? 07/11 Mačka - AMPS 666 +5 368 +9 517 / PMPS 606 +2 496, +3 374 another sleepless night?

Penelope and Mačka

Penelope and Mačka

Member Since 2019
Last night's thread http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/...s-470-2-347-active-cycle.216637/#post-2403904

He bounced and feeling down again. I did not sleep again at all last night and ready to be very sick.
Should I stick to 1.75 for the day? And maybe 1.5 for the night in order to avoid too much dropping? Is this something we can do?
I am sorry but I can't go on like that (sleepless and in fear), there's no one that can help me here, and I need to sleep, just even a few hours.

A feeder is a good idea, but there's another cat here (they are fighting non-stop, it's exhausting).
Do you have recommendations? I don't know where to start right now :/

Thank you all for your support
 
Stick to 1.75 units for now. He only dropped to high blues last night, plenty of room before he was in danger. I am glad Bron was there to help you, though I am not sure he would have gone into danger even without the high carb food. Her advice to slow the drop, which can by itself cause bounces, was spot on. I hope you took good notes on how much of what carb food you fed, and when. Might want to go over last night’s action and ou notes in your spreadsheet. Knowledge of how Macka responds to food are what make this a lot easier.

One other thing to consider, he will likely bounce for those six cycles. You will be able to get sleep tonight. Use the bounce cycles to give yourself a break from feline diabetes. :bighug:
 
Penelope,

Like Wendy said, Blues are just fine, Macka does seem to be quite enthusiastic though, some kitties I think are very dramatic. Maybe it is because he is a French kitty, haha.

I will be checking in periodically today. Why don’t you try to get some rest? Lack of sleep is only going to stress you out more.

It will not always be so crazy, once Mackas body gets used to lower healthy numbers he should not swing so wildly, paws crossed:cat:

:bighug::bighug::bighug:
 
Penelope and Mačka said:
Last night's thread http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/...s-470-2-347-active-cycle.216637/#post-2403904

He bounced and feeling down again. I did not sleep again at all last night and ready to be very sick.
Should I stick to 1.75 for the day? And maybe 1.5 for the night in order to avoid too much dropping? Is this something we can do?
I am sorry but I can't go on like that (sleepless and in fear), there's no one that can help me here, and I need to sleep, just even a few hours.

A feeder is a good idea, but there's another cat here (they are fighting non-stop, it's exhausting).
Do you have recommendations? I don't know where to start right now :/

Thank you all for your support
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Better to use same dose am and pm, when it is time for reducing dose, both doses would also be reduced. It is more consistent for cats body and will help get him going more smoothly eventually..
They do have feeders that are controlled with a chip that can go on a cats collar if he will wear one, then it only opens for that cat and other cats can’t get the food.
 
Hi @Julie and Honey and @Wendy&Neko , thank you!

He stayed in the blues yes, but I fed hi mid and high carb (plus honey) for 4 hours to do that.
To me, he was going to (but I don't have your experience). I am so glad he was hungry and loved the gravy. He ate 1 can of gravy, 1 spoon of high carbs and 1 drop of honey. After eating the mid carb (12%) 3 times, he was still going down, which is why I am not reassured.

I just slept an hour, will check hi BG +2 now and will go back to sleep hopefully until noon?
@Julie and Honey good luck on your interview.
 
Penelope and Mačka said:
Hi @Julie and Honey and @Wendy&Neko , thank you!

He stayed in the blues yes, but I fed hi mid and high carb (plus honey) for 4 hours to do that.
To me, he was going to (but I don't have your experience). I am so glad he was hungry and loved the gravy. He ate 1 can of gravy, 1 spoon of high carbs and 1 drop of honey. After eating the mid carb (12%) 3 times, he was still going down, which is why I am not reassured.

I just slept an hour, will check hi BG +2 now and will go back to sleep hopefully until noon?
@Julie and Honey good luck on your interview.
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Sounds like a plan. It was a quick interview and over, whew! Hoping I get on to next round, I hate looking for work it is as exhausting as these darn kitties...
 
