Two cat questions

I have a cat with the same problem of being attracted to eating string and anything similar.

It's called pica syndrome -- if you google "pica syndrome in cats" you will find a wealth of information.

What I can tell you is that it can indeed KILL your cat if you let the cat eat a length of string.

It can very easily bind up the intestine and cause you either thousands of dollars in surgery, or a dead cat in a very nasty death.

Your mother is "shrugging off" something very serious, potentially.

When I have realized that my cat had eaten string, ribbon, etc, what can help is to feed a dollop of Vaseline.

That sounds weird but it works in one of two ways -- it can sometimes cause the cat to vomit up what it ate and it usually comes out in a bundle, or, it can ease the way as the string progresses through the intestinal system.

Then keep checking the poop in the litter box for the next couple of days. I've always seen the string come out in the end, sometimes even chopping up individual poops with the scooper, where I find he had chewed it in segments.

But if the whole length gets digested intact, that can be really, really serious. You can't be casual when you have a cat like this.

So, the best way to avoid disaster is prevention. You've heard of "child-proofing" a home, well you have to pica-proof. Get a mindset of keeping all string-like items well away from your cat, stored where he can't get it or cut into bits and thrown away immediately instead of left sitting around on a table.

I have to keep away from my cat the following:

String
Cat toys with ropey or stringy elements like "fishing rods" (have to put them in a cupboard between play times)
Elastic bands
Hair elastic for ponytails
Ribbon
Plastic bags
Sometime even paper and magazines, discarded envelopes, etc
Electrical cables, including phone chargers, TV wiring and connections, you name it

I can't have any of these items accessible to him; have to hide, cover, put away and monitor these things, or he'd chew through them.

I've been fortunate so far that he hasn't bitten through a live electrical cable, and that string and ribbon he has eaten was apparently eaten in segments that passed through him, rather than swallowed full-length.

But if your cat swallows string intact you've got serious worries ahead, so do take that seriously and decide now to "pica-proof" your home by keeping items like string banished to safe cupboards and drawers, and get yourself and your mother uber-aware of keeping it out of the cats' way.

Thank you so much! I'll do some homework on pica syndrome!
I fed my shorthair a few treats with vaseline, so I hope something will come of it. I'll talk to my mom about how we should look into taking him to a vet to be sure. I'd really, really prefer not to lose my baby!!

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"This is good... Isn't it?"

You're welcome, I hope it's helped a little bit. I had to find out about pica for the first time too, with my current cat, as my previous cats never had this problem.

Just be sure to "think pica" now around the house, being careful not to leave stringy things lying around. It's kind of like having to adjust to a child's safety, coming into your home, except in this case it's a cat who eats stuff that could wrap around his guts!

Wow, that was very informative. Even though it's impossible for me to own a cat, it's so good to read something on cats here.

I don't know if I'd feed him Vaseline with petroleum in it. I guess in an emergency you do what you have to do. And maybe the vet would say okay. But I used to have a tube of something similar to feed my cat to avoid hairballs. I think it would work the same way. It was kind of brown. I don't recall the name. In fact, it might have had petroleum in it for all i know. At the time I didn't think about it, but now I would look. If you're going to have to do it often I suggest looking for the product made for that purpose and see if it's a non-petroleum product since he's digesting it to an extent.

Edit to add: Now that I looked I remember it's a malt-flavored product. They do have other flavors, though. Also, they make petroleum-free versions with cod liver oil of lecithin and beeswax. You just have to look for it.

The perfect human being is uninteresting. -Joseph Campbell

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