Educating the human family

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Anyone else had trouble with getting family members resigned to a diabetes diagnosis?
The cat I'm treating is my 83 year-old father's cat. He always let me handle her vet care and I'm now handling all the feeding and medicating for him. I did make him go in to the vet to listen to all of the information and I've been talking non-stop since the diagnosis to get him to understand what is going on and the changes that must happen.
So I was really nonplussed this morning when he mentioned that she is so much better she should have her dry food left out to nibble on today. This time he really seemed to listen but is still in denial that his baby isn't going to get her favorite treats, isn't going to free feed dry food, etc. for the rest of her life. His cat already thinks I'm the spawn of Mordor for controlling her food and giving her jabs. Now Dad is unhappy with me for making his cat unhappy.
Anyone had any success in educating family members? Any easy to understand print outs any where?
 
Maybe you could try explaining it in the context of if it was a person that had the dx.
Try and get them to understand what it means for a person, then explain that it is the same thing for a cat.
Like say, if this were a child that had diabetes, would you offer the child a Hershey bar? Well, that dry food and those favorite treats are no different to the kitty as the hershey bar to the kiddy. ;-)

I would also suggest going to the pet store and pick up a tub of freeze dried salmon treats. This is called kitty crack in my household. Start giving them to kitty and within a day or 2, you'll see why we call them that.
Than when dad see's how much kitty likes them, he might not feel so bad about kitty not getting the other treats.
 
totallybeachin said:
I would also suggest going to the pet store and pick up a tub of freeze dried salmon treats. This is called kitty crack in my household. Start giving them to kitty and within a day or 2, you'll see why we call them that.
Than when dad see's how much kitty likes them, he might not feel so bad about kitty not getting the other treats.
Click to expand...
That just might work! His main concern is spoiling his baby. Thanks for the tip!
 
Other analogies to help:

epilepsy - seizures aren't (when controlled) non-stop, there may be long periods of "normal" function in between

arthritis - some days, you can move OK; other days require meds for pain, hot soaks, and so on.

Many chronic health problems often have ebbs and surges in their symptoms; to prevent problems you have to be consistent in treating each and every day.
 
Can you remove the dry food from the house.

Does he do his own shopping (and could buy more). If he has someone
take him to the store, advise that person to not buy dry cat food.

Or if it does get purchased, 'put it away' somewhere where you can take it
out of the house to the shelter, or back to the store for a refund !
 
I think it's sweet that you dad loves his baby so much. I too would use the human analogy.
If you were dx'd diabetic and were feeling better on insulin and proper diet, would he want you to have a McDonalds kid's meal with a chocolate shake? Carb count approx. same in scale for kitty.
So nice that you watch out for Dad's kitty like you do.
Lori
and tomtom too!
 
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