Laura and Harley (GA)
Member Since 2011
Once again I drop in out of the blue for another update and an announcement! This time, I have all good news to report and that is no small feat. The story so far...
Harley continues to be stable since his dental & endoscopy in August. So long as he gets his 5 mg prednisolone and 1/6 pill Zantac each day his pancreatitis & IBD seem to be sleeping. Great news on the food front - he will actually deign to eat FF Liver & Chicken Feast! Yeah, I can feed him a low carb, gluten free food again! I'm trying to wean him off the FF EM Chicken and onto the FF L&C but right now he's eating a 50/50 mix. And even better news, since Molly joined the family his insulin needs have gone down. He doesn't just lay around the house all day, he gets up and follows her around and watches her play. He still can't play but all his other P's are firmly in place. He's now on a "fat" 1u or maybe a 1.1u BID. He is acting better than he has in years - meeting me at the door when I come home, flopping on his side asking for belly rubs, demanding to be carried around on my shoulders, and insisting on snuggle time at night. I wake up in the middle of the night to find his body on my pillow and his head on my check sleeping with his cheek on mine and purring. Life is indeed good.
Princess continues to do well after her surgery. She spends her days in the window seat looking out the window watching skunks and other animals dig up my lawn. (I have grubs again this year. :roll: ) She's continued to have GI trouble, vomiting and diarrhea and my vet suggested testing her for hyper-t and her free T4 came back high, so she is now on methimizole along with pepcid and I'm seeing a difference. Less vomiting and diarrhea. But her fTLI continues to go down. It was 11 in June and now it's 10 - we're keeping an eye it that as it could be the reason for some of her GI symptoms. A pancreatic tumor is also a possibility. Thanks to my vet, I have a large supply of fluids, buprenex, ondansetron and Anzemet for both cats.
Molly has been home over a month now and is settling in. She's still OTJ and her numbers have been in the 50's the last few times I've tested. Molly greets me when I walk in the floor along with Harley. I call them the tux twins although they are kind of like Mutt & Jeff - he's tall and slender and she's small and kid of built low to the ground. When I'm home, she's my little shadow following me from room to room. She's not a lap cat yet but will sit within a foot or two of me on the couch or on the floor. At night she sleeps in my grandmother's rocking chair by my bed. Someday I think she'll make an awesome lap/bed cat. She loves to play with her collection of crinkle ball toys. I pile them all on my kitchen rug and throw a few her way and she starts to play. By the time she's done my rug is in the living room and the toys are all over the house. I dig out all the toys, put the rug back in place and the next day she re-decorates again.
Harley likes to sit and watch her and she trills at him as if to say "Let's play" but he can't. I've got lots of pictures of her, I just need to take time and upload them to my Facebook account. But, time may not be forthcoming yet because...
...I'm adopting a 4th kitty! Molly needs a playmate and this poor fellow's story just tugged at my heartstrings. Meet Hadley who actually was posted on DCIN's blog the same day as Molly. Both are originally from Maryland but both kitties fates took different turns. Molly got to go to Uncle Don and get OTJ very quickly, Hadley had an adopter and lost her and because of the timing of things, lost his foster spot at Uncle Don's to Molly. Instead he was taken in by a Fancy Cats Rescue Team foster mom who has a huge heart for kitties but had never fostered a diabetic before. So DCIN has been working with Hadley's foster mom on his regulation which is still an ongoing quest. He started on ProZinc in July 3u BID and dry/wet WD food. After vet BG curves showed BGs in the 4-500s the dose was quickly raised to 5u BID and then to 7u BID with no improvement in numbers. He was switched to Lantus but started out at 3u BID and at the time he went to go to his foster mom's the vet prescribed 4u BID. DCIN reduced his dose back down to 1u BID after discovering that he was in some major rebound and they've been trying to get him regulated ever since. His Lantus SS is here. Hadley flies home to me on Caturday, October 29, and I will start him on Levemir that night. I'm still trying to figure out a starting dose - any suggestions would be gratefully appreciated.
