12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98, PMPS 79, +13/72, +14/132

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KPassa

KPassa

Member Since 2012
Previous Condo.

I mentioned a while back that I've been tracking his food intake for the past couple of months. Then, after the Evo incident* (where he topped 400 for the first and only time), I've switched him to daily mono-diets to narrow down specifically which food affects him and why. These last three days, he hasn't broken under 200 and yesterday, he never broke 300! So, this morning, I reviewed what he'd been eating and he's been on ~18 carbs/day for the last four days.
Coincidence? Perhaps, so today I've got him on ~10 carbs for the whole day and I'm seeing blues and greens again, WITHOUT INCREASING HIS DOSE! party_cat That means the only Friskies he's getting from here on out is the Special Diet T&G. I hope he likes that flavor well enough because he's going to be eating a lot more of it....

By the way, it's really hard finding LOW low carb foods because he has to eat twice as much as an adult cat, so he's already getting twice as many carbs in proportion to his size, but at least now I'm finding out his carb threshold.


*I think the problem with Evo and Mikey is that Evo has either too little protein or too high a fat-to-protein ratio even though it only has 3 carbs per 5oz can. Or they're lying about their carbs or they changed the recipe since Dr. Lisa last updated her list.
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

Glad you got that sorted out and here's hoping for lots of blues and greens in his future!

Also, I *love* that kitty smiley you've got in the condo. Super, super cute. :)
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

Michelle & Dusty said:
Also, I *love* that kitty smiley you've got in the condo. Super, super cute. :)
Click to expand...

You can access it (and many more; there are two more pages of them) by clicking on the "View more smilies" link underneath the default smilies that show up to the right when you're posting replies. laptop_smiley
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

drinking24

Thanks! I had seen some but never noticed there was a *second page* of them. AWESOME!
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

Not sure if I understand what you were saying above - were you feeding him 18% carbs? Remind me why? We recommend less than 10% of calories from carbs for cats.. especially diabetic ones that cant handle the carbs..

If you were then you might well see a big difference in his numbers.
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

18% per day. He consumes approximately two cans of Friskies or 3-4 cans of Fancy Feast a day, so if I combine the carbs from each can for the day, depending on what I've fed him, certain varieties will equal out to as much as 20% in a day.

That's one of the reasons I started meticulously documenting his eating habits because I realized that as humans, if you go on something like the Atkins diet, it's your total carb count for the day, not per meal, and I'd only been paying attention to the overall carb counts in the food and not his daily carb intake.
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

I think I've finally gotten to a point in this whole learning curve where I'm no longer regurgitating information I've memorized but am now actually applying it and understanding it. So, maybe it's common knowledge that the "less than 10% carbs" is supposed to be per day, but I've just recently figured that out. :lol:
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

Its so much to take in at one time I am not surprised. But this may well be the reason you are having issues with his BG. I always make sure that every can I feed is less than 10% calories from carbs (well I actually go for 5%) .. I would make sure its less than 10% in each meal since if you feed say a 1% meal he is fine but a 25% meal will spike his sugar and damage his pancreas.

This list is useful http://felinediabetes.com/FDMB/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=81687 - as long as you feed from it you are good. There is also a list here that you can check what you are actually feeding http://www.catinfo.org/docs/Food%20Char ... -22-12.pdf

So just to confirm.. you have been feeding him varieties with 18% calories from carbs (not by weight)? Which ones?

By the way, once you do change the food you may see a sudden drop in his BG levels and have to adjust insulin accordingly.. it can happen in a few weeks or less.. so keep an eye on him.
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

Wendy&Tiggy said:
So just to confirm.. you have been feeding him varieties with 18% calories from carbs (not by weight)? Which ones?
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No, I've been feeding him anything less than 10% carbs off all the food lists for the past few months, but I was never adding it together for throughout the day. For example, in one day, if I feed him a can of Friskies Poultry Platter that has 9% carbs and a can of Friskies Special Diet Turkey and Giblets at 5% carbs, he has a lower carb intake than if I fed him two cans of Friskies PP.
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

ah ok good.. so he is less than 10% no matter what. Whew. Shame though.. I was hoping he was getting higher carbs so we could switch him to low carb and maybe OTJ.. oh well. we keep working on it!
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

Well, now that I've realized he's so carb-sensitive, we might be getting a dose decrease soon...if he doesn't grow again and eat up all that extra insulin in size alone. :lol:

Since Mikey is most likely a Type 1 who need insulin their entire lives, he will probably never go into remission. But, since Type 1 feline diabetics are so rare, then who knows! Maybe he'll turn the veterinary world on its head by becoming the first ever Type 1 diabetic to go OTJ! It'd be a pleasant surprise, but not something I'm hoping for or expecting.
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

To find the overall percent carbs, you need to do a weighted average. I know that is a little complicated, but I'm an engineer and I like math. :-D The easiest is if you feed him the same amount of two different foods, say the 9% and the 5%, then the overall carbs is the average of the two, 7%. The overall will always be between the lowest and highest percent of whatever you feed.
Liz
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

:mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen: Nice to see Mikey in green!!!

it might help to read Dr. Lisa's Feeding Your Cat: Know The Basics of Feline Nutrition. In short all calories come from protein, fat or carbs. When we are talking % these must add up to 100. But if you have a 5% food w/ 30 kcal/oz and another food that is 8% but has 40 kcal/oz , you can't just add the two percents together and divide by 2. It's all relative to the calories.