I see the 368 at +5, so you are looking good, close to mid cycle, may come down a little more, but you are fine and will likely start heading higher in a few hours. :cat:


He does seem to have some big swings, hopefully as numbers come down over time this all should even out.
 
If he is looking good in a few hours, maybe you can take a nap this afternoon. Hopefully will be a quiet night, but after last night hate to see you lose more sleep. I think if you can rest when you can, it will help calm your nerves and not be so stressed. We don’t want your health to suffer so much, wish we could just tell Macka to chill out and let mamma rest:)

I may need a nap myself!
 
Did he get a little low carb food after his +5 test? Just so he has a little food in him during middle of cycle may help, just low carb.
 
Julie and Honey said:
If he is looking good in a few hours, maybe you can take a nap this afternoon. Hopefully will be a quiet night, but after last night hate to see you lose more sleep. I think if you can rest when you can, it will help calm your nerves and not be so stressed. We don’t want your health to suffer so much, wish we could just tell Macka to chill out and let mamma rest:)

I may need a nap myself!
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Yes, that's exactly what I am going to do, I don't think he's going to go any low today, but not sure about tonight, as on his SS, it looks like a pattern before a rollercoaster night to me :/
 
Penelope and Mačka said:
Yes, that's exactly what I am going to do, I don't think he's going to go any low today, but not sure about tonight, as on his SS, it looks like a pattern before a rollercoaster night to me :/
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Hopefully he will get out of these crazy cycles soon once he realizes it is okay to come down from those really high numbers then he should be less trouble to watch and you can relax some. My cat hat a 300 point swing yesterday and this morning she bounced up in the 400s which is high for her, she came down, but I suspect she may do the same thing for a few days until she gets used to the dose she started a couple days ago. Unfortunately, it is all part of getting them regulated, their bodies need to get used to it before things start to get better.
 
Julie and Honey said:
Hopefully he will get out of these crazy cycles soon once he realizes it is okay to come down from those really high numbers then he should be less trouble to watch and you can relax some. My cat hat a 300 point swing yesterday and this morning she bounced up in the 400s which is high for her, she came down, but I suspect she may do the same thing for a few days until she gets used to the dose she started a couple days ago. Unfortunately, it is all part of getting them regulated, their bodies need to get used to it before things start to get better.
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I can see Honey has a lot of blues during the day, which is great. Do you stay calm in those circumstances? Do you feed her just in case she goes too low? I find her SS quite beautiful and regulated compared to the Macka...
 
Penelope and Mačka said:
I can see Honey has a lot of blues during the day, which is great. Do you stay calm in those circumstances? Do you feed her just in case she goes too low? I find her SS quite beautiful and regulated compared to the Macka...
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She just started getting more blue lately, I actually hope for blue, lol. I feed her every few hours during the day. I think maybe it is scarier with Macka because he is so much higher to start at this point and going further down to get to blue?

Once she gets past mid cycle and is in a safe number I don’t really worry about it much.
 
@Bobbie And Bubba, @Bron and Sheba do you guys have any words of wisdom for tonight? I think Penelope wants to try to get some sleep tonight and I bet she is wondering how will she know it is safe to go to sleep without worrying.

Ugh, I just stepped in a hair ball. Be right back..

I think it’s If she checks +2 or +3 and it is close to PMPS , then okay and maybe set alarm to check at +6?
 
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Looks like today was a bounce day and/ or what we call New Dise Wonkiness(NDW). That occurs sometimes on the 2 -3 cycle after an increase where the numbers go up a bit for about 24 hours and then start to come down.

I would get a +2 tonight and if it’s lower than the preshot it could indicate an active cycle and some more testing might be necessary. If the +2 is higher, get one more test in before you go to bed and then get a good night’s sleep.
 
Thank you so much @Julie and Honey. Do you shave Honey sometimes?

