julie & punkin (ga)
Member since 2011
last condo 8/7
okey dokey - things are looking better today!
not only have i recovered from my oral surgery last week, but punkin's numbers are back in the realm of survivable. we've increased the lantus by 2 units over the past 6 days, plus used more R than i've ever used before to help us get to this point. yesterday's bounce has already cleared and he's been in the blues for at least 3 or 4 hours this afternoon. we're getting there. i should be able to get him back into greens before long.
i took him to the vet this morning. had a senior blood panel run again (3 months since last one) and talked more about pain relief with her. i think the C Diff might be under control - he had the last dose of metronidazole yesterday morning (2 weeks total) and mostly his poop has returned to normal. if it goes back to diarrhea i'll take in another sample to get checked.
in the meantime, we talked about pain relief some more. I asked her if we could try a higher dose of the gabapentin and initially she said yes, but then she checked her manual and there was a warning on using it with cats with kidney issues. that was new info for me and i wanted to mention it to anyone else using it - i know many of the acro cats use it, but if there is kidney compromise, it might be good to look to another pain reliever.
for anyone reading who's new to punkin's issues, he has acromegaly, a tumor of the pituitary gland that causes the diabetes. the tumor puts out a growth hormone and one of the consequences of the forced growth is an acceleration of arthritis. acro cats are assumed to have pain from the growth hormone and often headaches from the tumor itself. i know he hurts because he doesn't want to be held or really even touched. the side benefit of taking him to the vet is that he crawls up on me like he used to and wants me to hold him and get him out of there! i take what i can get! :lol:
anyway, we decided to go back to the bupe and i'm getting it in the injectible so i know that he actually gets the dose. in the past we've tried the oral and it has to absorb through the mucous membranes. you squirt it along their gum line. if punkin were more cooperative that would be easier, but i never knew if it really got there or not. so i'm picking up injectible bupe today to try.
i also mentioned to her that while i didn't really think he has a bladder infection, he's peed on the carpet multiple times in the past few months. i clean his box multiple times a day and there are 2 boxes in the house, although he prefers one of them, but he still goes elsewhere sometimes. she asked what kind of litter we use and i told her the Feline Pine wood pellets. she said often cats with arthritis don't like the wood pellets because of how they feel on their feet. it can actually hurt them and they can have trouble feeling balanced on the pellets. so i threw out my environmental morals and in my typical "i'll do anything for punkin" went and bought clumping sand litter. i know he prefers it because he always uses my daughter's cat's box if it's available.
thanks to everyone for all the supportive comments on his last condo. i was feeling pretty despairing about the uncontrollable numbers, but that night, i decided i could be weepy or i could grab the bull by the horns, shoot the amount of R that was needed while we increased the lantus. it completely got rid of my whinies to get have a plan to get control again of his BG. and on the plus side, i'm getting a good understanding of how he responds to R.
knowledge is power.
okey dokey - things are looking better today!
not only have i recovered from my oral surgery last week, but punkin's numbers are back in the realm of survivable. we've increased the lantus by 2 units over the past 6 days, plus used more R than i've ever used before to help us get to this point. yesterday's bounce has already cleared and he's been in the blues for at least 3 or 4 hours this afternoon. we're getting there. i should be able to get him back into greens before long.
i took him to the vet this morning. had a senior blood panel run again (3 months since last one) and talked more about pain relief with her. i think the C Diff might be under control - he had the last dose of metronidazole yesterday morning (2 weeks total) and mostly his poop has returned to normal. if it goes back to diarrhea i'll take in another sample to get checked.
in the meantime, we talked about pain relief some more. I asked her if we could try a higher dose of the gabapentin and initially she said yes, but then she checked her manual and there was a warning on using it with cats with kidney issues. that was new info for me and i wanted to mention it to anyone else using it - i know many of the acro cats use it, but if there is kidney compromise, it might be good to look to another pain reliever.
for anyone reading who's new to punkin's issues, he has acromegaly, a tumor of the pituitary gland that causes the diabetes. the tumor puts out a growth hormone and one of the consequences of the forced growth is an acceleration of arthritis. acro cats are assumed to have pain from the growth hormone and often headaches from the tumor itself. i know he hurts because he doesn't want to be held or really even touched. the side benefit of taking him to the vet is that he crawls up on me like he used to and wants me to hold him and get him out of there! i take what i can get! :lol:
anyway, we decided to go back to the bupe and i'm getting it in the injectible so i know that he actually gets the dose. in the past we've tried the oral and it has to absorb through the mucous membranes. you squirt it along their gum line. if punkin were more cooperative that would be easier, but i never knew if it really got there or not. so i'm picking up injectible bupe today to try.
i also mentioned to her that while i didn't really think he has a bladder infection, he's peed on the carpet multiple times in the past few months. i clean his box multiple times a day and there are 2 boxes in the house, although he prefers one of them, but he still goes elsewhere sometimes. she asked what kind of litter we use and i told her the Feline Pine wood pellets. she said often cats with arthritis don't like the wood pellets because of how they feel on their feet. it can actually hurt them and they can have trouble feeling balanced on the pellets. so i threw out my environmental morals and in my typical "i'll do anything for punkin" went and bought clumping sand litter. i know he prefers it because he always uses my daughter's cat's box if it's available.
thanks to everyone for all the supportive comments on his last condo. i was feeling pretty despairing about the uncontrollable numbers, but that night, i decided i could be weepy or i could grab the bull by the horns, shoot the amount of R that was needed while we increased the lantus. it completely got rid of my whinies to get have a plan to get control again of his BG. and on the plus side, i'm getting a good understanding of how he responds to R.
knowledge is power.
