? 1/4 Ozzy PMPS 269, +2 226, +4 177

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yes- he ate breakfast before shot/I left. Left them several meals in feeder. Will try to get a ketone test again tonight.
 
I think he is not used to having food in his petsafe5. When I was on vacation the last 2 weeks, I'd take him into the kitchen for meals. But I don't think he realizes that most times there is food in there waiting for him if he wants it. Last night was the second night in a row that he came to wake me up around 4am for food, and I had to take him to the kitchen to show him that he had some food there waiting for him. He ate his 2am snack (around 4:30am) but then didn't notice there was a 5 am one there too. I wonder how long it will take for them to realize they are getting fed on a schedule now. Also, I wonder how long it will take for them to associate the sound of the dish rotating with the fact that it means food.

Maybe because he didn't eat all his snacks last night, that could have caused the higher PS? I feel like sometimes I notice he might have higher BS if he hasn't been eating as much throughout the day. Does this sound possible?
 
I trained George with the feeder, by putting treats in it and making it spin, I would show him the treats as soon as it spined, he soon associated the noise of the feeder to food being available, that said I do put it in the same room as him if I have to leave him, to make sure he hears it, this is easy with George as he doesn't move much from his favorite spot:rolleyes:

As for the no food making the BG higher, that can be true in cats on smaller doses where the pancreas is sputtering food can stimulate the pancreas to produce insulin and thus lower BG, and it hold true for George who is now OTJ, but I'm not sure if that would be the case with Ozzy.

It may be NDW as Marje suggested, or it's possible that he dropped a bit further a couple of nights ago, that 192 at +2 has me wondering if that was an active cycle, as he dropped significantly from pmps, he may have seen some lower BG?? ..... and if that happened the higher numbers could be a resulting bounce. ( a +2 that is lower than the PS can often be a heads up for an active cycle)

How is Ozzy today? Is he acting normal?
 
Hey Jo :bighug:....just a thot about Ozzy..maybe part of his deal is adjusting to new feeder and to u/DH going back to work....I believe our cats can read us and pick up on our emotions as well...all that said, for stress around the holidays when our house is full of overnight company I use Feliway plug in diffusers...they emit a calming feline pheromone and really work with Elmo who is olfactory challenged ...smells set him off like crazy....Feliway makes a comfort spray as well that I use when I take him to the vet or when he seems stressed. You can spray that on carpets, chairs, beds ..not on Kitty :woot:. Amazon, of course, has it all. You are doing fantastic with Ozzy...just keep putting one foot/paw in front of the other and remember u both r in our thots and prayers :bighug:
 
I think his PS is likely due to NDW and also potentially dawn phenomenon. This occurs in people, too, where the AMPS is the highest number. In cats that are coming down the dosing scale and headed for remission, we often find that the last number to come down is the AMPS.

Let’s see how he’s doing when you get home.
 
PMPS 269 so he is back in the yellow at start of cycle. Ozzy just ate his food (watered down good) and is 'locked' out of room with LB in it for a few so I can trick him and get a ketone test again. Shooting in 10 mins.
 
Marje and Gracie said:
I think his PS is likely due to NDW and also potentially dawn phenomenon. This occurs in people, too, where the AMPS is the highest number. In cats that are coming down the dosing scale and headed for remission, we often find that the last number to come down is the AMPS.

Let’s see how he’s doing when you get home.
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The vet looked at Ozzy's spreadsheet and said he thought Ozzy might be headed for remission. I posted about the vet's feedback in this post here: Feedback from Ozzy's Vet
A couple folks responded but no one commented on the matter of Ozzy heading for remission. I am not sure if I agree with the vet on this yet, but I don't know much about this to be honest so I'd appreciate any feedback on this, especially given Marje's comment above related to high AMPS.

Also, what is dawn phenomenon?