I know that I was told to stick to 1.75, but again, if it wasn't for all the high carb food and honey I gave him last night, I am so sure he would have been in the low greens like 3 days ago. I am tempted to reduce to 1.5 tonight, to be safe.
When I look at Macka's SS, I can see that with 1.5 units he had a few ok-ish numbers. At the time, I did not know I had to test more during the day to get an idea of the curve, and so many data is missing, but with hindsight, I suspect there might have been some yellows and blues during the cycles (and Macka was doing better than this week, he was less tired, more alert and playful).
 
Penelope and Mačka said:
Thank you so much @Julie and Honey. Do you shave Honey sometimes?

I know that I was told to stick to 1.75, but again, if it wasn't for all the high carb food and honey I gave him last night, I am so sure he would have been in the low greens like 3 days ago. I am tempted to reduce to 1.5 tonight, to be safe.
When I look at Macka's SS, I can see that with 1.5 units he had a few ok-ish numbers. At the time, I did not know I had to test more during the day to get an idea of the curve, and so many data is missing, but with hindsight, I suspect there might have been some yellows and blues during the cycles (and Macka was doing better than this week, he was less tired, more alert and playful).
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I tried shaving a small patch of fur when I started shots to be easier to see where I was shooting, but not anymore.
 
Penelope and Mačka said:
Thank you so much @Julie and Honey. Do you shave Honey sometimes?

I know that I was told to stick to 1.75, but again, if it wasn't for all the high carb food and honey I gave him last night, I am so sure he would have been in the low greens like 3 days ago. I am tempted to reduce to 1.5 tonight, to be safe.
When I look at Macka's SS, I can see that with 1.5 units he had a few ok-ish numbers. At the time, I did not know I had to test more during the day to get an idea of the curve, and so many data is missing, but with hindsight, I suspect there might have been some yellows and blues during the cycles (and Macka was doing better than this week, he was less tired, more alert and playful).
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People here can offer advice on what they believe is the best corse of action based on all the data that is available for your cat. One of the main concerns was the recent DKA and the 1.75 was best course of action to help keep that under control, from a data perspective. Ultimately you are the one that has to deal with this, we can only try to help. It is possible after a few days on 1.75, he may be in better numbers and it would be getting reduced soon anyway. Hard to say for sure. Just don’t want to see you having to go through this a second time if you go down too soon and have to go back up again. Ultimately it is your decision because you are the one holding the syringe as we say...:bighug:
 
Penelope, we gave medium carb last night with just a 1 drop of honey at one point, but we did not give a lot of high carb food. When I asked you the highest carb food you had, you told me was 14% which is medium carb. In the last thread you told me you didn't give all that much food altogether, that the teaspoon was small.
I know you are really tired, and you need sleep, but we can only offer our best advise. As Honey said, it is ultimately up to you what you do with Macka. I'm not around today but I can be around if you need me again tonight. Just tag me.:):bighug:
 
As I suggested previously, you might want to also write down when in the cycle you gave extra carbs. Food really is your tool to keep Macka in safe blood sugar numbers but you need to learn how carb sensitive he is. Which means being able to look at what you fed before, and how well it worked. Each cat differs in what % carb works for them. You will also find differences in carb sensitivity at different times of the cycle. Right after onset, when the insulin is it's strongest, you will need higher carbs than later in the cycle (after nadir) when the insulin is starting to lose effect.

For that reason, it's also important to try to limit the amount of carbs they get on a regular basis after nadir. While multiple small meals are good, try to limit how many carbs he gets after nadir, unless you are trying to prevent a low numbers event. Carbs after nadir will slow the insulin action, you'll get shorter duration, and higher preshots. Imagine a car slowing towards a stop sign (insulin after nadir). Adding carbs just taps on the brakes and causes the car to stop earlier than you want. Resulting higher preshots means further for them to come down, and possibly mean fast drops and yet more bouncing.

I also doubt he would have gone to low green if you hadn't intervened last night. The goal was to slow down the drops, which you did. Get that +2 test tonight and post the result. We can help you decide if you need to test after that tonight.
 
