19 Sept | Girlie | AMPS 140; +2=50; +3=76; +3:30=61; +4=67 +4:30=58; +10:30=266

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Sandy and Black Kitty said:
Where is a bounce when you need one? ;)

I was fortunate to have been working from home when we were in the thick of it. My home office however was in a cottage behind our main house. I spent many nights sleeping between tests on a cot in that office, which took a toll on me. Someone suggested a timed feeder. For us, it was lifesaver. I was able to once again sleep in my be in the main house, knowing that food would be offered In his case mini meals at +4 and +8 and a piece of kitty crack at +10 to ensure any leftover food from the earlier offerings became unavailable after +10 so as not to influence PS.
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Girlie is a nibbler, and if she's going to do a dive, it's between +2 and +5. I'm not sure how a timed feeder would help in that respect...? I'm not worried about her gulping down all of her food in one go: I'm worried about her diving and not having the appropriate food to bring her up.

She's also not food motivated (unless she's diving), and if food isn't there, she'll just walk away. I'm happy to give the timed feeder a go, but I'll be curious to see if she'll still come looking for food if she finds the device shut when she wants food. She typically goes looking for a nibble of food every hour or so. But if it's a nice sunny day, she'll forego food to sleep in the sun instead.
 
How will I ever do this when I'm back at work full-time? I can't leave out MC/HC food for her five days a week during the day just in case... sigh... :banghead::banghead::banghead:

Looks like the only way to do this is to get in up to a +3 and hopefully a +4 before I go off to work. I can try to give the timed feeder a go, but not sure how she'll react to that - we'll see. But that doesn't solve the problem of MC/HC on a daily basis.... any suggestions? Sorry, rushing to get ready to go to work. :-)
 
That makes it a challenge for you. Got to be creative. Is there someone who could come over during the day while you are away? Maybe just to check on Girlie and feed?
Thats nice to know that if she is diving she'll eat. If she's not over weight I'd leave plenty of food out.
 
DebG said:
That makes it a challenge for you. Got to be creative. Is there someone who could come over during the day while you are away? Maybe just to check on Girlie and feed?
Thats nice to know that if she is diving she'll eat. If she's not over weight I'd leave plenty of food out.
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Indeed! :-) No neighbours or friends who'll do that, unfortunately. I could pay the mobile vet $50/day to come and do one BG test, but they're not going to stay with her if she's too low. She's always been lean - it's more of a problem to get her to eat enough, which is why she's on Mirtazapine.

Am I too anxious, I wonder? And how much will I mess her up if I leave MC food every day just on the off chance that she might dive when I'm not there? It's not like I can tell her to save her diving times for Friday night to Sunday night! :-)

She seems to be doing well the past few days, but...?
 
I do like greens, but I'm not so happy that she's already gone to 76 @ +1:30 when I have to leave for work in a half hour...

It's sunny and warm outside, so she's not looking for food at all - she'd rather just lie in the sun.

We're using AlphaTrak2, so anything close to 68 requires intervention. :)
 
Here we go again... 50 @+2

Just lying in the sun - not even looking for food so not even her usual tell of "going low! Where's food?"

Gave some MC 16; how do you get just the gravy out?
 
50 on the alphatrak is too low. You need to be giving honey to bring her up or high carb.
If you are planning to go to work you will need to abort the cycle in my opinion..
Have you tested again?
 
Bron and Sheba said:
50 on the alphatrak is too low. You need to be giving honey to bring her up or high carb.
If you are planning to go to work you will need to abort the cycle.
Have you tested again?
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Gave her some MC16 then HC20
Just tested: 52 now; gave 1/2 tsp HC20

Work cancelled, of course.
 
rhiannon and shadow (GA) said:
that's quite a dramatic drop... like she did before.
If she won't eat, you can always rub honey on her gums....
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She's eating the HC, but what's really strange is that she usually will come looking for food when she's dropping or too low. Today, I would never have known as she chose lying in the sun over looking for food, although she was happy to eat when I put the bowl in front of her.

So I guess I will never go to work again... trying to find some humour in this! :(:eek:
 
sounds like you've got it now....
it takes 30 minutes for body to respond to the food/gravy so I would check again in 30 minutes.....

maybe you could go in 2 hours or so....

I was lucky that my work was completely flexible .....
 
Bron and Sheba said:
You have earned a reduction.
Ok ....if you have cancelled work, then no need to abort cycle.
You must have an understanding boss!
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How do you abort a cycle?

Not an understanding boss at all. They just have no choice in the matter. We're going through a restructure so I have to reapply for my job; not making a good impression with over 4 months off for surgery recovery and now the beloved cat. Too much stress at the moment. :eek:
 
aborting is when you give honey and numbers go up up up.... or a high carb gravy food.....
after a low low number, kitty has nothing to prove to earn the reduction. It's earned.... so we call it aborting....
 
Okay, while I'm waiting for the next test: great that I caught this as I was about to walk out the door. What would/could have happened if I'd not caught this and wasn't here to intervene? I'm trying to think of things like this as I need to plan for the future when my boss might say "come in or else."

She's more keen on the sun today than food, so not sure if she would have necessarily corrected herself. And if I had just left LC or MC food out, then that wouldn't have been enough, would it? Bottom line: could she have died by the time I got home? I'm just wondering what the worst case scenario could have been. I'm not trying to scare myself or be overly dramatic: I just am unsure about how these things could go so I can consider and prepare for the future.
 
