[Cristi C]

I have a cat with this problem, not a dog–but cats and dogs are more alike than different. Here is her story. She began vomiting rather frequently, then began gulping so hard that we had to keep from touching her, because any purring would make her gulp even worse. Then the focal seizures began: her face, then her whole head, then her upper legs. Then she started losing her fur. The poor thing was half-naked before I figured out that I had changed her litter to a litter made of corn. I changed it to clay litter, then removed all corn from her diet–a difficult proposition, because corn or corn products seem to be in nearly everything. She began growing her fur back, but the rest didn’t improve. We got rid of all grains, and she improved a little more but not much. We discovered that some of the expensive, high-end “healthy” canned food we had been driven to find for her made her worse and some didn’t. That was when we finally figured out, by process of elimination, that not only had she become allergic to corn and then all grains, she was reacting to carageenan, which is in nearly all wet products as well as many dairy products. Carageenan is extracted from seaweed and used in nearly everything these days to impart “creaminess” and a smooth, gelled texture. It’s also a known intestinal irritant for some people. Fortunately, pet food manufacturers show it in their list on ingredients. After we had removed all carageenan from her diet, she finally began to heal. It has been a long, slow process of healing: it didn’t happen overnight. Every now and then she vomits, gulps, and has little seizures, but they are not nearly as violent as they once were, and she has longer periods of wellness in-between. She is almost normal now. There is one last chemical that we can remove from her diet if necessary: potassium chloride. It, too, shows up in most pet foods (because it’s cheap) and is an intestinal irritant. We’ll see if that becomes necessary. Right now there is only one dry food in existence that she can eat and one brand of wet food (but only 4 of the varieties offered by that brand). And she is allowed no dairy.
The intestines are incredibly important to health–for all species. The intestines are there to absorb nutrients and water. They also have a role in making nutrients, as well as a role in the immune system. Without healthy intestines, people–and animals–can become very sick indeed, including signs of malnutrition and allergies. Seizures, of course, can be the result of missing nutrients, as can eating bizarre things. Gulping, swallowing, and vomiting are all signs of a distressed gastrointestinal system.
Carageenan may well have been the irritant that started all this, gradually sensitizing her to more products as the years went by. We feel terrible about this–but even our phenomenally good vet had no idea: she had never heard of carageenan being a problem.
I’m sorry I haven’t said anything until now. I tried numerous times and had no idea that answering the emails I was getting from this site would just take my posts into an Internet black-hole.
I hope it helps.

[Cristi C]

Cole, did you get my message about my cat’s problem, now solved? Did you try removing him from ALL grains and feeding him only a meat-based food that was made in the USA? No rice, no barley, and so on? (And did you make sure he has no contact with peanuts or peanut
butter as well?) No treats or anything that aren’t fully guaranteed to be 100% grain free?

[Cristi C]

Molzy, we had problems like this with our cat. No vet could help us. She chronically threw up but had no other problems. Her appetite was fine but her weight was very light. She was hyper and nervous. As she aged, she began to have more problems besides her vomiting and nerves: she began to lose all her fur, gulped a lot in the evenings, and had developed focal seizures in her face (also in the evenings). At his point we switched her to a grain-free diet, made in the USA, and changed her litter from corn to wheat. She calmed down, her vomiting decreased, and her fur began to grow back–but her gulping got harder and more frequent and her seizures, more frequent as well, began to spread to her front legs. Last week we replaced her wheat litter with clay litter. The gulping has stopped, the seizures stopped, and she is calmer and happier than I have ever seen her.

In other words, the key to our cat’s good health was removing her from all contact with grains. Not only can she not eat them, she cannot touch them. She eats Core Wellness foods But here’s the thing: she can only eat the fish variety. No poultry or other meats. I believe it is because poultry and other meats eat grains. And I think the problem is toxins, whether GMO, fungus, or pesticide, in those grains. Our cat is just the canary in the coal mine.

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