I'm at my wit's end!

Status
Not open for further replies.
Ali Stretmater

Ali Stretmater

Member Since 2017
I really need help here, it's been a difficult and exhausting day! Nicky was diagnosed just over three weeks ago and he had his first glucose curve at the vet on Tuesday.


His numbers were REALLY high (from 422 to 463 ), and I don't know what to do. His appetite has been wildly inconsistent and today's been a bad eating day, especially after I caught him sneaking a bite of his "old" food that his non-diabetic siblings eat.


Should I be home testing? My instincts are saying yes, but he already fights me tooth and nail when it's time to shoot - to say nothing of the fact that I live alone AND I've got RA (rheumatoid arthritis) in both hands. I'll manage him if home testing is in HIS best interest, I just want to do right by him.


I'm open to suggestions on food, testing, you name it! I'd get everyone eating the same food, but his little sister is in renal failure (she's been difficult about eating all day too and may well be de-stabilizing, she's getting her values checked on Monday), so I'm trying to juggle both of their unique needs.


Just for the record, Nicky currently eats Hill's MD canned and dry. He also gets 3 units of PZI twice daily (up from 1 unit twice a day at the time of diagnosis). I love my sugar boy so much - he's only 11, and I want him and all of my fur babies to have the best quality of life possible. Please help, and TIA!
 
Ali Stretmater said:
I really need help here, it's been a difficult and exhausting day! Nicky was diagnosed just over three weeks ago and he had his first glucose curve at the vet on Tuesday.


His numbers were REALLY high (from 422 to 463 ), and I don't know what to do. His appetite has been wildly inconsistent and today's been a bad eating day, especially after I caught him sneaking a bite of his "old" food that his non-diabetic siblings eat.


Should I be home testing? My instincts are saying yes, but he already fights me tooth and nail when it's time to shoot - to say nothing of the fact that I live alone AND I've got RA (rheumatoid arthritis) in both hands. I'll manage him if home testing is in HIS best interest, I just want to do right by him.


I'm open to suggestions on food, testing, you name it! I'd get everyone eating the same food, but his little sister is in renal failure (she's been difficult about eating all day too and may well be de-stabilizing, she's getting her values checked on Monday), so I'm trying to juggle both of their unique needs.


Just for the record, Nicky currently eats Hill's MD canned and dry. He also gets 3 units of PZI twice daily (up from 1 unit twice a day at the time of diagnosis). I love my sugar boy so much - he's only 11, and I want him and all of my fur babies to have the best quality of life possible. Please help, and TIA!
Click to expand...
Awww, I'm sorry you're going through all of this. I highly recommend getting him completely off of all dry. My kitty improved 150% just because of that. I would also feed your other kitty with special needs in an area maybe that Nicky can't get to? I would also try the fancy feast classic. They're low in carbs and affordable. It has to be the pate only. And yes, I would start home testing asap. It will relieve some of your worries. There's plenty of videos you can Google that will give you tips on how to do it. You can use a human meter. Just grab one at your local pharmacy. Good luck.
 
Ali Stretmater said:
His numbers were REALLY high (from 422 to 463 ), and I don't know what to do.
Click to expand...
You mentioned that he's up to 3 u only 3+ weeks after diagnosis and was started at 1 u. It's very likely that the dose is too high and was raised by too much too fast. Testing is the only way to verify this and see what's happening. Home testing really is in his best interest even though you have some limitations yourself. I also live alone and have extremely weak hands so I've had to figure out "work arounds" to compensate.

Vet curves cost a lot of money and the stress of being there can raise the kitty's BG. If dosing decisions are made on those curve numbers, the cat can easily be overdosed.

Re food: a wet low carb canned food is best. Grocery store brands like Friskies and Fancy Feast pates are fine (no gravy types - too high in carbs). If you can feed your two in separate rooms on a schedule of several small meals a day that might help with handling the different dietary needs. I have a similar situation with my three.

