Our experience with a cat and Valium was for a far different reason
than yours so may not be useful to you.  Our Custard was losing a lot
of weight and refusing to eat; our vet told us that a shot of Valium
would stimulate the appetite to the point that cats would eat
*anything* in sight, hungry or not.  She demonstrated this by giving
Cus-Cat a shot of it, then offered her some food.  Cus *inhaled* the
stuff, every bite.  It was amazing.  It was a band-aid fix but at home
she'd eat normally again for several days.  She had her Valium "fix"
about once a week, always gorging herself after the shot.  I don't
know if Valium pills are any different or would have the same effect
on Nikki; as well as calming her grooming problem, it *may* boost her
appetite.  At any rate, I hope it's a good cure for her.

  Jeanne      

Quite uncanny. My Nikki had that overgrooming problem, too. And once,
she lost the fur around one of her eyes, but only once. Anyway, I don't
have experience with Valium, and I'm sure you and your vet have ruled
this out, but my Nikki's overgrooming turned out to be a symptom of
hyperthyroidism.

I don't have any experience with valium, but I do know that Oscar hasn't
barfed (except once when I gave her way too many of her favorite treats
right after she'd had dinner -- that was dumb of me!) at all since I
switched her from Nutro dry to Wellness canned.  I've spoken to many
other cat owners who had the same experience.  If you haven't tried
Wellness before, it might pleasantly surprise you.

It's unfortunate that your vet does not seem too interested in finding
the cause of your cat's troubles so it can be rectified rather than
having to do steroid shots and drugs for the rest of its life.

Just a note that feeding one food long term can result in cats
developing an allegy to that food. You're better off finding out what
your cats don't react to and then feeding a variety of foods with that
in mind.
I checked the ingredient list and I see that Iams, which is a poor
quality food to begin with, contains *corn* - a very common allergen for
cats, along with beef, fish and wheat. I have several cats that have a
corn allergy and Basil in particular had suffered the same exact
symptoms as your cat, losing the hair around his face and being
miserable. This was easily rectified by changing his food. He now eats
Wellness *canned* food (which is not made by Purina) and *no dry* and he
hasn't had a problem in years. My recommendation would be to get your
cats off of dry food and feed a completely grain free canned diet for
awhile and see if there's improvement. Wellness Chicken and Turkey
flavors would be a good place to start. You can find where to purchase
it by going here:
http://www.oldmotherhubbard.com/locator/locator_form.asp

I wouldn't worry about the change in diet for your second cat as my
guess is that the throwing up was probably caused by an ingredient in
its previous dry food and it very well could have been large amounts of
corn or wheat. The Iams Lamb and Rice contains less corn than a lot of
foods, but corn nonetheless, which could be small enough not to cause a
reaction in one cat, but enough to set off allergies in the other.

As to the valium, this would not be my first choice for the type of
obsessive compulsive behavior your cat is exhibiting (which could also
be allergy related.) Prozac would be a better option and has fewer risks
and side effects than valium, although the focus should be on finding
out what is causing this. I wouldn't want to drug the cat because it
will make it hard to find out if improvement in the behavior is because
of the change in diet or because of the drug.

Seriously, if these were my cats I would get them off the dry food
immediately and try what I suggested above. Results are not instant and
it can take several weeks to see improvement, but it's certainly a
better option than resorting to drugs if you don't have to. There is
also a great benefit to feeding canned food as dry is not an appropriate
diet for cats and is suspected incausing a variety of problems with
allergies, kidney failure, diabetes and IBD on the top of the list. You
can read more about the problems with dry food here (which may address
the issues of your one cat throwing up): http://www.catnutrition.org
and also read why canned food is the best diet for cats here:
http://catsincanada.com/articles/feeding.html

Megan