This is my last adoption for a long while. As my ex-DH who is a sports fan put it: "You're like a football coach - you've got your senior, first-stringers, who will graduate someday, and you're deepening your bench by adding two sophomores to the team for your second stringers." That about sums it up! Just like a guy to put things in the simplest terms. LOL
Harley continues to be stable since his dental & endoscopy in August. So long as he gets his 5 mg prednisolone and 1/6 pill Zantac each day his pancreatitis & IBD seem to be sleeping. Great news on the food front - he will actually deign to eat FF Liver & Chicken Feast! Yeah, I can feed him a low carb, gluten free food again! I'm trying to wean him off the FF EM Chicken and onto the FF L&C but right now he's eating a 50/50 mix. And even better news, since Molly joined the family his insulin needs have gone down. He doesn't just lay around the house all day, he gets up and follows her around and watches her play. He still can't play but all his other P's are firmly in place. He's now on a "fat" 1u or maybe a 1.1u BID. He is acting better than he has in years - meeting me at the door when I come home, flopping on his side asking for belly rubs, demanding to be carried around on my shoulders, and insisting on snuggle time at night. I wake up in the middle of the night to find his body on my pillow and his head on my check sleeping with his cheek on mine and purring. Life is indeed good.
Princess continues to do well after her surgery. She spends her days in the window seat looking out the window watching skunks and other animals dig up my lawn. (I have grubs again this year. :roll: ) She's continued to have GI trouble, vomiting and diarrhea and my vet suggested testing her for hyper-t and her free T4 came back high, so she is now on methimizole along with pepcid and I'm seeing a difference. Less vomiting and diarrhea. But her fTLI continues to go down. It was 11 in June and now it's 10 - we're keeping an eye it that as it could be the reason for some of her GI symptoms. A pancreatic tumor is also a possibility. Thanks to my vet, I have a large supply of fluids, buprenex, ondansetron and Anzemet for both cats.
Molly has been home over a month now and is settling in. She's still OTJ and her numbers have been in the 50's the last few times I've tested. Molly greets me when I walk in the floor along with Harley. I call them the tux twins although they are kind of like Mutt & Jeff - he's tall and slender and she's small and kid of built low to the ground. When I'm home, she's my little shadow following me from room to room. She's not a lap cat yet but will sit within a foot or two of me on the couch or on the floor. At night she sleeps in my grandmother's rocking chair by my bed. Someday I think she'll make an awesome lap/bed cat. She loves to play with her collection of crinkle ball toys. I pile them all on my kitchen rug and throw a few her way and she starts to play. By the time she's done my rug is in the living room and the toys are all over the house. I dig out all the toys, put the rug back in place and the next day she re-decorates again.
Harley likes to sit and watch her and she trills at him as if to say "Let's play" but he can't. I've got lots of pictures of her, I just need to take time and upload them to my Facebook account. But, time may not be forthcoming yet because......I'm adopting a 4th kitty! Molly needs a playmate and this poor fellow's story just tugged at my heartstrings. Meet Hadley who actually was posted on DCIN's blog the same day as Molly. Both are originally from Maryland but both kitties fates took different turns. Molly got to go to Uncle Don and get OTJ very quickly, Hadley had an adopter and lost her and because of the timing of things, lost his foster spot at Uncle Don's to Molly. Instead he was taken in by a Fancy Cats Rescue Team foster mom who has a huge heart for kitties but had never fostered a diabetic before. So DCIN has been working with Hadley's foster mom on his regulation which is still an ongoing quest. He started on ProZinc in July 3u BID and dry/wet WD food. After vet BG curves showed BGs in the 4-500s the dose was quickly raised to 5u BID and then to 7u BID with no improvement in numbers. He was switched to Lantus but started out at 3u BID and at the time he went to go to his foster mom's the vet prescribed 4u BID. DCIN reduced his dose back down to 1u BID after discovering that he was in some major rebound and they've been trying to get him regulated ever since. His Lantus SS is here. Hadley flies home to me on Caturday, October 29, and I will start him on Levemir that night. I'm still trying to figure out a starting dose - any suggestions would be gratefully appreciated.
This is my last adoption for a long while. As my ex-DH who is a sports fan put it: "You're like a football coach - you've got your senior, first-stringers, who will graduate someday, and you're deepening your bench by adding two sophomores to the team for your second stringers." That about sums it up! Just like a guy to put things in the simplest terms. LOL
