Feeding in between doses

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Tara & Buster

Tara & Buster

Member Since 2012
So the same day I pick up home testing supplies, my poor kitty had a severe hypoglycemic episode <insert I told you so's here>. Scared the holy living crap out of me! He is home from emergency today. They gave me a lower dosage and changed the diet from W/D to M/D. I know M/D is still high carb for a diabetic, and I need to wean off of it, but at least it's lower than W/D. As my home testing gets better I can get more aggressive with that.

My question is, is it ok to feed something like M/D am/pm but then feed something very low carb at lunch and just before bedtime?

New dose (Lantus):
3u am
2u pm

Tara & Buster
 
Okay first off...Lantus needs the same dose both am and pm because it works off a depot under the skin and both of those doses are way too high as a starting dose if your kitty is on an all wet diet.

Okay that said ....yes feeding smaller meals more often helps to balance out their bloodsugar just like it does in human diabetics. In fact I feed all of my cats (12 non-diabetics and 2 diabetics) 4 times a day. They get breakfast, lunch, dinner and a before bed snack. The first 3 I put down fresh and the last one right before I go to bed I put out frozen so they can nibble on it all night long as it thaws out.

Now another thing ....you don't need the special prescription diet, there is much better food both carb wise and ingredient wise on the commercial market, I personally feed everyone here Friskies Pate style canned catfood and so far I have one diabetic that will celebrae 2 years of remission and off insulin this coming November 1st and my newest girl has gone down from 1.5u twice a day to barely .1u (yes the decimal point it in the right place, her dose is just above the zero line on the syringe) and will more than likely be off insulin and in remission by this Christmas if everything goes as it has been.

Mel, Maxwell, Autumn & The Fur Gang
 
That isn't his starting dose. He was diagnosed July 5th and I've been working with my vet until I found this forum and learned A LOT. We started at 1u and had worked up to 3.5u. I want to lower the dose and the carb content for food, just need to get the home testing done so I can do it safely.

So for the dose maybe I should do 2.5u am/pm? He was over 400 at the hospital this morning so they gave him 3u. Once I get some numbers going I'll know better what to do. Is it normal for a kitty to be so all over the place or is it because he's fighting the high carbs in the food, too?

Small meals throughout the day is good - got it.

Tara & Buster
 
What dose was he on when he went Hypo on you? Because if he can go low enough to end up in the ER from low blood sugar you don't want to give a dose higher than that.

And while every cat is different yeah it is pretty normal until you find their ideal dose for them to jump around alot. And then even when you do find what you think is their ideal dose they will occassionally throw you a curve ball out of left field.. :lol: Because while these babies maybe extra sweet now they are still afterall CATS! ohmygod_smile :lol: :-D

But also that higher carbed food isn't helping anything either because his body has to fight those carbs. You see their bodies break all the food they eat into sugars, but it breaks carbs down into those sugars faster than it does protein, so the higher the carb load the more sugar being dumped into his blood stream just what you don't want in a diabetic. If you follow this link you will find one of the charts we use to pick food for our sugarcats Binky's List and you will want to find foods that are under 10% carbs, most of us like to try to stay between 5-7% carbs. But you will have a lot more options than that nasty expensive prescription stuff.

And as an interesting side note as I said earlier I have 14 cats in total, when my first diabetic was dxed I too was sent home with WD for her, not a single one of my entire 14 would touch the stuff after the novelty of it wore off, but in the last 3 years of feeding solely canned pate Friskies nobody misses a meal and usually are trying to convince that I NEVER feed them about half an hour before mealtime. :-D

Mel, Maxwell, Autumn & The Fur Gang
 
He went Hypo on 3.5u. I've now bumped down to 2.5u. My vet had recommended 3.5u after he never dropped below 400 on a curve tested after 3u. He appeared to be doing well on 3.5 for about 1.5 weeks before he crashed. I guess we know the ceiling now!

Can you start over with the whole thing? As in, can I just take him OTJ, put him on a real low carb food for two weeks and then re-evaluate? Seems like that would be a bit of a shock to the system.

Tara & Buster

PS - testing equipment has been acquired and I have learned to use it on myself. Attempt #1 with Buster will start tonight!
 
I wouldn't take him all the way off insulin but you could drop him down to say 1u twice a day, put him on low carb wet food, and test him not only for blood sugar but also ketones. You do know how to test for ketones right? If not just yell and we will tell you how its pretty easy once you get the hang of it. :-D And actually it doesn't surprise me that he ran high at the vet's that is why we advocate home testing is because cats stress out really easy at the vet's and stress will raise their blood sugar.

