I don't know if I can do this

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Rkrbirdgirl

Member Since 2017
Just went in to have tumors removed that are due to needing to be spayed she's 11-13. Was told can't operate today she is diabetic. Tumors are getting bigger. I only got a tech monday vet was busy she explained i needed to give her insulin teice a day until Tuesday when we come back. Thank god my sister is diabetic and helped. I have no clue. She's not in pain and is so far letting me inject her. I work doubles alot and have no one home in the evenings to give her a second shot. I'm so lost.
 
Welcome! If you can write all your questions in list form and be as specific as possible we can give better answers.
 
Rkrbirdgirl said:
Just went in to have tumors removed that are due to needing to be spayed she's 11-13. Was told can't operate today she is diabetic. Tumors are getting bigger. I only got a tech monday vet was busy she explained i needed to give her insulin teice a day until Tuesday when we come back. Thank god my sister is diabetic and helped. I have no clue. She's not in pain and is so far letting me inject her. I work doubles alot and have no one home in the evenings to give her a second shot. I'm so lost.
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I'm sorry you are feeling so lost, but you've come to the right place for help. As Kris has said, your questions would be better-posted on the Main Health forum. Lots of people will see your post there and be able to chime in with ideas and answers!

EDIT: Sorry, I see this is already on the Main Health forum! My bad!
 
Can your sister, or another family member or friend, come in to give the second shot? If not, maybe you can arrange your shot schedule differently to cover roughly 12-hour cycles? What type of insulin did the vet give you, and how much at each shot?
 
My cat bites and scratches my family. Plus most of them are diabetic and said they can't. Not sure I will have to look on what kind they called in for us. I work. I just can't find a new home for her. It took her forever to like me. I can't abandon her. But I feel like if I put her asleep because I can't give her the care she needs I'm still abandoning her.
 
Rkrbirdgirl said:
My cat bites and scratches my family. Plus most of them are diabetic and said they can't. Not sure I will have to look on what kind they called in for us. I work. I just can't find a new home for her. It took her forever to like me. I can't abandon her. But I feel like if I put her asleep because I can't give her the care she needs I'm still abandoning her.
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It's too early to do anything irreversible. You probably feel totally overwhelmed and that makes it impossible to think clearly. Why not give it a day or so and come back here with all your concerns. I'm sure we can help you find solutrions to a lot of them.
 
I'm not gonna jump and put her down right away I don't know everything I just I wish I knew she was in pain I'm worried about those tumors I'm scared
 
Rkrbirdgirl said:
I'm not gonna jump and put her down right away I don't know everything I just I wish I knew she was in pain I'm worried about those tumors I'm scared
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  • What tumours are these?
  • What has your vet said about them?
  • What insulin are you using?
  • What dose are you giving?
  • What was her blood glucose at the vet clinic?
 
Tumors are caused due to her not being spayed. Had a tumor removed 2 yrs ago been saving for spay then i noticed a new tumor. Went in to have it removed Monday. They did blood work and the vet tech sent me home with instructions. Vauge instructions. They told me to start with 2 units. I took vacation this week to be with her for the planned recovery. So now I'm trying my best to give her these shots and waiting to see what Tuesday brings and demand the vet.
 
Rkrbirdgirl said:
Tumors are caused due to her not being spayed. Had a tumor removed 2 yrs ago been saving for spay then i noticed a new tumor. Went in to have it removed Monday. They did blood work and the vet tech sent me home with instructions. Vauge instructions. They told me to start with 2 units. I took vacation this week to be with her for the planned recovery. So now I'm trying my best to give her these shots and waiting to see what Tuesday brings and demand the vet.
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Are these uterine or ovarian tumours? What insulin are you giving? Is it Vetsulin? ProZinc? Novolin?
 
A fatty tumor is a lipoma. They are completely harmless and unless they are causing the cat discomfort then they should mostly be left alone. My sugar kitty has one between his shoulders.

Did your vet aspirate them to tell if they were fatty tumors? I think I'd want some clarification from the vet before I went through with surgery.
 
I sympathize with you. That is a tough situation. Some good advice from the others. It is good you are experienced with diabetics. If you provide minimal dosing for your kitty then you are helping. I always dose just prior to giving Leo a meal.
 
It's very overwhelming at first. We've all been there, and overwhelmed for our own reasons.
But slow down, take it one step at a time.

First, things like food, vet stress, and infection can all raise blood glucose levels. So if you address any of those, your kitty may not even need insulin in the long run - which would be the ideal case! So make sure those things get addressed as needed, and see if it drops her glucose levels enough to stop insulin.

If she does need to continue receiving insulin, there are ways to handle it even if you're working long hours. Squaliesmom mentioned finding a vet tech in your area -- this is an excellent suggestion. First, see if there are any vet tech schools nearby, a student would be glad for a few extra bucks plus get some hands-on experience. If there aren't any schools, ask your vet or do some looking online to see if any techs will make house calls in your area. Another option is to find a pet sitter who is knowledgeable enough to do insulin shots. There are many who will, since it gives them a bit of an advantage over other sitters.
There are options to make this work!

For now, just take a deep breath, and start to read and absorb all the information here. Ask questions. Don't be too hasty in making any decisions. People with all sorts of work and family situations have found a way to take care of their sugar cats, and there is quite a range of situations on this board - so wherever you end up going next, you will have people here who can provide advice.
 
