Hi all:

I'm looking for opinions on how best to get an injured stray, who was hit by a car, to eat and use a litter box.

She is a sweet little tortoiseshell that I found shortly after she had been apparently hit by a car. I took her to my vet right away (I have three rescue cats and a small dog). I've been looking after her now for 8 days.

She has an injured jaw (broken or dislocated) and a damaged eye, and has lost several teeth. Other than that she is amazingly strong. She purrs and is alert and walks without trouble. My vet feels she should recover.

The problem is that I cannot get her to eat more than tiny amounts now and then, and she doesn't seem to know what a litter box is. She was peeing in a cat bed that she wasn't sleeping in. At this point I put her in a large dog cage (labrador size) to try and confine her space and get the litter box to be a very attractive place to go. No dice yet -- she just seems to be holding it since the catbed episode 2 days ago.

She does drink water and I have had to gently forcefeed with that Hill's canned prescription diet (as her painkillers were liquid and needed to be in food). She has also started eating a bit of dry, of all things. She only seems to want to eat if I am sitting with her. She does allow her jaw to be handled gently without complaint -- she is a trooper.

I will try the advice on another thread to use baby food (lamb). But any other suggestions on food or litter box, or anyone with experience of a cat that has had an injury behaving like this and how long it might take for her to readjust? Do I stop forcefeeding or continue trying to get some HIll's into her if she isn't touching the other food? (I just put small bits on her palate and she swallows it down easily). I should add my vet has seen her twice more, yesterday being the last day when she gave her an enema to get her to pass a bowel movement (eek!) just to make sure she was empty in that dept!

Thanks for any advice! This goes beyond my experience in dealing with sick pets.

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