# Petting cat on back causes her to meow and lick/chew her arm



## meemcat (Nov 26, 2006)

Hi there. I have a cat that is almost 9 years old. She is a black cat with medium length fur-and is alittle fat (after she was fixed when she was 3 she gained weight and i was never able to get her to shed it). Lately she has been acting strange and i figured i would post here before taking her to the vet since it doesnt seem like an emergency and vet bills are a killer 

This summer my 3 indoor only cats had problems with fleas....i used flea treatment(advantage i believe) on them for 3 months and they seemed to pretty much all go away. About 3-4 months ago my oldest cat started acting strange when her back is petted....she will approach you almost like she WANTS you to scratch her back-and if you scratch or honestly so much as lightly touch the area from the back of her tail to about 2-3 inches into the middle of her back she meows and begins to groom and chew her front leg until you stop. 

I examined the fur around that area and i coudlnt find any sores or bugs or rash. She does have a 'dry skin' problem she has had for about 2 years where she has 'dandruff' type flakes-but nothing as servere to make me think its walking dandruff or anything. She also seems to still have a small amount of tiny black specs in the fur on her back-like flea poop,Though i have not seen fleas on her in a few weeks.

I dont THINK she is in pain when she is scratched or touched there because she doesnt hiss or run away or swat(which is somthing she wont hesitate to do if she is annoyed typically) and its almost like she is releived when scratched.

My question is if maybe this is somthing i need to take her in to the vet for or if perhaps she still has fleas and they are the cause, or if there are any skin conditions i dont know about that may be affecting her. Or if perhaps she is just an old cat and has developed a quirk? I just dont want her to be in any sort of discomfort-but i want to make sure its nothing simple before i break my bank taking her into the vet and buying more expensive flea treatment 

thanks for your help!


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## queen of the nile (Aug 16, 2003)

I experienced something similar with my cat, Cleo, several years ago. She used to be quite overweight (actually obese), had dandruff on her back and was sensitive in the area above her tail. Once I got her onto a canned only diet, and she lost about 5 pounds, she was able to groom the area again, and the dandruff and irritation went away.

Like you, I couldn't see anything in that area other than dandruff, but I think the spot was tender because she couldn't reach it to groom.

I'm sure there might be other reasons for her behavior, but that is the experience I have had with my own cat.


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## gunterkat (Aug 19, 2006)

There's a slight chance she might have mites in her skin. Try to collect some of the black specks and look at them under 30 to 50 times magnification. If they look like horror-movie monsters, 8O those are mites.


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