3/31 Eeyore PMPS 542

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Melanie and Eeyore

Melanie and Eeyore

Member Since 2014
Today's earlier post

I just tested Eeyore before I fed him his dinner and he is at 278 (+9). His insulin is given at 8pm CT so I will check him again for his pre shot. I think I should stay with the 1.75 u dose, given most of his nadirs were in the 70 ish range?? He didn't get below 50 at all today, besides his pre shot. I'm trying to take in to account all the suggestions, and low dosing readings, so I just want to make sure I got it all! I suspect the increase to 278 was from the 1 tsp snack of chicken I gave him around +6 and/or that he is getting closer to his 12 hour mark post insulin?
 
Re: 3/31 Eeyore AMPS 42, +1 170, +4.5 67, +5 70, +6 76, +9 2

I would guess the 278 is more likely a bounce from the lows than anything else...he does like to bounce.

The nadir is the lowest point in the cycle, and when that happens can range widely from cat to cat, and within one cat.

I'd probably be inclined to stay with 1.75 for now, too, but monitor very, very closely. Eeyore is definitely playing by his own rules, and those low numbers he its can be dangerous...who knows if he's gone even lower at times.

Also...just for clarification: do you feed his dinner several hours before doing his shot? The normal procedure here is to test, feed dinner, then shoot, all within a pretty shor time-span (15 minutes or so). Many of us do feed mini-meals for a few hours after the shot, too. I do wonder if you are feeding him so far in advance of his shot if that is having a funky effect on how he is responding to the insulin, too.

Hopefully some others will also come along with some feedback...
 
Re: 3/31 Eeyore AMPS 42, +1 170, +4.5 67, +5 70, +6 76, +9 2

I agree with what the others posted in your earlier thread -- I won't shoot numbers below 50. There's just no margin for safety.

So, lesson for next time, stall and don't feed. Once you see numbers rising above 50 without benefit of food, it's fine to shoot.

Amy's point is well taken. We typically advise people to not feed a meal that late in the cycle. It can influence the pre-shot numbers and artificially inflate them since there's less insulin available to offset the effect of the food. Generally, you don't want to feed after nadir.
 
Re: 3/31 Eeyore AMPS 42, +1 170, +4.5 67, +5 70, +6 76, +9 2

So I don't want to feed after nadir at all? Does that mean he doesn't get a "dinner" meal?

Right now Eeyore has breakfast around 8am and his insulin 15-20 minutes after.
He has dinner at 6:00pm but since his morning insulin isnt until 8am his evening insulin isnt until 8 pm. There is no way for me to not feed him dinner until 8pm. He will kill me. He sees us making our own dinner, feeding the puppy, and he has eaten around 5-6 his whole life so how am I supposed to wait to feed him until closer to his insulin shot?
 
Re: 3/31 Eeyore AMPS 42, +1 170, +4.5 67, +5 70, +6 76, +9 2

You don't want to feed within 2 - 3 hours prior to shooting. I feed at pre-shot, +1, +2 and +3. Unless I need to prop Gabby's numbers up with food, she doesn't eat after +4. Some people do allow their kitties to graze through out the day but food is picked up, 2 - 3 hours prior to shot time. I test, feed and shoot all within 5 min.

Well, you could feed yourselves and the puppy at the same time you'd be feeding Eeyore!! Alternatively, would your schedule allow you to move Eeyore's shot time closer to 6:00? That way, feeding and shooting are at the same time in the AM and PM.
 
Re: 3/31 Eeyore AMPS 42, +1 170, +4.5 67, +5 70, +6 76, +9 2

Hmmmmm......I'm not as well-versed with (for lack of a better term) "less traditional" feeding schedule with regards to meal time versus shot time. I had the same issue as you...I couldn't NOT feed her at the usual 5:00pm time slot because when we get home from work, they all "demand" dinner. So, instead, I changed my mornings to match her meal/shot routine. I ended up switching my own morning schedule so that I get up at 5:00am, feed Trix and the others, do her shot by 5:45, then go back to bed for a couple hours. It's not ideal for us beans, but it was really the only thing I could figure out so that all the kitties could get their dinner at the time they were used to and keep the Trix on a schedule that was good for her insulin. I know it is impossible to expect a kitty to wait for a late dinner when everyone is being active and eating.

Maybe others will have suggestions that will work well for your schedule with Eeyore....like maybe splitting his dinner meal in half??? I'm just tossing ideas out there....hopefully others will also chime in.
 
Re: 3/31 Eeyore AMPS 42, +1 170, +4.5 67, +5 70, +6 76, +9 2

You do want to feed the main part of the meal just before the PM shot and give no food for 2 hours before hand. It will help even out Eeyore's numbers. Neko would also kill me if I don't feed her an afternoon snack. She always used to get half of her dinner then and as an acrocat, she has an amazing hunger like a teenager. What I did was gradually reduce the amount of food at her +9-9.5 meal and turn it into a snack. I give primarily zero carb food and at most a couple tsp of food. Since she's on a raw diet, I serve some chicken gizzard, chicken neck or some freeze dried zero carb meat. An alternative is to boil some chicken breast in plain water and cut it into cubes. You can freeze some and keep some for snack time.
 