On a different topic- Ozzy has GAINED WEIGHT! What!??? So has Figgie! What!!?? I am actually ok with Figgie gaining weight because he has always been so super skinny his entire life and it's nice to be able to pet him and not feel his spine. I'm glad to see him looking more healthy. But Ozzy seems to have gained back ALL his weight since he came home from the hospital (1 month). Could he have been seriously dehydrated from the DKA episode (he was definitely dehydrated- vet said so) that now that he's more back to normal, he's filled back out? He is eating NO dry food. But since Figgie has gained weight too, I definitely think they are both gaining from food. Maybe I'm feeding them too much. I actually was happy to see Ozzy with a little less weight on him and now he's a little fattie again! Could this all happen in 1 months time???? What should I do? I am afraid to diet him until we get him regulated on insulin due to him being ketone-prone and recovering from DKA.
 
Ozzy Pawzbourne said:
Also, what is dawn phenomenon?
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Basically, the dawn phenomenon is a surge of hormones that the body produces daily around 4:00 a.m. to 5:00 a.m to raise the blood glucose in preparation for getting up and getting going.

The rise in glucose is mostly because your body is making less insulin and more glucagon (a hormone that increases blood glucose) than it needs. In normal people/cats, the pancreas releases some insulin to help, but in diabetics, the pancreas isn't able to compensate for the flood of extra hormones. Glucagon signals the liver to break down glycogen into glucose
 
Chris & China said:
Basically, the dawn phenomenon is a surge of hormones that the body produces daily around 4:00 a.m. to 5:00 a.m to raise the blood glucose in preparation for getting up and getting going.

The rise in glucose is mostly because your body is making less insulin and more glucagon (a hormone that increases blood glucose) than it needs. In normal people/cats, the pancreas releases some insulin to help, but in diabetics, the pancreas isn't able to compensate for the flood of extra hormones. Glucagon signals the liver to break down glycogen into glucose
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Thank you for this explanation, Chris!
 
Ozzy Pawzbourne said:
The vet looked at Ozzy's spreadsheet and said he thought Ozzy might be headed for remission
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I think your vet is just among the "normal" vets we hear about here who consider a cat that's able to stay under 300 "controlled".....we don't ....since most people won't do the kind of testing that we do, vets tend to prefer their patients run too high and not risk the dangers of hypoglycemia

Ozzy Pawzbourne said:
Could this all happen in 1 months time???? What should I do?
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Yes!! Look at China's profile page (in our signature)....you'll see how far she came in about 3-4 months!! You might try a food like Weruva...it's got less calories per ounce than most...also, getting Ozzy to exercise will help keep his weight down as well as possibly reducing his insulin dose even more.
 
Beth 73 said:
Hey Jo :bighug:....just a thot about Ozzy..maybe part of his deal is adjusting to new feeder and to u/DH going back to work....I believe our cats can read us and pick up on our emotions as well...all that said, for stress around the holidays when our house is full of overnight company I use Feliway plug in diffusers...they emit a calming feline pheromone and really work with Elmo who is olfactory challenged ...smells set him off like crazy....Feliway makes a comfort spray as well that I use when I take him to the vet or when he seems stressed. You can spray that on carpets, chairs, beds ..not on Kitty :woot:. Amazon, of course, has it all. You are doing fantastic with Ozzy...just keep putting one foot/paw in front of the other and remember u both r in our thots and prayers :bighug:
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My hubby says I baby Ozzy.... Ok, I'll own it, I do. He's my baby! He does get stressed. Tonight he is being SUPER lovey dovey. I think he was missing me since I basically was with him all day every day for the last few weeks. I am going to look into the feliway diffusers. I've seen you mention them a couple times now.
 
Chris & China said:
You might try a food like Weruva...it's got less calories per ounce than most
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We got a bunch of new foods for the kitties off of Dr. Lisa's list... Weruva was one of them and they really like it! Any suggestions on how to maybe help him get in some exercise even while we are gone for the day? He's a little fat cat...and well, he likes to do what fat cats do... sleep!!! Ahhhhh to be a cat! Wouldn't we love that life!
 
