Fur shots....

M

ManxMama1201

Member Since 2025
I've been at this since the beginning of November with My sweet kitty. Recently I've been having more partial or full fur shots. I don't know if it's my nerves, his or im doing injections wrong all of the sudden or a combination of the both. But everytime I smell insulin on him I start crying. We are on 4u of Lantus, going through a food change, and high 400's on alphatrak3. He does have some trace ketones (take these via blood). He eats half a can of Purina dm wet in the morning and at night and is free fed dry kibble (we are transitioning to Purina dm from Purina proplan) at a ratio currently of 40% dm - 60%Purina. He does have a sensitive gi so this has been slow transitioning. I never noticed fur shots before (never smelled insulin or seen or felt wet fur). We've had possibly 3 this weekend already. We changed vets due to our old one not listening to concerns we had and she told us to stop home testing. Which is absolutely crazy in my eyes. Any help would be gratefully appreciated
-NewNew's Mom
 
It's possible that the reason you're smelling the insulin is that there's a drop or two on the syringe. If you're adjusting the dose and there's still some insulin on the outside of the needle or syringe when you give a shot, it may transfer to your cat's fur. This post on giving shots may be helpful.

Please do not give a second shot. Even if you see the insulin squirt across the room, you do not want to give a second shot. You have no way to know for sure how much insulin went it.

Also, if you are feeding dry food, even the so called "diabetic" dry food, it is very high in carbohydrates. There are only a handful of dry foods that are low in carbs -- Dr. Elsey's Clean Protein and Young Again Zero Carb. There may be one other brand. The Purina DM is at least 18% carb. A low carb diet should be under 10% and most members feed their cat a diet that's in the neighborhood of 5% carb. You'd be better off with a timed feeder that you can set up to feed your cat canned food that's low in carbs.
 
Sienne and Gabby (GA) said:
It's possible that the reason you're smelling the insulin is that there's a drop or two on the syringe. If you're adjusting the dose and there's still some insulin on the outside of the needle or syringe when you give a shot, it may transfer to your cat's fur. This post on giving shots may be helpful.

Please do not give a second shot. Even if you see the insulin squirt across the room, you do not want to give a second shot. You have no way to know for sure how much insulin went it.

Also, if you are feeding dry food, even the so called "diabetic" dry food, it is very high in carbohydrates. There are only a handful of dry foods that are low in carbs -- Dr. Elsey's Clean Protein and Young Again Zero Carb. There may be one other brand. The Purina DM is at least 18% carb. A low carb diet should be under 10% and most members feed their cat a diet that's in the neighborhood of 5% carb. You'd be better off with a timed feeder that you can set up to feed your cat canned food that's low in carbs.
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Unfortunately our guy has a sensitivity to fat and those foods are very high in fat and we learned that the hard way with emergency visits and a month plus of trying to fix his gi. The pruina dm dryfood is working for us currently and is less carbs than the previous indoor food we were feeding him. Our vet doesn't mind the dry kibble right now as we are trying to get him regulated and will revisit taking that away at a later time.
 
ManxMama1201 said:
Our vet doesn't mind the dry kibble right now as we are trying to get him regulated
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I think the thing with this is that it might be harder to get him regulated while he’s eating the high carb dry food. That was a big help for us when we started, ditching the dry and using an auto feeder to simulate the grazing. But I understand being hesitant because of the GI stuff, that sounds scary. And glad you trusted your gut about home testing.
 
Tim & Pookey said:
I think the thing with this is that it might be harder to get him regulated while he’s eating the high carb dry food. That was a big help for us when we started, ditching the dry and using an auto feeder to simulate the grazing. But I understand being hesitant because of the GI stuff, that sounds scary. And glad you trusted your gut about home testing.
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Correct it will be harder for a little bit. but once fully transitioned we will start really limiting it and take it away completely slowly. He is a crunchy food junkie as out new vet calls it! but all the changes are in motion to make this happen when the vet gives us the all clear to start.
 
Well, we sure have a lot in common! See my post in this thread about my sudden inability to do shots! Just this past week too. And we are also trying to switch foods, AND we are also consistently in the 300-400s.

Anyway, I pretty much had a complete breakdown on Friday morning after 2 furshots in a row (thurs pm and fri am), so I totally get the crying etc. In my case, it was a new syringe brand that "shoots" differently so I have to completely baby it; make sure someone else is there to help, hold it completely still and steady and take it so slow so it doesn't just go off prematurely. I also think even though they are supposed to be 31g just like my first batch of syringes, the needle is duller(?) and Bartholomus twitches. It's definitely frustrating. I hope you can figure out something that just works though. 🫂 🤗
 
My boy has issues with fat as well. Over about 50% of calories from fat and he has problems. So many of the low carb wet foods have high fat, it's really frustrating. But you can find ones that are high protein/low carb and lowish fat just means a lot of label checking. I made a quick spreadsheet to keep track and do the maths for me as I did end up trialling around 20 foods (but he also has other food intolerances)

this is the spreadsheet:
Spreadsheet for calculating food values

If you want to make your own copy
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1uX6bbfCMXgvoYA87xiwgeo3PFKQo-GxvG3E72sADnuc/copy

When you're ready to try transitioning to wet it might make it easier.
 
I know, I used to get sick everyone I had a fur shot, c which at first happened a few times, then I realized that I was shooting side ways, not downwards, so I began to you pick up the scrub and shoot down, but 1 fur shot happens to all of us don’t beat yourself up, practice with an orange on how to position the needle or a stuffed animal until you feel comfortable that you got it
 
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