Thank you so much I appreciate everybody it's what I need to hear I hope it's just the stress because she does not like going to the vet but they did the blood test two years ago and didn't mention diabetes to me the numbers were just a little high and now they're really high like I think 400 but she was super stressed I mean she Peed and she pooped in her carrier and she's never done that before. Plus we are getting ready to move I was putting it off until after she had the suppose surgery to wait till she healed but we're moving 45 minutes away into the boyfriends so now we are going to do it this Friday so I can be with her make sure she gets her shots on time until Tuesday and these needles that they gave me I think one day I thought I gave her her medicine and I was wrong and then I realized I was in giving her the right dose I was giving her half of it it's a learning curve.
 
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It is very overwhelming at first, I sympathize. As someone else said, if you do anything she will be better off. Many of us don't have easy schedules but I'm hoping your vet can help you figure it out. I am new to this as well, but I could have sworn that I read one of the insulins is only given once per day? Does anyone know what I might have read and if that is true?

For now, I would suggest switching to a lower carb food gradually. Switching too fast could turn them off to eating in general. We switched overnight from free feeding dry Hills Z/D to wet Z/D twice a day. Tigger adjusted to it because he was just so ravenous when he was completely unregulated. We are having some appetite decrease going down and he is not quite regulated, but even though his blood glucose levels haven't been ideal, as soon as I started even 1 unit twice per day, he started peeing and drinking less and began putting on weight.


I think the vet tech is a wonderful answer. The one from my vets cat sits and gives him his injection and charges $20 per visit (I'm in NY). Perhaps you could find one who would do it for less or the same if that's manageable for you. Again, I hope your vet can work with you and your schedule to make sure your baby is taken care of.
Stephanie
 
Rkrbirdgirl said:
I have no clue about numbers. I was sent home with give her 2 units and we will see you next Tuesday
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I was going back to the vet for frequent testing and became concerned with them getting high numbers in the office due to stress. It can raise numbers alot. So it's at that point I decided to bite the bullet and home test. I was more stressed about it than Tigger was. You get good at it the more you do it. I use the Advocate Pet Test meter and it is pretty close to the vet number when we compared them the other day.
 
'Fatty Tumors' - I like that that was the description. Also called a 'lipoma', they are indeed harmless, actually only skin deep. One of my non-diabetics had one about the size of a marble when we adopted him over 10 years ago. Over the years, it grew slowly to about the size of a 'shooter marble'. A couple of months ago, it suddenly began growing rapidly until it tripled in size. Not ever painful, just messy and 'clean up' surgery if it bursts. We had it removed last week - indeed even after suddenly growning so rapidly, it was only attached just under the skin, easily removed.

HUGS and hugs!
 
My cat has to travel with me back and forth this weekend. She has been in hiding every since and I can not get her out. So no insulin this morning. I'm praying that we can convince her to come out by tomorrow afternoon. We go back to the vet Tuesday. I know its hard to adjust to new places. Harder on older cats period. I keep thinking if I'm doing the right thing by making her adjust to my life. We are going to stay together in the apartment but her vet is 45 minutes away. Planned on taking her back to my parents tomorrow so it would be a better commute Tuesday
 
Welcome! :)

Pause, make a cup of tea/coffee and take a deep breath.

Lots of good suggestion here, and a lot to process.

The good news is. My kitty Crunchie(GA) had several of those fatty tumours and I had them removed when he was 18. They biopsied them and came back clear, I just left the other ones alone.
He lived to 27.

As your kitty is newly diagnosed it's possible you could try getting her numbers under control with food. I'm not promising this will work but feeding a low carb diet often works miracles.
The lovely people on here helped me get remission with my kitty - Tempest in super fast time. I managed that with disabilities and working part time. I'm not saying your kitty will go into remission but it is possible for a lot of cats.

So this could 'possibly' 'maybe' be a short term thing. Why not give it a try, step by step and see how it goes. It can't hurt and you never know. :bighug::bighug:
 
Rkrbirdgirl said:
My cat has to travel with me back and forth this weekend. She has been in hiding every since and I can not get her out. So no insulin this morning. I'm praying that we can convince her to come out by tomorrow afternoon. We go back to the vet Tuesday. I know its hard to adjust to new places. Harder on older cats period. I keep thinking if I'm doing the right thing by making her adjust to my life. We are going to stay together in the apartment but her vet is 45 minutes away. Planned on taking her back to my parents tomorrow so it would be a better commute Tuesday
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If you start testing at home you can just email your vet a copy of the test results and save you both a lot of stress and driving.
 
You can even give your vet a link to your spreadsheet so he can have access to it any time he needs/wants to see how your kitty is doing.:cat::)
 
Rkrbirdgirl said:
I may have to find a different vet. I dont feel like this one has helped me out too much.
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Most of us here have learned that we have to become educated about diabetes ourselves and then do what it takes to help our kitties. There's a learning curve and some skills to master but the peace of mind and confidence in your own judgment and ability to handle it are worth gold.
 
I give thrive freeze dried treats, any freeze dried ones are fine as far as I know.
 
Rkrbirdgirl said:
Today is the day we are going to the vet. Actually decided to find a different vet and had all the files transferred over. I explained what I needed and didn't get. So here's hoping this vet is better. That I get the vet and not a tech.
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Good luck and let us know how you get on? :bighug::bighug:
 
We ran a blood test and they checked her urine. She for sure has a UTI poor kitty. Kinda upset the other vet didn't bother checking that. Urine test came back negative. She got insulin last Monday thur Friday. Blood test came back. She is not diabetic!! I can not express how relieved I am. Need to work on her diet.

Thank you to everyone here who helped relieve my stress and gave advice.
 
Fabulous news!! :cat: So happy for you! :) And yes low carb wet food so that you don't ever end up with a sugar kitty :rolleyes:
 
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