u/ha2ne39

My poor cat Oatmeal has been aggressively licking and chewing the hair off of her belly, legs, and tail for the better part of two years now. I have taken her to the vet several times, and initially the vet thought it was a stress issue from the other cats in our home so they put her on anxiety meds, but we saw no improvement after several months. We tried a steroid shot, and that helped significantly which made our vet believe it comes from an allergy. We gave her a strict diet of hypoallergenic food to no avail. Our vet basically told us we would have to take her to a “cat dermatologist” the next state over to see a specialist but as advised they are expensive and we just cannot afford a vet bill atm. We have taken to putting a cone on her so she can’t lick or scratch, and she has two hours a day without the cone around mealtime and all. she. does. is lick herself those two hours. Her behavior otherwise is very sweet and relaxed. She doesn’t cower, run, hide, hiss, fight, she is overall a very cuddly little angel but we cannot seem to figure out this licking issue. Any advice would be appreciated, especially around the cone issue because I am not sure if having her in a cone 24/7 is the answer I worry abt her being itchy and miserable but I just cannot stand to see her lick all of her hair off. Thank you for coming to my ted talk.