I don't think Ozzy is on his way to remission at this time. And we try to not focus on that here. First, we focus on them getting regulated. We comsider them close to remission when they are down to about 0.1u in dose and numbers are primarily under 100.

I've used Feliway and haven't found it to be that helpful. I prefer flower essences and really like Green Hope Farms. When I brought Livia home, I gave her and Tobey both "new beginnings" and also the one for loss. It really helped the introductions and they were best friends from the get go.

Have you ever seen the Jackson Galaxy Space Station or the Ripple Rug. Our two play and play with these. Tobey is six and Livvie is 7 months and Tobey plays as much with them as Liv does. Maybe Ozzy would like these toys the two of them can play with while you are gone?

The other thing you can do is weigh him, cut his food back a tiny bit and feed for a week, weigh him again and see if he lost or gained or stayed the same. Then adjust. Cats can safely lose 1% of their current weight a week.
 
I read the thread on main health about Ozzy potentially headed for remission. I confess that I'm not seeing anything that suggests that yet. However, as everyone has said, this is a process. Newly diagnosed cats do have the best chance at becoming diet controlled, but there is no way that we can look at a particular cat at this phase and know if it's a cat that can eventually go OTJ or not. The path to becoming diet-controlled includes getting the cat's blood sugar into green numbers as much as possible - that's the focus.

Ah, I see Marje just posted the same thing. :D

Just a thought - I noticed when looking at his spreadsheet that on the night of 1/2 he had a fairly good drop between the +11.15 and the pm +2. Whenever you see a +2 that is much lower than the preshot, it's not a bad idea to get another test in if you can manage it. Just to see if he's dropping low somewhere. Many cats have their lowest numbers at night and since the low numbers determine your dose changes, it can be important to catch them when you can.
 
Thank you Marje and Julie for your honesty Re: Ozzy and remission. I know it's really everyone's goal and dream to get their cat to remission after finding out they have diabetes. I really really truly hope this will be the case for Ozzy. I know there are a ton of other complications with DM and I really hope to avoid them and that Ozzy can have a happy healthy long life. I know it's a process....so we are just taking it one day at a time. This is all still so new to us.

I LOVE Jackson Galaxy. We watch his show on tv all the time. I will definitely look into those toys and other suggestions made. Thank you.

I will try to get in as many PM shots as I can. I am a really bad sleeper and have a bit of insomnia regularly... if I get up in the middle of the night (for any reason, even to use the restroom) I have the hardest time going back to sleep. It really makes it very difficult for me with my job that is very fast paced and stressful all the time. We will do what we can to make this work. Some days are going to be better than others. I am just so thankful for starting lantus since it seems much more gentler on Ozzy (maybe too much so until we get his dosage figured out). I don't feel like I have to worry so much when I'm at work and whether or not my cat is hypo'ing at home and I'm going to come home to a comatose kitty. I have to admit that I was so sad to poke my kitty every day so many times when I was at home on my holiday vacation, and now I just wish I could be here more so I know what's going on with him and that he's safe. Again, very happy to have switched to lantus! I am very hopeful and look forward to some progress with Ozzy (finally) in the next few weeks in bringing his numbers to safer levels.
 
Punkin was tested for 2.5 years, and every time we went to a new vet (specialist) they would examine his ears and say they wouldn't have known he was being tested by looking at his ear. I only used one - the left ear scarred while we were learning and we only used the right ear after that. Every night I put on Neosporin ointment with pain relief (which I also tried on myself) on his ear, and every morning I wiped off the excess before we started for the day and his ear would look completely healed. I don't think it's a horrible thing to test their ears - I told myself that it was necessary for me to keep him safe. I believe that, and I told him that too. Testing was what was keeping him safe. He was always happy to have his post-pokey treat, so he would sit still for me long enough to get poked, then leap away to run to the kitchen for his piece of chicken. :D

When you have enough tests to know what Ozzy's patterns on Lantus are, you'll be able to make predictions and probably be able to test less. All cats have patterns and we can help you see them once they emerge. He is still building the Lantus depot at this point.
 
