Recognizing the early signs of pain in your cat is an essential step in ensuring their long-term health and happiness. Unfortunately, felines are experts when it comes to hiding their discomfort. While they typically show outward signs when experiencing acute, intense pain, it’s not nearly as easy to detect when a cat suffers from long-term pain or discomfort.

Pain is a clinically significant symptom that can adversely affect an animal’s quality of life—and the first step in treating it is recognizing and acknowledging it.

Our pets share the same anatomical and biochemical pain pathways that we do; therefore, we can expect their level of discomfort with certain conditions to be similar to ours. Unfortunately, they cannot tell us with words how they feel or where they hurt, but they can give us clues about their level of discomfort.

Would you know if your cat was in pain? As attentive and loving cat owners, we all want to answer “yes” to that question, but the truth is, felines are masters of disguise—and because of this, they are one of the most common species with undiagnosed pain.

When your pet suddenly loses his appetite, it can be concerning—particularly if you’ve got a regular chowhound on your hands.