Here's a plan:
  1. Start testing BG systematically - AM and PM before feeding and giving insulin (no food at least 2 hours before) to see if a dose will be safe, at least one other test near the middle of a cycle or before bed, extra tests when you have more time;
  2. change food to canned low carb only
  3. set up the spreadsheet we use here to log all your BG data. It's viewable by all members and is the first thing we look at before offering advice: http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/fdmb-spreadsheet-instructions.130337/
  4. post on the ProZinc forum for help with dosing
  5. post on the main health forum for tips on testing, food transitioning, etc.
Welcome to the best place for advice and support! :)
 
Home testing is really in both of your best interests; keep Nicky safer and lower you anxiety of wondering :). There are also foods that are diabetic friendly AND little sister friendly for renal failure, so you could try getting them both on the same diet so there's no contraband around ;). If you can get them off dry, that's a big plus, some kitty's don't take to the full wet diet but there are still ways to manage. Definitely want to be home testing if you cut out dry food because it can drastically lower their BG and with Nicky being on 3.0U could be risky.

Would be awesome if Jeanene lives close and she could help you learn :)

Kris has laid a nice plan out for you and gave you SS link. I'm just going to add 2 things, which I usually put on an introduction post. Setup your signature so we have some "at-a-glance" information, we follow lots of members and their sugar babies here so it helps refresh: http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/editing-your-signature-profile-and-preferences.130340/

And this is good to have to be prepared: http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/how-to-treat-hypos-they-can-kill-print-this-out.15887/
 
Here is a list of foods that work for FD and CKD: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/112NvvzgxEBOtkb42rA0XR8GeShw9xXs9kccf9-olK7I/pubhtml

I've also recently found that Primal Turkey is low carb and low phosphorus (not sure how low - it just had the red star that my pet store uses to indicate kidney diets). One of my cats will eat the frozen, the other will only eat the rehydrated freeze-dried. Same recipe, so I can't really explain that. Cats are weird. :confused: ;) That's why we love them, right? :cat::cat::cat:
 
Oh, and definitely yes on the home testing. Here is a great video about how to do it. Peanut (the cat in the video) is super chill about it. My cat was not like that when we started. He would growl, hiss, "bark", run away, bite... It was a process to convince him that getting his ear poked was okay. Lots of love and treats and patience and persistence got us through it though. Please ask any and all questions you have about it. There are as many tips and tricks as there are people on here, so we can help you make it work.

@Sieden's video

 
Yep... Start testing, use our templates to start a spreadsheet and then we will be able to help you with dosing.
 
Thank you all so much for the advice and support, it really helps and means a lot! I bought a Relion Confirm meter and strips, and a few flavors of Fancy Feast classic pate for him, and I'm on the path of TikiCat (which is hard to find in my small town). I need to watch videos, etc, on home testing - IDK anything about it at all. So far, he and his sister have only eaten a little today and I'm trying to calm down as best I can, but TBH I'm fighting the urge to have a complete meltdown and/or cry, I'm still really stressed out
 
Ali Stretmater said:
Thank you all so much for the advice and support, it really helps and means a lot! I bought a Relion Confirm meter and strips, and a few flavors of Fancy Feast classic pate for him, and I'm on the path of TikiCat (which is hard to find in my small town). I need to watch videos, etc, on home testing - IDK anything about it at all. So far, he and his sister have only eaten a little today and I'm trying to calm down as best I can, but TBH I'm fighting the urge to have a complete meltdown and/or cry, I'm still really stressed out
Click to expand...
Take a deep breath.....FD (feline diabetes) is not easy to tackle and all of us have been in your shoes. It is ok to melt down :) I melted multiple times!
This forum is a wealth of information and has many advice givers who have you and your kitty's best interest in mind.
Tiki is a great choice for diabetics as it is virtually 0 carbs.
Fancy feast classics are great as well--there is a food chart in the "stickys" with the carb count of many foods.

I don't want to overwhelm you with any more information and we learn as we go. Please remember 1 thing-- please do not hesitate to ask ANY question you may have. Many members are more than happy to help and if they do not know the answer they can tag a senior member who will be able to help you.
Welcome aboard!:bighug:
 
Ali Stretmater said:
Thank you all so much for the advice and support, it really helps and means a lot! I bought a Relion Confirm meter and strips, and a few flavors of Fancy Feast classic pate for him, and I'm on the path of TikiCat (which is hard to find in my small town). I need to watch videos, etc, on home testing - IDK anything about it at all. So far, he and his sister have only eaten a little today and I'm trying to calm down as best I can, but TBH I'm fighting the urge to have a complete meltdown and/or cry, I'm still really stressed out
Click to expand...
It's stressful in the beginning. Testing at home takes away a lot of the stress.
 
