more kitty troubles

It's really been an awful couple years for the cats.  First was Lou, who had to have part of his tail amputated due to some sort of attack (not sure what happened).  Then we lost Riley to possible hemophilia.  Prince never came home.  Max had urine crystals and Baily, his brother, was sick for a bit.  George had to be put down due to old age.  Leo had to have most of his teeth out due to stomatitis.  Then, most recently, Thomas had to have most of his teeth out due to severe gingivitis; he had some other issues, too. And now, Leo went for his recheck this week for the stomatitis and they discovered he's lost a pound since the beginning of April (it's tough to notice because he's so furry, so we didn't notice it). I keep wondering what's going to happen next.

This is Thomas. It's an older picture.   

Thomas is doing well in terms of his health. He's eating well and his mouth is healed; however, he's hiding constantly now.  He was always skittish--he was a feral kitten--but it's gotten much worse since we moved to the new house.  Since then, he's usually in the back of the closet next to the kitchen, or he's under one of the beds. We see him maybe a couple times a week, either early in the morning or late at night. That's really our only indication he's alive.  And that's why we didn't know he had anything wrong with his mouth.  We had noticed a couple months ago that he had really severe mats in his fur.  We were able to catch him and confine him in one of the bedrooms.  We then shaved all the mats out and checked his mouth, which didn't look good.  (He was such a good boy, too!  He was calm and didn't try to run.  He's one of those cats where you scruff him and he just goes completely still.)  We got him to the vet a few weeks ago and he had to have most of his teeth out.  They also found some other issues, which weren't serious. Since the surgery, he won't come out from under the bed in the upstairs bedroom.  Even with the doors closed and just us in there,  he won't come out for us to pet him.  In order to make sure he eats, since the others will bully him, we have to put the food down and shut the doors so the others can't come in and eat it.  I know he's eating, so at least that's one good thing.  But I just don't know what to do with him, or how to get him so he's not so scared all the time. He was always scared, but never this bad to where he won't come out for us to pet him. I'm thinking he's traumatized by the surgery and long vet stay.  My cousin mentioned the possibility that he could be depressed or have some other sort of mental problem.  He goes back for a checkup soon, so I will have to ask about that. For now, he's under the bed upstairs.  We close the doors to feed him and then reopen them when he's done.

This is Leo.

And then there's Leo.  He went for another checkup this week for the stomatitis.  He's been on a daily dose of liquid minocycline.  I was hoping the vet would tell me I could stop the medication, since it's getting pretty difficult to medicate him; he knows exactly what I'm doing every night when I go the fridge.  Even though I've tried to mix up the routine, he's wise to it and runs away or fights me.  The medication has helped quite a bit, but his mouth is not 100% yet.  He still has some inflammation in the back of his mouth.  Unfortunately, Leo has lost over a pound since early April; a pound is typically a lot for a cat. During his last blood test they found he has low albumin, but they chalked it up to his mouth issues.  The vet ran some new blood work this week with a GI panel, so I'm waiting on the results.  There was a mention of possible lymphoma and I'm really hoping that's not the case.

Let's hope the rest of the year is relatively quiet and no one has any major issues.