I have one non-diabetic that loves his vet to death and you would never think to look at him that he is stressed out while he is there but even his BGs will shoot up to around 200 but get him back home where he is on familiar turf again and he drops right back into the 50s.

Mel, Maxwell, Autumn & The Fur Gang
 
We just found out our 14 yr old cat has diabetes. We're, unfortunately, seasoned vets at dealing with this because our cat's brother also got diagnosed with it two years ago. We treated him for a little over a year before finally having to put him to sleep because we were unable to regulate him, even with trying 3 different types of insulin, diet changes, tight regulation, monitoring his BG at all hours of the day and night, etc. It was absolutely heartbreaking...And so now here we are again, with his brother...We've been feeding him Purina DM dry since our other cat got diagnosed -- we tried soo many different kinds of canned food from Binky's list, but they ultimately wouldn't eat enough of any of them, so we settled on the DM dry, which they love. But now that we're at this point again, we're wondering if we should try a renewed effort to find a wet food he'd actually eat. You mentioned this Friskies Pate Style, but I couldn't find it listed on Binky's lists. Do you know what the nutrition breakdown is? And what flavors exactly do your cats like?

Also, is it smart to try different foods during this initial period of trying to find the right insulin dosage? (He just started on insulin this past Wednesday, so 4 days ago.) We ordered a glucometer, which should be arriving in the mail soon (we had just thrown out our old one when we moved recently! arg!) So we plan to do a curve maybe this Wednesday. I'm hesitant to mess with his diet at this initial stage, but then again, I don't want to keep him on "bad" food for longer than I have to, if switching to all wet food might help him to not need insulin at all...Any advice?

Thanks!
 
Hi Erika - I'm pretty new so I don't feel comfortable offering advice yet. I just thought you might want to post in the main FDMB forum for greater visiblity. Good luck with your kitty - I hope one day to see you OTJ!!

Tara & Buster
 
ErikaS said:
We just found out our 14 yr old cat has diabetes. We're, unfortunately, seasoned vets at dealing with this because our cat's brother also got diagnosed with it two years ago. We treated him for a little over a year before finally having to put him to sleep because we were unable to regulate him, even with trying 3 different types of insulin, diet changes, tight regulation, monitoring his BG at all hours of the day and night, etc. It was absolutely heartbreaking...And so now here we are again, with his brother...We've been feeding him Purina DM dry since our other cat got diagnosed -- we tried soo many different kinds of canned food from Binky's list, but they ultimately wouldn't eat enough of any of them, so we settled on the DM dry, which they love. But now that we're at this point again, we're wondering if we should try a renewed effort to find a wet food he'd actually eat. You mentioned this Friskies Pate Style, but I couldn't find it listed on Binky's lists. Do you know what the nutrition breakdown is? And what flavors exactly do your cats like?

Also, is it smart to try different foods during this initial period of trying to find the right insulin dosage? (He just started on insulin this past Wednesday, so 4 days ago.) We ordered a glucometer, which should be arriving in the mail soon (we had just thrown out our old one when we moved recently! arg!) So we plan to do a curve maybe this Wednesday. I'm hesitant to mess with his diet at this initial stage, but then again, I don't want to keep him on "bad" food for longer than I have to, if switching to all wet food might help him to not need insulin at all...Any advice?

Thanks!
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Hi Erika,
My very first suggestion for you would be to make yourself a separate new topic, with your 14yr old's name and just diagnosed. Your post here, inside Tara's topic, is going to get lost and you won't get any real replies, and if you do, they will be mixed up with the ones meant for Tara & Buster.

I will say that your first diabetic may well have had an insulin resistance issue and too many vets do not recognize the situation, ending with many cats being pts needlessly. Several cats with acromegaly have posted to say that 'they had problems regulating and had tried several insulins'.

For your current diabetic, don't make any changes to what you are doing now. When you start your own topic, just copy all of your post here, and add info on the type of insulin and dose you are giving now, plus the kind of foods you are feeding. People can give you a great deal of info in that new topic of yours.
 
Tara & Buster said:
He went Hypo on 3.5u. I've now bumped down to 2.5u. My vet had recommended 3.5u after he never dropped below 400 on a curve tested after 3u. He appeared to be doing well on 3.5 for about 1.5 weeks before he crashed. I guess we know the ceiling now!