Wendy&Neko said:
For that reason, it's also important to try to limit the amount of carbs they get on a regular basis after nadir. While multiple small meals are good, try to limit how many carbs he gets after nadir, unless you are trying to prevent a low numbers event. Carbs after nadir will slow the insulin action, you'll get shorter duration, and higher preshots. Imagine a car slowing towards a stop sign (insulin after nadir). Adding carbs just taps on the brakes and causes the car to stop earlier than you want. Resulting higher preshots means further for them to come down, and possibly mean fast drops and yet more bouncing.
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This is interesting and something I have never heard before. I generally only think about 2 hours before shot, but this would include a longer time before shot. Good to know to maybe cut back a little on the amount of food during that time. I am going to try this! Thanks for the info Wendy.
 
Julie and Honey said:
This is interesting and something I have never heard before. I generally only think about 2 hours before shot, but this would include a longer time before shot. Good to know to maybe cut back a little on the amount of food during that time. I am going to try this! Thanks for the info Wendy.
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Yes indeed, that explains a lot. Thank you @Wendy&Neko for the clarification. I will refrain from giving much food after +6.
 
PM +2 is 496. Would you call it an active cycle? His PMPS was 606 so it went down a 100.

I could sleep 1 hour and it was the hardest thing to wake up right now :)
 
374 is still really high. He would have to drop over 300 points to be anywhere near in danger. When he went low on 7/07, he was down in the blues at this point of the cycle. Personally, I would leave out some food and go to sleep. If you are nervous you can do one of two things. The first is to test again in an hour. The second option is to try to sleep for 2-3 hours, then test again.
 
Thanks @Wendy&Neko for your thoughtful message. I think I am going to sleep for 1-2 hours if I can (but I am very agitated. I know it's still a high number, but I guess I got a little traumatized by the hypo).

Should I leave mid carb or low card food?
 
Low carb for now is fine.

Over time and gathering of data, you will learn Macka's patterns and get a better idea of when you need to be alarmed, and when you don't.:bighug:
 
Wendy&Neko said:
Low carb for now is fine.

Over time and gathering of data, you will learn Macka's patterns and get a better idea of when you need to be alarmed, and when you don't.:bighug:
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+5 = 232.
I wonder how much more he can decrease? Does it look like he's safe?
He's eating some low carb right now.
 
Bron and Sheba said:
He is probably close to nadir now so may not drop much further. Still in safe numbers.
You could test again in one hour
Did you manage some sleep?
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Thank you for still being around. OK. That would reassure me. I slept another hour... If I could call it a night now and have 5 more hours to recharge, I could function a little tomorrow...

Funny how it's always at night that he decides to have an active cycle.

In an ideal world, i would also like it to test less and leave his poor ears alone :(
 
Bron and Sheba said:
It’s slowing right down though isn’t it.
Are you still awake.? If you are you could test at + 7. I don’t think he will drop much further. Then I think you could go to sleep and get some much needed rest.
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I am still awake, yes. I will test at +7
He's having an asthma crisis too :( I just gave him albuterol with his inhaler
 
Hi Penelope, I'm not sure how flexible you are with shooting times but here's something to maybe consider....

I've always. *needed* my sleep, and at least 8 hours (ha). Physically queasy if I had to get up through the night and "woke up", or get up early. We shot at 8, and watching Willow in the beginning were often up to 2am, usually 3am before asleep...

Hubby proposed shooting earlier. I fought it, because it meant I'd have to be *up* earlier and there was no real difference, same hours of sleep time, just going to bed earlier.

Except I did it, moved shot time back an hour, and honestly... best thing ever mentally. Going to bed "early" really, really helped me feel better physically and mentally, and more able to handle things. Turns out for me, getting to bed is the trick to make me feel I'm getting enough sleep, not when I get up.

Also really good to have a good idea where Macka is nadiring, because you can say to yourself, ok if I'm shooting at 6 and nadir is usually +5 or +6, then after 12 I'll be heading to bed, and maybe sooner! Because you know that after nadir, numbers will be rising and Macka will be safe. It's a mental thing for me.