Can you take her to the vet or take her to work? Otherwise you are going to be quite late today.
 
Girlie's mom said:
Okay, while I'm waiting for the next test: great that I caught this as I was about to walk out the door. What would/could have happened if I'd not caught this and wasn't here to intervene? I'm trying to think of things like this as I need to plan for the future when my boss might say "come in or else."

She's more keen on the sun today than food, so not sure if she would have necessarily corrected herself. And if I had just left LC or MC food out, then that wouldn't have been enough, would it? Bottom line: could she have died by the time I got home? I'm just wondering what the worst case scenario could have been. I'm not trying to scare myself or be overly dramatic: I just am unsure about how these things could go so I can consider and prepare for the future.
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We can't say definitely what would have happened.
Her body may have panicked and dumped glucose.......and then it may not have. 50 at +2 on the alphatrak is a big red flag and I would not like to leave it to chance. You did the right thing today...
It can be hard juggling FD and work especially if you have a diver. I know I could never trust Sheba to drop gracefully...sorry Sheba.
 
Wendy&Neko said:
Can you take her to the vet or take her to work? Otherwise you are going to be quite late today.
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To be honest, I don't know that the vet would do what I'm doing with Girlie right now. They'll just put her on a glucose drip.

I wonder why she's doing this? Is this a positive sign that she's making steps forward (while driving me to a nervous breakdown, of course! :p)
 
that is a huge dive. I would think that you may need to increase the do no shoot number when you are working taking into consideration that she dives. The priority is keeping her safe.
 
Marvin's Mom - Nat said:
that is a huge dive. I would think that you may need to increase the do no shoot number when you are working taking into consideration that she dives. The priority is keeping her safe.
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That's interesting. 140 doesn't seem like a do not shoot number, but maybe not with her? I don't know how we'd make any progress if I avoid shots in the AM because I have to go to work, though. Or would I just not shoot if her AMPS is at a certain level? I still have a week or two when I can go in late if I absolutely have to, but that's going to end soon. :-)
 
Girlie's mom said:
76, so going down a bit.

Can't seem to squish gravy out of this FFHC20 or the MC, so just giving 1/4 tsp of the HC. Have been trying to figure out other ways to get just the gravy out...anything besides squishing I could try?
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I always had trouble squishing the gravy out too. I think the texture out here in Oz must be a bit different. I just used to give a teaspoon of the mixture and it seemed to worked OK
 
I'm at a loss here. You need to be able to go to work. What about switching to SLGS and not TR protocol? Or some kind of variation. I agree with @Marvin's Mom - Nat that keeping Girlie safe is priority number one and while we all aim for OTJ maybe for now focus on under renal threshold and no huge dives...if Girlie will cooperate:rolleyes:
 
Bron and Sheba said:
Have you tested again yet?
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+3:30 = 61 so gave tiny bit more of HC20 as she's dropping on that

Bron and Sheba said:
I always had trouble squishing the gravy out too. I think the texture out here in Oz must be a bit different. I just used to give a teaspoon of the mixture and it seemed to worked OK
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Good point! Thought there must be a secret to getting the gravy out that I was missing...maybe this is just a can that is low on gravy. :-)
 
Beenie said:
I'm at a loss here. You need to be able to go to work. What about switching to SLGS and not TR protocol? Or some kind of variation. I agree with @Marvin's Mom - Nat that keeping Girlie safe is priority number one and while we all aim for OTJ maybe for now focus on under renal threshold and no huge dives...if Girlie will cooperate:rolleyes:
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Well I'm at a loss, too, as we've been decreasing since 3 September. She's been on the 0.50 for 8 cycles now. I don't see how SLGS would make her any safer, to be honest. And she was on the 0.75 for 8 cycles as she was bouncing, etc. So it's not like I'm doing dose changes every 3 days or so... (tearing hair out here...gorgeous day today in Sydney, though! Trying to focus on the positive in that she clearly wants to swim with the sharks and reduce her insulin a bit...)
 
Beenie said:
What I'm thinking, and I'm by no means one of the experts, she dropped below 90 yesterday so you would've reduced her dose last night. Perhaps then she may have not dropped too low today?!?
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I see - I was just taking a closer look at the SLGS. Maybe that's the way I have to go right now to keep her safe and not lose my job. :-)
 
I Believe you want to give HC until she is up above the reduction point (68). Then keep testing to make sure she stays above for at least 2 tests. But remember the HC stays in her system for 2 hours, so you need to monitor for at least that long.
 
Down to 58 again @+4.5 She's going down, not up. Just keep giving HC food or find a higher than 20 HC food or ...?
 
Girlie's mom said:
I don't think she has a normal nadir number! Not that I can see, at least...


I might just give her some glucose syrup to bring her up as she seems determined to keep going down, instead.
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I was just looking at your spreadsheet. I agree not a definite nadir. Hope you are able to get her up soon and that she stays up.
 
I would go with the syrup and re-test. Lets focus on keeping her above 68. I think she drops lower in the beginning of the cycle so she should start naturally going up soon too.
 
She looks like she nadirs between +5 and +7 but it moves around on different days. So if you get a low number like 50 at +2 you are going to have to be vigilant until at least +7 and possible later. That is because the insulin is going to continue to try and lower the bsl until nadir, when it's effects will start to wear off.
 
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