I'm trying to decide how to deal with a cat problem, and was looking for
different points of view. I have a 15 year old cat. She is a domestic
short hair, and has lived inside her entire life. She has easy access to
her litter box, water, and food, which are in the garage, accessible via
a cat door. She spends most of her time inside, sleeping on the bed or
couch. I am meticulous about keeping her litter box clean, and scoop it
every morning. I use clumping litter.

Over the course of this past year, she would, maybe once a month, have a
bout of diarrhea on one of the bathmats in my bathroom. While nasty, I
was glad she was at least going on the bathmat. This was new behavior,
and I wasn't really sure why it was happening. Her litter box was always
clean when this happened, and she would frequent the garage for food and
water no problem, so I don't believe it was trouble getting to the box.
In December, because I noticed that her stool was very, very loose, I
took her for a full medical exam, including blood test & fecal exam. The
vet found nothing wrong. But, we switched her to a low-allergy food to
see if it helped. It seemed to help for about four months.

Now, this behavior has increased, and expanded. In the past three weeks,
she has made messes on my bed and two area rugs. Also, if I give her a
full serving of cat food (dry, Science Diet Low Residue) she throws it
up immediately. I did just switch to this food a few weeks ago at the
suggestion of the vet. I have to feed her small amounts during the day.
Again, she goes to the garage just fine to eat and drink. If she does
wander into the backyard, 100% of the time she'll eat grass, come
inside, and throw it up.

The vet says the only other thing he can do is perform an Endoscopy,
which I've been told including the biopsies & everything will be $500.
He thinks it's irritable bowel syndrome, some kind of infection, or some
kind of cancer. Other than the puking/diarrhea stuff, she seems happy
and playful. I'm having a hard time justifying the $500 fee on an
elderly cat. For now, she has become a garage cat, which she isn't
really thrilled about, but I don't know what else to do. I just can't
have her crapping on things in the house.

Anyway, I'm just looking for some quick thoughts. What would you do? Pay
the $500, keep her in the garage indefinitely...what else? Does anybody
have a similar experience, or anything else to try?

I'd appreciate any advice; thanks for reading such a long post!

Bean