I would like to thank you all for what you are doing it is much appreciated.
Just to let you know a little about our fur family. We have been showing ragdolls and Maine Coons for 8yrs and we are registered breeders of Maine Coons. Our affected cats are all ragdolls or MC's and are much loved members of our family. We started Feb 2008 with 6 healthy cats and one cat that had an auto-immune disease that was well under control. Av did not eat the Orijen as she has some food allergies - she is the only cat we have that is still healthy. Darling Rob, who was only 5 yrs old, died in June from acute renal failure caused by an "environmental toxin" - please be aware all our cats had access to the same food & environment with the exception of Av's inability to eat Orijen. We feed a raw diet twice a day and the cats have access to dry food on an adlib basis to keep them going between meals. Orijen only made up a 1/4 of our cats dry food component. We stopped feeding Orijen at the end of Sept as soon as it appeared that it could be a food related issue. Months on and we still have a house of wobbley cats.
Please be aware Orijen was not labelled as irradiated nor was it labelled as containing BHA or BHT both of which were found on subsequent testing and admitted to by a company representative - more information on this is also available on the Itchmo thread. So as well as being aware of the problems with irradiation we also need to be aware that companies and governments both think they have the right to stop us making informed decisions about the ingredients in and the way our foods are treated. A label stating this food was irradiated or contained BHA & BHT would have prevented it entering my home and the homes of many other affected cats owners.
Many people on here seem to be aware of what this condition looks like but for anyone that doesn't one of the local current affairs program did a segment on it and this will give you some idea - though the cats can get far worse than those shown progressing to full paralysis.
http://www.abc. net.au/7. 30/content/ 2008/s2464272. htm there is a video link on the right hand side of the page so you will be able to see some of the wobbley cats. There have also been videos posted on You tube by Wendy whose beautiful cats are also affected
http://www.youtube. com/watch? v=s2tLHUn1RSA
http://www.youtube. com/watch? v=xrqy3SIUTqM&feature=channel
http://www.youtube. com/watch? v=f-78h1pa- ug&feature=channel_ page
And an update on our cats
Aub - getting around OK though definitely not 100% still wobbly on bad days - not wanting to move around, tail functioning thank goodness (he broke his tail coming off a cat tree due to the weakness in his hindquarters) , auto-immune disease (he had an auto-immune disease that was well controlled prior to the addition of Orijen into his diet) settling thank goodness as we have our hands tied with doing anything to treat it as the cats are so reactive to everything due to the damage their systems have sustained. It appears that the alternate therapies he was on for his auto-immune disease protected him to some extent from the toxic effects of Orijen.
Uly - getting around OK on a good day still wobbly on a bad day. Went for a run down the hall for the first time for 6mths yesterday.
Evie - last affected and wobbly walking but very determined. Unfortunately one of our entires and far to ill to desex given these cats reactions to conventional medicines. Fingers crossed we will get her well enough to desex but my vet is saying it could be a year before her body has recovered enough - if it does.
Hali - very wobbly but walking was doing OK with recovery had even managed a wobbly trot and had bladder control again when she went into her first full call and had a severe relapse - degenerating back to full paralysis in a matter of hours. Very, very scary as it was of course on a Sunday and if we had taken her to the oncall vet the outcome could have been dire as her little body can not tolerate conventional medicines and someone unfamiliar with her condition could have inadvertantly killed her. Luckily one of our wonderful vets returned my call and talked me through what to do to get her back on track. She is now a month later about back to where she was before her call. Fingers crossed we can manage her as she is still way too ill to desex. We are managing to control our bladder through the night and pee in the litter box that we have set up in her crate. Still crating her at night for her safety and so we can get a little sleep.
Quoi - still unable to walk without support and seems to be not handling what is happening very well. But then our raggie girl has always been our princess and things like this are definitely not suppose to happen to princesses. She use to on the very odd occasion she had a furball throw it up into a litter box and now she can not control her bladder properly - very hard for our baby girl to cope with and not great for us either as we have puppy training pads placed all over the place so she & Hali are never far from one.
Rob deceased and we are still waiting for Orijen to release the results of the toxicology reports they have that show toxins were found but "not neurotoxins" according to Clarke Stride on the Itchmo forums.
The only positive that can be taken from this is we did not have pregnant girls or girls nursing kittens or litters of kittens on the ground. We should have had but we delayed mating when we became aware their could be a problem timing wsa about the only thing in our favour - thank goodness for winter.
We will keep on as I was at the vet with them again last week and she is happy they are progressing even Princess Quoi who when I said we were really worried about her and didn't know if we should keep putting her through this stood and walked 5 steps unaided. LOL cats - smarter than your average bear! Certainly know how to make me look silly lol - didn't care though as I was so relieved.
Anyhow we are struggling on - Orijen dumped us in this black pit and we are still trying to walk out and unfortunately for others we are not the only ones down here. So on we go what option do we have - someone said we could get off this path whenever we want but given that means without the cats that is just not an option for us.
I would like to warn all cat owners on here about the risks of irradiated cat food - given the research that is readily available I can not even begin to fathom why governments and companies think this is a valid treated for our and our pets foods. Please be alert and be aware that companies are pushing to allow for the unlabelled irradiation of foodstuffs as a cheap alternative to decent hygiene in production plants. And please be aware that in the US the symbol for irradiation is a flower that no one would relate to irradiation if they were not aware that is what it meant.
Jo
Author