My lil sweet potato updates

Quick cheat sheet for any new or confused peeps, I have two cats, a boy and a girl and they're siblings from the same litter, both turning eight this fall:
📍 Dewen (pronounced Devon), female, smaller calico (white, black, & ginger bits)
📍 Arthur, male, MASSIVE CHONKER (the fat one), grey black and white

Tldr its been a super stressful few months but new vet thinks she has allergies and temporarily managed her symptoms to finally give us all some much needed relief! Couple more weeks till they flare again but hopefully the new diet helps by then (that's the plan anyway, fingers crossed!)

I know lots of you got invested in lil dewens health after she took another turn for the worse again a few months back. It's been real tough, obviously been a huge source of anxiety and stress for me, some days I'd just sit there bawling in exasperation I couldn't help her, and worried what it could be, or spiral into a panic attack worried about respiratory complications again and losing her Esp since she's older now.

I didn't talk much about how it was effecting my mental health and I'm honestly not sure why. Maybe just trying to compartmentalize to survive or maybe a bit self conscious over how hard I was taking it over "just a cat" you know how some people can be. But fuck it like yeah I'm incredibly attached to them, they're the most maternal I'm ever gonna be, they feel like my children, I was there when they were born, I almost hand reared Dewen bcs she was such a sickly runt she wasn't gonna make it without help. They follow me from room to room, they make me laugh, and almost every time I limp in my front door Arthur is immediately at my feet tail all a buzz hopping about. In the brutally painful mornings whilst waiting for meds to kick in Arthur comes and snuggles on my chest purring like a an engine.

Yeah they're a huge pain iny ass, but I probably would have jumped off my roof awhile ago without them, a lot of days they're the only thing that brings me a smile and I I give zero fucks who knows it. I'd also probably willingly leave the majority of the people I know on a desert island to die if I had to to save my cats, I'm dat bish 👌err I mean Uhm not you guys tho 😂

SO for months she's been mauling herself raw and bloody all over (eyes, ears, cheeks, paws, legs, random tummy spots). She's had numerous vet visits (very stressful for everyone) and so many different rounds of medications... Most days I used all the spoons (spoon theory if you're confused) I had just to get all her meds in order and take care of her to make her as comfortable as poss and many days it broke my heart when I wasn't even well enough for that.

We finally found a new vet who is wonderful a few weeks ago on a rec from another client via my RMT (she talked to us both about our kitties and made the connection hehe) and was so informative. It was also the best vet visit she'd ever had despite an extra long car ride. They're both very sensitive/nervous cats, but ten minutes she was so chilled she even stretched out for pets and was purring half way through. Apparently they had two pheromone diffusers going to it helps them feel in safe territory.
Turns out they think she has really awful allergies (can't even imagine how itchy she was to scratch herself bloody) hadn't been able to figure out what they're from yet tho so we're in a small limbo of reprieve as she got a steroid shot which helped her symptoms but they're gonna come back when the shot wears off in a few weeks and she can't have more bcs it's a big risk for causing diabetes and she's already had a few from her breathing issues last year.

The vet said that it was probably either something she's eating causing the allergies or Environmental, he gave us some decent tips for the environmental but most of it we already did like not having carpets and stuff like that because of our allergies anyway. if it was dietary that's where it gets complicated cuz you basically have to put them on a super simple diet, it's sort of like what we do with an Elimination Diet to figure out allergies , for couple of months. now this is where it gets even trickier because Arthur has to be on a special diet food for his urinary issues and also his weight problems so he gets food only in a feeder tree that he has to kind of work for his food for, and then Dewen..., well either we trained her or she trained us to put her food down for her in the kitchen whenever she was hungry, she probably ended up eating like 8-10 times a day because I'm at home most of the time, so it was pretty close to a free feeding schedule for her which was fine cuz she's always being underweight anyway, just that we had to pick the food up after so that Arthur didn't get at it cuz he was literally not allowed anything outside of his diet food, like no treats or anything lest it cause uti issues.

So for like 5 years their entire diet was geared around Dewen being able to eat whatever the fuck she wanted of both their foods, and Arthur only eating his food... so at this point of the visit I'm kind of panicking here being like how the fuck do I stop Dewen eating out of the food tree or if I try and take the food tree away from Arthur he's going to cry for 24 hours straight and just maul the entire apartment.... We still have huge gashes in the wall where he got anxious and upset just because we had maintenance here for like half an hour, he's a special cookie.

This was when the vet was like they actually just came out with a new food that's meant for allergies and urinary issues so you can feed them both the same food... it's super expensive though. And I'm like " of course it is, perfect 👌 " anyway haha I'm glad the timing worked out and so far they're both doing decently on the new food. But Dewen is not a fan of having to work for her food 24/7 she basically tries to drag me into the kitchen and stares at me with her cute face every couple of hours to get easy access food haha I'm not holding out well 😂

So I think the rough idea is by the time the shot wears off, if it was food allergies the new diet should be helping by then or seasonal will be over and she shouldn't have too much of a flare, fingers crossed!