got interrupted. Thanks for your comments and suggestions, much appreciated!

Diabetes, hyperthyroidism, and kidney function all ruled out.

Increasing depth of litter in the box … started that yesterday and I’m liking it, thanks for the suggestion!

Dry Food - She was getting dry food from the grocery store. I’m not even sure what brand it was because they gave it to me in a container, and I knew I’d be switching her to the kidney care diet that my other cats get, so I didn’t ask. She’s now fully switched over and I think her drinking has gone down a little. She’s getting introduced to the other kitties now so monitoring her water intake is harder, but at night I put her up in the bathroom and the 16oz is all gone by morning.

Wet Food - I’ve started introducing wet food, and she really likes it. Unlike my other cats who lick the juices off and leave the rest, she finishes it. Only problem is it’s giving her the runs. So I’ll keep at it and see if her system will adjust.

Syrieno - thanks for your story, sounds like there could be something hereditary going on, interesting! I too like to joke that I am a hypochondriac for my pets, because I seem to have a collection of ailments of one sort or another.

Urinalysis - I failed. I’m now an hour away from my old vet, and the morning I took her in, I tried to get a sample but failed. It’s not likely I will be getting another and running it down to them like I might have when I was just 15 minutes away. Am hoping to find a closer vet soon.

Other Info - We are going ahead and trying a course of antibiotics. My vet said with it being a long-standing problem, then a UTI problem of that long should show up on the bloodwork which it didn’t. Once that antibiotic is finished, I’ll put her on some probiotics that I have left over from another kitty, I think I’ve got 2 weeks worth.

Dumb question of the day … is it normal-ish for a cat’s pee to come out in multiple short spurts, as opposed to a steady stream? I can’t say I’ve paid a ton of attention to litter habits before this, but when I had a litter box in my bedroom and I’d hear my boys going at night, I don’t remember it being broken up like that. She also doesn’t squat very far down, which could be part of the “peeing outside the box” problem … standing nearly upright and it shooting out a ways behind her.

[ladymcts]

“Dumb question of the day … is it normal-ish for a cat’s pee to come out in multiple short spurts” – google says no. Will have a chat with the vet about this new info.

[HenryisBlaisin]

I would ask to have a glucose test run on fresh blood. IME, when it’s drawn into a tube with an anticoagulant, it gets a lower reading than it actually is…my cat’s diabetes diagnosis was delayed because the vet was testing blood from a tube rather than an ear/pad prick, and then we went through the same thing trying to get him regulated–vet would test the blood from a tube, say his numbers looked great. I discovered by accident when I tested him right before an appointment and then his reading was much lower at the vet’s. I asked for a retest using fresh blood and it matched the one we’d done at home, much higher than the one the vet had just done.

[Ruth0552]

@ladymcts

“Dumb question of the day … is it normal-ish for a cat’s pee to come out in multiple short spurts” – google says no. Will have a chat with the vet about this new info.

NO. No it is not normal. Usually if you can’t bring a sample they will offer a cystocentesis to get urine. It sounds awful but cats really don’t seem to care about it- just a needle prick into the bladder. If she is urinating in small, frequent quantities it could definitely be a bladder issue. When you said she is urinating a lot I assumed it was a large quantity when she urinates. My diabetic cat makes HUGE clumps of litter from urinating too much, but it’s a large quantity not frequent amounts.

[ladymcts]

No, I would say this was a large amount, and does make huge spots in the litter box. But it’s just that the stream was kind of staccato sounding, didn’t exactly even stop, just stuttered a lot. If she were a male I’d assume there was a clog in the pipes. Less common with females, but not impossible. I’ll make sure to get a urine sample to them.

[Rackonteur]

Urinalysis – can you take her to the vet and leave her there all day? That’s what my vet had me do when my kitty was having problems. They got the sample from her. Turned out to be a UTI. She wasn’t peeing a large volume, just a little bit, often.