By the look of Sasha in the photo below, you might assume that she is excited about the food in her bowl, and that she is licking her chops in anticipation. Well, you would be wrong if that is what you assumed. We were too!
I mixed up some yummy food that I know Sasha loves. It was her usual Orijen kibble mixed with some moist Wellness Core Salmon. She was gobbling it down and licking her bowl clean just a few days ago! I gave Carlos a thumbs up when Sasha happily licked the food this night, but my celebration was short lived.
Here’s Sasha after her initial taste, and my happy reaction.
And here she is five seconds later. This girl’s got attitude! Look at that face!
What a pitiful look.
We decided to leave the room and see if she’d eat the food on her own. It wasn’t happening. After about 30 seconds we came back in and found her like this. Sasha on one side and the food on the other side. Untouched.
At first I did feel bad, but then I had to agree with Carlos. Sasha has learned that we have been giving her (very) special treatment lately, and she thinks she can get away with anything. And she could have last week, but not anymore. We have a smart girl who knows how to take advantage of her mom and dad.
After this feeding failure, we decided on no more treats for Sasha. She would only get a cheese bomb when it was time for her pills. We thought this worked because yesterday morning, after not getting treats for a while, Sasha ate like a champ 🙂 But today she’s back to not wanting to eat. We’ll have to see how things progress. We are giving her a holiday from a couple of medications, per our vet’s recommendations, so we’ll see how this time off makes her feel. We’ll be sharing an update later this week.
We also started giving Sasha chicken broth in an attempt to increase her water intake. Sasha loves it and we are happy to continue giving her broth. Some special treatment continues.
Do you have experience with finicky pets? Was it from a time when she was sick and received special food, or did your pet realize that it could get something better by turning her nose up at her usual food?