On a totally separate side note and rant....I was recently exposed to chicken pox and never had them as a kid and did not receive the vaccine (it was not around yet). I might be having some psychosomatic symptoms...but I have been feeling like I am coming down with something since this morning and have an itchy bump on my scalp. Could you imagine getting chicken pox at almost 40?!!! Oh holely hell...I hope this is not the case!
 
julie & punkin (ga) said:
Punkin was tested for 2.5 years, and every time we went to a new vet (specialist) they would examine his ears and say they wouldn't have known he was being tested by looking at his ear. I only used one - the left ear scarred while we were learning and we only used the right ear after that. Every night I put on Neosporin ointment with pain relief (which I also tried on myself) on his ear, and every morning I wiped off the excess before we started for the day and his ear would look completely healed. I don't think it's a horrible thing to test their ears - I told myself that it was necessary for me to keep him safe. I believe that, and I told him that too. Testing was what was keeping him safe. He was always happy to have his post-pokey treat, so he would sit still for me long enough to get poked, then leap away to run to the kitchen for his piece of chicken. :D

When you have enough tests to know what Ozzy's patterns on Lantus are, you'll be able to make predictions and probably be able to test less. All cats have patterns and we can help you see them once they emerge. He is still building the Lantus depot at this point.
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My poor kitties ears look a little bit like a chew toy sometimes. I was putting on Neosporin at first but his ears seemed red, and down past the point where we were testing. I also noticed that down at the base of his ear, it was very red and bruised. My guess is that he did not like the ointment on his ears (even though I used such a small amount) and he was rubbing them with his paws to try to get it off. Or maybe he is allergic to the ointment. I have stopped using the Neosporin and the redness I described seems to be going away. Will keep experimenting and see what works best for him.

Love the 'post-pokey' treat saying. That's cute!:p

I would say that Ozzy does pretty well with the ear testing so far. He sits still for me most times and sometimes purrs...but honestly, almost every time I poke him he lets out a little tiny cry and sometimes he will paw at his ear as I'm trying to get the sample. Makes me feel bad. I started giving him treats after as well. Hopefully the fat chuck of freeze dried chicken bites that he LOVES will be worth it to him for the moment of being uncomfortable.
 
Marje's Gracie (@Marje and Gracie ) reacted to the Neosporin, so that's definitely possible. I don't think there is any good substitute for it, but if there is, Marje will no doubt let you know.

Treats made a HUGE difference for punkin. We cooked a couple of chicken breasts, diced them small (1/2" cube), froze most of it and kept a couple of tablespoons in the fridge. That would last for a couple of days. It was easy and couldn't have made him happier.
 
My quest for a ketone test tonight is not going well. I gave Ozzy his dinner at 7pm and locked him out of the room with the LB. Tried to take him in there a few times tonight and dropped him in the box...and NOPE. Gave him some more watered down food at 9m and let him back in the room with LB and dropped him in....tried several times...but nope. He's having a stand off with me. It's been almost 3 hours and no pee.

My other kitty hasn't gone either.

Maybe he just doesn't have to urinate as much as he did before.

Probably a fail for a ketone test tonight.... will keep trying before I go to bed but don't want to lock them out of the room all night. That idea may backfire and I definitely don't want cat urine anywhere in my house but the LB. Will try again tomorrow if tonight is unsuccessful.
 
Ozzy Pawzbourne said:
My quest for a ketone test tonight is not going well. I gave Ozzy his dinner at 7pm and locked him out of the room with the LB. Tried to take him in there a few times tonight and dropped him in the box...and NOPE. Gave him some more watered down food at 9m and let him back in the room with LB and dropped him in....tried several times...but nope. He's having a stand off with me. It's been almost 3 hours and no pee.

My other kitty hasn't gone either.

Maybe he just doesn't have to urinate as much as he did before.