Also remember that when we get a food that is low % carbs, % of protein and/or fat must go up. Since fat has twice the calories of protein or carbs and is way cheaper than protein, tale a guess on which it usually is.
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

Anne & Zener said:
To find the overall percent carbs, you need to do a weighted average. I know that is a little complicated, but I'm an engineer and I like math. :-D The easiest is if you feed him the same amount of two different foods, say the 9% and the 5%, then the overall carbs is the average of the two, 7%. The overall will always be between the lowest and highest percent of whatever you feed.
Liz
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I hate math. :razz: That's one of the reasons I switched him to daily mono-diets so I wouldn't have to figure that all out! But, since he's eating so much, another part of the problem is that even with low % carbs, the actual physical amount of carbs add up significantly, so what I'm seeing is that if I feed him something with, say 9% carbs, I need to feed him something else with like 1% carbs (I think that's where your "weighted average" math comes in). Right now, I'm playing around with that number to find the right percentage to keep his numbers low. 9% is too much for twice a day. And 3% is even too much if he's eating five servings of it in a day!
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

I think you are fine with the 3% food. You don't add up the percentages for each meal, it's closer to the average. It depends on how much of each kind and the calorie density too. Do you weigh what he eats?
Liz
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

Ann & Tess said:
Also remember that when we get a food that is low % carbs, % of protein and/or fat must go up. Since fat has twice the calories of protein or carbs and is way cheaper than protein, tale a guess on which it usually is.
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Yes! I think this is exactly what I saw happen with the Evo when he was eating it! Thank you for explaining that to me. At this point, I think I'm going to work on figuring out the right carb % and then next move on to the right protein/fat ratio once I've narrowed down the list of LC food that don't significantly increase his BG levels throughout the day. I want to eventually find him one or two food options that I can feed him consistently without having to track how much % of carbs is in each can and finding other varieties to match up to that percent so his BG levels don't go up (i.e. the 9% Friskies being paired with 3% Fancy Feast for the day or something along those lines).
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98

Anne & Zener said:
I think you are fine with the 3% food. You don't add up the percentages for each meal, it's closer to the average. It depends on how much of each kind and the calorie density too. Do you weigh what he eats?
Liz
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I weigh it in terms of 3oz can vs. 5.5oz can. :lol: He's about 7.8 pounds right now and needs on average ~350 calories a day (if I'm doing my math right), so he eats about two 5.5oz cans or three-to-four 3oz cans a day right now.
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98, PMPS 79, +14/72

confused_cat WTH?!?!? confused_cat

I don't want to complain or anything, but really, what is going on here?? nailbite_smile If he were a normal cat, I wouldn't be freaked out, but now my mind is spinning with the possibilities of what these low numbers could be a side-effect of or what might have caused a 2-month-long stint on insulin. @-)

Yeah, all this is needless, premature, and borderline preposterous worry, but it still makes me feel better to vent. :lol:

In all seriousness: does this sort of thing happen every now and again? I've had a couple of delayed doses and/or skipped shots with him before, but I've NEVER seen him running such chronically beautiful numbers for so long, all in a row like this!

I fed him at +13, so I was expecting to see the rise at +14. Now, I'm doubly curious to see what his +15 will be.
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98, PMPS 79, +13/72, +14

They always can surprise us! It's good that things are changing, you don't want him getting stuck at yellows and pinks. Plus now you have learned something new again.. Ie what happens when he has a low pre shot. Read the sticky on handling low numbers and next time maybe stall /shoot accordingly...
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98, PMPS 79, +13/72, +14

I'm confused.

It sounds like you're saying that if you feed Mikey 3 oz of 9% food at time#1, then another 3 oz of 9% food at time#2, then you've fed him 18% carb? Is that what you meant? If so, that's not how it works. The lists we use express the carb count as a proportion of the total content/calories of the food. This is what Ann was saying. This being the case, it doesn't matter if Mikey eats 3 oz or 12 oz. It's still 9% carb. (Think of it a different way. If you gave Mikey a teaspoon of Karo or something that was 100% carb, and you did that twice, it wouldn't be 200% carb for the day.) With diets like Atkins, they're not using the percentage of carbs to calculate your total carb consumption.

There are times when a cat hits a breakthrough dose and all of a sudden, numbers fall in line. There are also times when the pancreas decides to kick in and you get a string of good numbers. What I suspect is that you think you can control all of this. You've forgotten a major component -- Mikey's a cat and he's in control. It's his job to entertain and confuse you.
 
Re: 12/11 Michelangelo AMPS 324, +6/98, PMPS 79, +13/72, +14

Sienne and Gabby said:
You've forgotten a major component -- Mikey's a cat and he's in control. It's his job to entertain and confuse you.
Click to expand...
:lol: :lol: :lol: So true!
Liz
 
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