Fado and Cumbia
Member Since 2023
Here I am, after reading I don't know how many posts from this beautiful community, trying to learn how to give my cat the support she needs, and also trying to find relief for myself, knowing there are many here facing similar situations.
This could be a long story, but I'll try to keep it short. I just hope I can get some ideas about how to face all these challenges.
-I'm not a native English speaker so you'll find a bunch of grammar mistakes here.
When I adopted Fado she was already dealing with severe allergies. After many visits to many vets, I got to manage the crisis with hydrolyzed protein dry food by Royal Canin and 2.5 mg of prednisolone (per day). We had at least 4 crisis during the year, but the doctor sent us back home with an increased dose of prednisolone until the crisis got controled and the medication for ear/eye infections when it occurred. We spent 3 years following this pattern. Then we moved from Wisconsin to Texas and in the last 4 months everything went out of control.
In April, Fado started showing a new allergy symptom: watery eyes. Non-stop tears. We went to the vet and she got antibiotics and more steroids in drops.
In May, suddenly, we got two abscesses in her cheeks and needed more antibiotics and more steroids.
Finally, in July, she stopped eating, drinking, and moving, and we went to the vet again. She was first diagnosed with diabetes, but they didn't look at her pancreas until a week later just to discover her poor pancreas was severely inflamed. The whole thing: appetite stimulant, pain killer, steroids (therapeutic doses as they said), subcutaneous fluids I gave her at home because I couldn't afford hospitalization, and insulin. They told me her skin issues wasn't related with the pancreatitis/diabetis.
I did everything I could to help Fado to recover from the crisis. It was a slow process, very painful for her, very painful for me. But we made it. I was lucky because I could change Fado's diet from dry to wet (Purina MD) pretty easily once she started eating again, but then the allergies came back as never before.
Right now, Fado's glucose is erratic: if more than 200 I use 2U; between 150-200, I use 1U (only if I know she ate); and when it is below 150 she doesn't take the insulin. She is also taking a B12 supplement, Apoquel and 2.5 mg/day of prednisolone. She is eating well, drinking little water, but drinking at least (I added Feline Freeze-Dried Nuggets Turkey to her diet mixed with Purina Dietetic wet), but her allergies are out of control and there is no way she can go back to higher doses of steroids.
Because I don't know the cause of her allergies (it could be anything. I did a test, but I was told this is not a reliable test for these things), I can't afford more testing and exams, I don't know what else to do. So now, she is alive, getting better from here diabetis and pancreatitis, but extremly itchy and with a cone the whole day.
Any way... I guess I wanted to let this message here hoping someone could tell me if there is light out there. Because I'm desperate.
This could be a long story, but I'll try to keep it short. I just hope I can get some ideas about how to face all these challenges.
-I'm not a native English speaker so you'll find a bunch of grammar mistakes here.
When I adopted Fado she was already dealing with severe allergies. After many visits to many vets, I got to manage the crisis with hydrolyzed protein dry food by Royal Canin and 2.5 mg of prednisolone (per day). We had at least 4 crisis during the year, but the doctor sent us back home with an increased dose of prednisolone until the crisis got controled and the medication for ear/eye infections when it occurred. We spent 3 years following this pattern. Then we moved from Wisconsin to Texas and in the last 4 months everything went out of control.
In April, Fado started showing a new allergy symptom: watery eyes. Non-stop tears. We went to the vet and she got antibiotics and more steroids in drops.
In May, suddenly, we got two abscesses in her cheeks and needed more antibiotics and more steroids.
Finally, in July, she stopped eating, drinking, and moving, and we went to the vet again. She was first diagnosed with diabetes, but they didn't look at her pancreas until a week later just to discover her poor pancreas was severely inflamed. The whole thing: appetite stimulant, pain killer, steroids (therapeutic doses as they said), subcutaneous fluids I gave her at home because I couldn't afford hospitalization, and insulin. They told me her skin issues wasn't related with the pancreatitis/diabetis.
I did everything I could to help Fado to recover from the crisis. It was a slow process, very painful for her, very painful for me. But we made it. I was lucky because I could change Fado's diet from dry to wet (Purina MD) pretty easily once she started eating again, but then the allergies came back as never before.
Right now, Fado's glucose is erratic: if more than 200 I use 2U; between 150-200, I use 1U (only if I know she ate); and when it is below 150 she doesn't take the insulin. She is also taking a B12 supplement, Apoquel and 2.5 mg/day of prednisolone. She is eating well, drinking little water, but drinking at least (I added Feline Freeze-Dried Nuggets Turkey to her diet mixed with Purina Dietetic wet), but her allergies are out of control and there is no way she can go back to higher doses of steroids.
Because I don't know the cause of her allergies (it could be anything. I did a test, but I was told this is not a reliable test for these things), I can't afford more testing and exams, I don't know what else to do. So now, she is alive, getting better from here diabetis and pancreatitis, but extremly itchy and with a cone the whole day.
Any way... I guess I wanted to let this message here hoping someone could tell me if there is light out there. Because I'm desperate.
Thanks to you as well because your experience is also helping to see alternative and, more important, to know that there are other special kitties out there.