Probably a fail for a ketone test tonight.... will keep trying before I go to bed but don't want to lock them out of the room all night. That idea may backfire and I definitely don't want cat urine anywhere in my house but the LB. Will try again tomorrow if tonight is unsuccessful.
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You can only do what you can do.

Yes, Gracie became allergic to Neosporin so Wendy sent me Polysporin from Canada. It has a pain reliever in it that the polysporin in the US does not have.

I hope you don't have chicken pox!
 
Ozzy Pawzbourne said:
I have been feeling like I am coming down with something since this morning and have an itchy bump on my scalp
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Usually you'll have a pretty high fever, aches and headache a day or so before the rash breaks out.....have you checked for fleas? ;)

It's usually a 10-21 day incubation period for chicken pox too
 
Chris & China said:
Usually you'll have a pretty high fever, aches and headache a day or so before the rash breaks out.....have you checked for fleas? ;)

It's usually a 10-21 day incubation period for chicken pox too
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I am on day 9 since the first exposure. Starting feeling like I was coming down with something this morning. A little headachy since this evening, and I rarely get headaches. Could all be psychosomatic so I'm not freaking out or anything.

The person who exposed me is actually my sister's father in law. He just recently survived multiple myeloma cancer and had to have full stem cell transplant therapy about 2 years ago. It's not curable but usually they have to have stem cell transplants every 10 years. Just on Thanksgiving they told him his white blood cells were down again and he might have to go through treatment again (only 2 years out, far less than the 10 years they recently discussed). He is obviously immno-compromised and got the chicken pox. No one knows where from. 9 days ago I was over at my sister's house visiting and he was there. He let me try out his new virtual reality game that they have for the Samsung phones. Essentially it is set in a sling that you put over your head and the phone sets in the dock over your face and eyes. So we shared some germs for sure while he was contagious. Now we just have to see if my immune system is strong enough to not get it. I do have an auto immune disorder...not sure if that matters. I just keep thinking of the bright side...if I do get stuck with the pox, I will be able to be home with Ozzy and test more! OMG..we are sick and twisted!!!
 
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Hey Jo,Elmo and I have made it to Lantus Land. Will be praying that 1. Ozzy pees for u and 2. U don't have chicken pox :bighug::bighug::):cat:
 
Oh lord...the timed feeder thing and Ozzy gaining weight just became more complicated to me. He could also be eating the food in Figge's feeder, although while I was home the last few weeks, Figgie was eating most of his food. He has gained weight too. But now that I'm gone during the day, I can't tell who is eating what. They will both eat from the other's bowls. Before the DM, we never left food out for Ozzy during the day. He just got breakfast and dinner. I would usually split his dinner portion so he could get it spread out and would also do this on weekends and my Fridays off from work. We did always keep kibble up on the washer for Figgie because he likes to free feed and has always been skinny. Ozzy is a ground dweller so he would never jump up to the washer to be able to get into Figgie's bowl. This is a fact.

I could put Figgie's feeder up on the washer from now on...but he will also eat from Ozzy's bowl (feeder) so Ozzy won't get his full meals which concerns me with him now being diabetic. They are a bit jealous of each other and constantly steal each other's food. There is a bit of competitive eating going on in this household!:facepalm:

I was putting small portions in the feeder and feeding them every 3 hours. With a diabetic kitty, can I just feed 2 meals a day, or is it better for them to have access to food more regularly? Obviously the BG dips are the issue...

What if I space out the feeder timings with smaller meals and make sure there is food available around +2 - +4 and then maybe a small snack later in the day before we come home? Nothing else in between.

Any suggestions???
 
It's better to have smaller meals spaced out for many kitties. Some cats lose duration if fed after nadir but others do just fine esp if you keep it low carb.

Off to bed for me! Have a good evening.
 
Ozzy Pawzbourne said:
What if I space out the feeder timings with smaller meals and make sure there is food available around +2 - +4 and then maybe a small snack later in the day before we come home?
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Sounds like a good place to start!! When you're home on days off, you can make adjustments if you find you need to
 
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