Thank you for the suggestions!
What I've gathered is that I either,

Keep Eeyore's morning routine the same, pre-shot, eating and insulin all within 15-20 minutes of 8am, and then give him a 'snack' (tiny bit of chicken) around 5pm. Then he can have his pre-shot, meal and insulin all within 15 minutes of each other around 8pm.

Or... I change his insulin shots to 6am and 6pm so his evening meal more accurately reflects the dinner of the rest of the household.

The second option obviously means that I have to change around my/our sleep schedule. Which I don't mind doing, I obviously want what is best for Eeyore but the issue is my husband is an F-22 pilot and has to have sleep. Literally, he is required 8 hours or can't fly. Lately he has been flying late afternoon or evening flights. I am a nurse (starting PA school in may) and have all sorts of crazy hours myself, but since I'm starting school again in May I have stopped working full time until then to help Eeyore and my Husband. I still cover shifts here and there and volunteer at a beach clinic. Therefore long story short, my husband and I will always have to sleep in different rooms so we dont disturb each others sleep so I can get up and shoot up Eeyore. :( I love Eeyore almost more than my husband sometimes ha, E's been my boo for 16 years, but I just don't know what to do yet :/ I'm sure you've all had similar struggles/ sacrifices. Not a bad idea Amy with getting up and going back to bed, but I would probably wake my husband in the process and definitely the puppy, which wakes everything else ha, so that leaves Eeyore, Estes (puppy), and myself all in the guest room, or my husband in the guest room!

For now I'll try the snack at 5pm leaving 3 hours before his meal and shot where he has no food. We'll see if we can figure out a way though to move his shot schedule up.
 
A little role playing here:
insulin = car
stop sign = next Preshot
food = brakes

If you are in a car coming up to a stop sign and you slam on the brakes when you are still 50' away, you won't make it to the stop sign. But as you approach the stop sign, if you just take your foot off the accelerator and not use the brakes, the car will glide to the stop sign. Same thing if you feed after nadir; you risk just slamming the brakes on the insulin and so your duration shortens and the numbers go up long before PS. However, if you feed mini meals spaced out before nadir so he's not so hungry and then either not feed or just feed a LC snack as Wendy suggests, you get more out of the insulin.

Gracie is on levemir and so her nadir is much, much later, but sometimes if I even give her boiled chicken breast, she is carb sensitive enough that it causes her BG to go up before she gets to PS. ECID.

I think, overall, there is a better way to manage Eyeore's BG. First, it's very important that you not miss taking reductions. The evening of 3/24, he got to 40 and earned a reduction. You could have shot through the bounce with 2u the next morning but then should have reduced to 1.75u the night of 3/25. You might want to read this post on Reductions. The depot can get ahead of you (it did us on the event I discussed in the post) and it can be scary.

I also find that the fast, hard drops like the one on the night of 3/24 leads to worse bounces than just lower numbers although he's being a little dramatic tonight ;-)

We can help you with food management which might help with his numbers and also will help with him not starving.
 
hi melanie!

i must be the only mean person here. :shock: :lol:

i was impervious to punkin's demands for food (mostly.) he also had acro and wanted to eat everything and all the time. i fed him at 7/7 when he also got tested and his insulin shot (1 can of fancy feast). i gave him another meal (1/2 can of fancy feast) at 10/10. other than that, he got boiled chicken breast treats when he was poked. if i felt uber sorry for him in the later part of the cycle (after +6) i might've given him a larger bit of chicken breast - like 1/8 cup.

part of what punkin wanted was The Feeding Contract, which included a schedule that was to be strictly adhered to. Even when he had had low numbers and i fed him 3 hrs late, he then wanted to still eat his dinner at the regular time - no 3 hrs late on that dinner! He was very vocal about it - so cute that i even made a video of him moving around the coffee table as he appealed to each one of us to feed him. :-D

there is no way that i would go sleep in another room or have the inconveniences you described just to keep my beloved punkin happy about eating with the rest of us. i'd just hold firm - give him treats and let him get used to eating later. you could feed the puppy later too.

it's just being a parent - you have to be convinced that what you're doing is best for them and they aren't wise enough to know it. so just like giving kids meds, ya just do it. i've had 4 of them so my mean factor is pretty mighty. :lol:

i do want to encourage you to try to ignore the high numbers and stay focused on the low numbers for dosing. it's the best way to keep Eeyore safe. You've gotten lots of good advice about what to do if you're faced with low numbers again. the only thing i would add is you definitely want to give carbs to a cat under 50 and then recheck in 20ish minutes to see if their blood sugar has come up. Others have linked the directions for you on how to handle low numbers either mid-cycle or at a preshot. that's a good page to print out and have ready to access, just in case the internet is down.
 
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