Ali Stretmater said:
Thank you all so much for the advice and support, it really helps and means a lot! I bought a Relion Confirm meter and strips, and a few flavors of Fancy Feast classic pate for him, and I'm on the path of TikiCat (which is hard to find in my small town). I need to watch videos, etc, on home testing - IDK anything about it at all. So far, he and his sister have only eaten a little today and I'm trying to calm down as best I can, but TBH I'm fighting the urge to have a complete meltdown and/or cry, I'm still really stressed out
Click to expand...
I legit had a mild nervous breakdown. I'm an extremely anxious person just in general. I would sleep 2 maybe 3 hours when I first found out and had several anxiety attacks a day. I had shortness of breath and I even frightened my family, I got so bad. Well, here I am a month later and I am a friggin pro, lol, maybe not a pro, but my anxiety about testing and shooting have completely faded away. It will get better, it will get easier. I promise. Routine is everything. :)
 
Djamila said:
Oh, and definitely yes on the home testing. Here is a great video about how to do it. Peanut (the cat in the video) is super chill about it. My cat was not like that when we started. He would growl, hiss, "bark", run away, bite... It was a process to convince him that getting his ear poked was okay. Lots of love and treats and patience and persistence got us through it though. Please ask any and all questions you have about it. There are as many tips and tricks as there are people on here, so we can help you make it work.

@Sieden's video

Click to expand...
Thank you, thank you for spreading my video. I'm super glad that it's helping people. I will for sure be making another one in a better angle once I get fully settled in at my new house. I know that it seems that Peanut is PERFECT and yes, he actually is. I really, honest to God, could not ask for a better cat but we've been at this for about 4 years so there has been plenty of time to purfect our little circus act if you will lol. I can still remember the very first night of trying this. He wasn't sure of what was going on and when I was trying to prick his ear he was trying to launch forward or scooch backward so I learned how to wrap my arm around his butt to that he can't go backward. I need to include that in the new video because he's been trying to do that lately. I kind of have to come down to his level, wrap my right arm over his body but still back far enough to prevent him from backing up, then bring my chest down on top of him to lock him in. Then I pet him with my left hand and talk to him with plenty of "good boys" and "bull bh!ts" lol. This is all part of the "loving process" and once I can get him to start purring then I can start my routine... but I should already have the test strip, the meter, the lancing device, the sock and whatever else that I might need out and ready. Peanut is VERY SMART and now I can get this stuff ready in front of him while he's on the table but back in the day and for a good 2 years at least I would have to secretly get it ready in another room and quietly bring it to his testing area and also have a treat ready. If he heard the shake of the strips he would stay under the bed for days. That's no longer an issue.
 
Sieden said:
Thank you, thank you for spreading my video. I'm super glad that it's helping people. I will for sure be making another one in a better angle once I get fully settled in at my new house. I know that it seems that Peanut is PERFECT and yes, he actually is. I really, honest to God, could not ask for a better cat but we've been at this for about 4 years so there has been plenty of time to purfect our little circus act if you will lol. I can still remember the very first night of trying this. He wasn't sure of what was going on and when I was trying to prick his ear he was trying to launch forward or scooch backward so I learned how to wrap my arm around his butt to that he can't go backward. I need to include that in the new video because he's been trying to do that lately. I kind of have to come down to his level, wrap my right arm over his body but still back far enough to prevent him from backing up, then bring my chest down on top of him to lock him in. Then I pet him with my left hand and talk to him with plenty of "good boys" and "bull bh!ts" lol. This is all part of the "loving process" and once I can get him to start purring then I can start my routine... but I should already have the test strip, the meter, the lancing device, the sock and whatever else that I might need out and ready. Peanut is VERY SMART and now I can get this stuff ready in front of him while he's on the table but back in the day and for a good 2 years at least I would have to secretly get it ready in another room and quietly bring it to his testing area and also have a treat ready. If he heard the shake of the strips he would stay under the bed for days. That's no longer an issue.
Click to expand...
It's great that you shared that for nervous new people to read. :)
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top