Hey guys!  My sweet 9-year-old, Teddy, stopped eating this morning and was acting a little weird so we brought him to the vet, where he was diagnosed with both stasis (maybe from shedding) and spondylosis (noticed in the X-ray).  

First question: He’s doing this new thing now where he makes a little sound almost like crunching hay, but just one crunch, like a few times a minute.  He doesn’t appear to be eating.  What could this be?  It doesn’t sound the same as when he grinds his teeth.

Second question: Is there anything we can do to slow the progression of spondylosis?  Teddy doesn’t show signs of it yet — he still likes to hop around, hop up to the second floor of his cardboard castle, and do binkies.  He also still eats his cecotropes.  For the past year or two I’ve been giving him one Sherwood Joint Support tablet every night, and a few months ago I introduced him to the Flopper’s Garden Old Bones herb mix, which he loves.  The vet is prescribing .15mL of Gabapentin twice a day from now on, but I think that’s just for the pain.

Is it a good or bad idea to keep encouraging him to hop up to the second floor of his castle?  

Thank you so much!!  (We’re starting the stasis treatment too but have been through that many times before so no questions on that right now.)