I tried to transition my cats to wet food once before, on the advice of one vet I had seen. this was when we had three cats. They had been eating the dry Iams multi-cat, and when we mixed wet food in, they had a really hard time. They were always hungry, seemed much more anxious about food, were almost frantic. It was rediculous. This was giving the recommended amounts, still mixed with the dry food a bit. So we eased them back to the dry food and all was well.
I know that water in food is important, and probably easier on my cat than drinking water so much from her bowl. . But I read the labels on the canned foods, and they all have less protein content than the dry foods, and I wonder if that was why my cats were so hungry when we tried to transition. I'm going to go to pet valu this week and see what they have that I can try - I want to do the right thing for my cat and her diet, but it all depends what she will accept. Now that we only have one cat, the transition might be easier to make.
My mom's cat was 18 when she died, had CRF, hyperthyroid, and recovered from a bad bout of pancreatitis. She would never eat ANY of the special foods for renal, etc... she would only eat the cheap crap (wet) from super-valu. So that's what she ate... (She had quite a personality, that cat, and would tell you in no uncertain terms if things did not meet standards.
)
Lucy isn't ravenously thirsty, so I will try and gently ease some changes in but not stress it too much if it distresses her. Older people don't often like the diet changes prescribed for them either, and at some point you've got to decide how much to push and when to leave it alone. So I'm going to do some investigating and definitely will try wet food. But my past experience made me a bit wary. I know it's different when cats are on wet food from the beginning, and with the next cat we get, that will likely be the case.
I didn't ask the numbers of her lab values, I don't want to get too focused on numbers. (Treat the patient, not the numbers) She still has lots of energy, etc, so I'm not too worried yet. I know that with CRI, diet is only a small part of it, and that the disease will still progress anyway. I'm pretty confident that she has a lot of living left to do.