Hope everyone is had a good hump day!

Its official. The biggest loser in the Left Coast Contessa house is Izzy the cat. Since I adopted her nearly two years ago Izzy has lost over 30% of her body weight!

Izzy was a Christmas present from my ex boyfriend in November of 2008 but I wasn’t Iz’s first owner. Izzy was rescued from an abandoned apartment building in New Hampshire in Spring of 2005 when she was a kitten. She was taken in by a very nice woman who had her spayed. Sadly, she had a number of other cats and they ganged up on Izzy and bullied her. Poor Iz even had her arm broken.

Eventually Izzy was adopted by an art student who put her on an automatic feeder. Little girl gained a TON of weight. Later the art student adopted a pit bull. Izzy had bad interactions with other animals in the past and she was totally traumatized by the pit bull. That is when Izzy came into my life.

I love Izzy but she was so big when I first got her. We didn’t measure her food when we first got her and Izzy was already overweight to begin with. She was about 18 lbs at that time.

Here is a picture the first Christmas I had Izzy:

Here is another photo of Izzy from May 2009 (around the time I started to measure food):

Izzy in my Boston apartment!

When I moved to LA I began to realize that Izzy needed to lose weight. In my new apartment she had a lot more room to run and play which helped but I needed to do more.

working out or hardly working?

Measuring her food also helped her lose weight but eating dry food wasn’t helping Izzy. A friend of mine in vet school explained to me that dry food is like junk food for cats. Cats needs to eat a primarily protein diet. Dry food does not have enough protein. Thus, after careful research I started to feed Izzy a protein diet consisting of wet food that doesn’t feature wheat gluten as a main ingredient.

Wheat Gluten is basically just carbs. Its pretty easy to find high protein food.  You can find certain types of Fancy Fest, Newman’s Own cat food, and 9 lives. You have to read the label of the can  before purchasing it and yes its slightly more expensive than dry food. But, honestly, it was worth it. Izzy is now 5 (her birthday is in April) and I want her to be able to live a full cat life complete with jumping and limited joint pain. I started the new diet on New Years Day. She started to lose weight more quickly!

Today Izzy went to the vet for her first official weigh in in over a year. The last time I weighed her she was around 15-16 lbs.

Iz weighed 12.8 lbs today! That is a very healthy cat weight. Mission accomplished! When she got home Iz got some party mix because girlfriend loves her party mix!

Here is her “after” shot:

I know this whole post screams “crazy cat lady” but I love my cat. She has been with me though moving multiple times, stomach flu, cross country loneliness, a big break up and law school. I love my companion animal. If you can, rescue a pet. Educate yourself beforehand and be prepared but you will never regret adopting over purchasing a pet. I love that I can give Izzy a happy and healthy forever home.

Andddd here is what the human ate for dinner tonight, Spag from last week but with roasted squash!

Boring, I know, but delicious.  Something interesting tomorrow and Friday I hit Bar G with ABC University so get excited!