Can you start over with the whole thing? As in, can I just take him OTJ, put him on a real low carb food for two weeks and then re-evaluate? Seems like that would be a bit of a shock to the system.

Tara & Buster

PS - testing equipment has been acquired and I have learned to use it on myself. Attempt #1 with Buster will start tonight!
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Hi Tara,
I am so glad that you have your meter - what's the meter you have - there are a couple meters which are useless for cats: the FreeStyle meters with the butterfly strips, and meters with TRUE in their name. The first one never registers over 299 with cats and the second one gives whacky numbers, not the least bit reliable or consistent.

Now, can you see if you can get a couple tests tried before Buster's shot tonite? It would be good to know his reading before you give his pm shot. You may find that he's too low to get a shot! If you try on him beforehand and have any difficulties, just post here and people can give you all sorts of tips to help you successfully get a good reading.

Lantus does not work well at all if the dose is frequently changed and having the 2 shots a day both different will sabotage any attempts to regulate your cat on Lantus. ... won't work.
Also, since the curves were done at the vet office, Buster's stress alone would likely have raised up his numbers, making the vet think he needs a higher dose when he does not. One of my cats always tested higher at the vet office but 30min after she was home, her numbers would be much lower.
Vet curves are not much use, and now that you will be home testing, you will not need to have any more expensive and stressful curves done at the vet office.

If you can test Buster just before it's shot time and then post his BG, people will be able to give you a hand to decide what dose is safe.

For the food, human diabetics eat smaller and more frequent meals/snacks through the day as it helps the insulin to keep a level balance, with less issues of spikes and drops. The same applies to cats.... you don't need to feed more food, but rather just divide up the daily total into maybe 6 small meals or 2 meals and 4 mini meals... many people who are away during the day use a timed auto feeder and it helps in rationing out the allotted amounts.
 
Thanks Blue!

I did get a couple of tests in yesterday and it was a good thing. I did one at lunch and he was at 33 so I fed him, then again at dinner and he was 49. I did not give insulin. I started a new post for today's numbers.

I got the OneTouch mini. It has shown both low and high numbers so I think it's working well. The test strips are quite expensive, though. I might switch to something else after this first round.

Tara & Buster
 
Ok, thanks. I only posted on this thread because I was specifically interested in the Friskies Pate food mentioned, but now I see I could have just sent a private message to that poster.
 
ErikaS said:
Ok, thanks. I only posted on this thread because I was specifically interested in the Friskies Pate food mentioned, but now I see I could have just sent a private message to that poster.
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Hi Erika,
You can make a post for just food questions if you liked! That's not a problem at all! It's just that replies for you and for Tara may get mixed if the person posting doesn't say the name, you or Tara.

Your post in here made me think it was your intro post for your cat, and it would definitely have been lost
 
Tara & Buster said:
Thanks Blue!

I did get a couple of tests in yesterday and it was a good thing. I did one at lunch and he was at 33 so I fed him, then again at dinner and he was 49. I did not give insulin. I started a new post for today's numbers.

I got the OneTouch mini. It has shown both low and high numbers so I think it's working well. The test strips are quite expensive, though. I might switch to something else after this first round.

Tara & Buster
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Hi Tara,
You've got a great meter but since you are in the US, the most economical meter would be the Relion... the cost is in the strips, not the meter. The Relions are just fine meters, so I'd suggest one of them. Do NOT get any of the FreeStyle or TRUEresults because they are horrible meters.

Thank goodness you tested before giving a shot, or you may well have ended up in the ER.... 33 is way too low to give insulin, and 49 is not much better because that number is likely food influenced.... when the food wears off in a few hours, you could see his numbers start to drop again.

One rule to follow: feed the 40s. And if you are ever in doubt, don't shoot. Post on the board and someone will help you with a decision.
 
There was a problem with Freestyle meter STRIPS several years ago, but the meters seem to be fine now. I use a freestyle on my dog and have no problems.

As far as ALL "True" meters being bad for cats, well, meters change and it would be helpful if we quit bashing meters for old results.


_Rebecca
 
I use the ReliOn meters from WalMart. The Prime has 50 strips for 9 dollars! Quite the bargain I thought so I bought it. I've been having some trouble with it turning itself off before I get Sam's ear to bleed as hes gotten quite a bit of scar tissue built up. That crunchy sound makes me cringe. But the new meters test strip prices are the best! So, I use both and do like the brand. Tested against the vets meter for cats it was about 15% high or low.
 
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