It might also help you to get a +1 on Macka for a few days. This will give you an idea of a food spike on his low carb food...For example you'll be able to say to yourself, I *know* Macka gets a "x point" increase in points in 1 hour from eating a low carb meal (3-4%?ish). And also, know that if he drops low (lime green) you usually only need to raise him maybe 10-15 points to be safe. So you will *know* that you can raise his BG levels by feeding a hi carb (say 25%) in 20-30 minutes. It's really the *knowing* that gives the comfort, knowing that you can bring him up....Which is why it's so important as Wendy had said, to record the amount of %carb you're giving. It is a tool.

Anyway, I hope this might help some. Getting into this all is very difficult...For me I was in a bit of a different situation because Willow ran greens and blues from pretty much the start, so I was terrified because she was always scary low to me. By learning her onset and nadir, and how responsive she is to carbs, Ive gained confidence because I know if she drops into lower numbers, I can bring her up quickly and keep her safe.

You're doing great, you can and will do this, and it gets so much easier :)

With love, nikki
 
Macka is on his way to a SS that will soon have Zorro (well, his mom really) green with envy, Penelope :bighug:

So happy for you and him to see the move into lower numbers! You're doing so great :bighug:
Perhaps find a book that you really enjoy, or get tucked into a box set tv series or anything that will make you look a little bit more forward to the couch pajama parties with Macka. Eventually they become not so bad, really.
 
Bron and Sheba said:
So Macka reached nadir at +6. That’s good data.
I hope you can sleep well Penelope
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Yes, I guess that's where his nadir is when it does exist?
This morning he was back in the 600s though :(
And not coming down much at +3 (545). I bet it's going to be active again tonight.

I slept 3 hours last night and 1 1/2 hours this morning. Not enough. I am aware I might be complaining a lot about this situation, the lack of sleep etc... it's just a real struggle. I am sure you experienced the same one and you all told me it would get better with time. I basically put my life on hold for Macka. I will do it because he's my love. But yes, I live and breathe for the next test now, one hour at a time, my husband has to force feed me in the evening, I stopped working, I cancel all my appointments, condo meetings, surgery; I can't leave the house! Maybe I could today since he's the highs, but then I would 1. be super tired, 2. be super worried.

nslade001 said:
Hubby proposed shooting earlier. I fought it, because it meant I'd have to be *up* earlier and there was no real difference, same hours of sleep time, just going to bed earlier.

Except I did it, moved shot time back an hour, and honestly... best thing ever mentally. Going to bed "early" really, really helped me feel better physically and mentally, and more able to handle things. Turns out for me, getting to bed is the trick to make me feel I'm getting enough sleep, not when I get up.
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Thank you very much for this insight @nslade001 . I shoot at 7h30. I wish I could shoot earlier because we used to go to bed at 9pm and wake up at 6am. The other cat is fed at 6-6h30. So we technically could move the shooting time to 6:30. The only reason we didn't was because in one of my jobs (on Fri and Sat, the one I have not resigned yet but already missed 3 days of work) I finished at 7pm. But it might be doable if I can convince my husband to pre-shot test (he's very uncofjrmtable with drawing blood, but he knows how to shoot).

nslade001 said:
It might also help you to get a +1 on Macka for a few days.
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Good idea, thanks for the tip. I feel so bad poking his ears so much :'(
nslade001 said:
Anyway, I hope this might help some. Getting into this all is very difficult...For me I was in a bit of a different situation because Willow ran greens and blues from pretty much the start, so I was terrified because she was always scary low to me. By learning her onset and nadir, and how responsive she is to carbs, Ive gained confidence because I know if she drops into lower numbers, I can bring her up quickly and keep her safe.
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Yes situation is different but fear is the same. Do you have any suggestion of not-too-bad high carb food? I'm going to go to the grocery store (finally) today and pack on food.
 
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