How much food should I feed Squeak - he's STARVING 24/7!

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sweetmelissa444

Member Since 2013
HELP! poor Squeak - we're doing good at dosing (1U bid) until next week. I'm going to try to home test tonight. Again - with crossed fingers. He's on Fancy Feast Classics - 2 cans a day. Those cans are SO small and I'm used to feeding him (no more) DRY Blue Buffalo - and LOTS of Temptations sweets. NO MORE - Soley FFC. Since starting him on insulin this past Tuesday, I really don't think he's quite as starved, but none the less... He's a 10 lb. Tabby. With a HUGE appetite!! I just want to make sure he's eating enough - Well, 'getting' enough! Thanks to all!
 
If he is hungry FEED HIM!

When Maui was on insulin - she could eat 2-3 cans at one time! 3 times a day. I gave her all she needed and eventually, this high demand tapered off.
 
Wow - thanks for all of that good info. I don't think he's as ravenous as he 'was,' but he'll eat it all.

How much would you feed a 10 lb. diabetic cat in the beginning? Thanks !! I cannot free feed - as I did - he'll eat it all at once. I'm not at home all the time due to long work schedules and am at times gone at night. So I want to do what's best for him. I love him SO much. He's just the sweetest, darling baby boy - even though he's wild when in the cage or at he vet (or trying to BG test!)
 
When Bob was first diagnosed he was 12 pounds (down from 22 six months earlier). While he was on insulin, I fed him a can of FF at each shot time. He got half a can for lunch, and half for a bedtime snack, so 3 cans a day. He gained back two pounds over 10 weeks or so.
He's maintained that weight for 18 months, but no longer gets a lunchtime snack.

Some of this depends on activity level too, and a really active cat may need more. Bob is pretty much a sloth:-)

And as Squeak's numbers improve, he should require fewer calories a day. At this point, his body is not metabolizing food as well as a regulated cat would.

Carl
 
There are timed food trays that you can use to space out his snacks. I have a petsafe5 that I will be selling soon now that Sneakers is not a ravenous black hole that eats everything in her path :lol: . But you can find them on ebay, amazon, as well as food stores.

You can also try freezing the food- either in ice cube trays (add water) or those silicone cupcake molds for a bigger 'puck' (add lost of water). I've done them both. As she is now an only and is now very picky I freeze a lot of food at one time and just thaw them out when I need them and she is good with that.

It takes about an hour for the cube to thaw out, 2 for the pucks. Also add an ice cube or two of water in the bowl for added moisture.

As the insulin starts working and he gets closer to regulation and starts getting nutrients out of his food the hunger will subside. Sneakers ate almost 20 oz of FF every day when she was unregulated- 5+ cans a day with those little toppers! Good thing I recycle but I had so many cans drying behind my sink they would crash into the sink in the middle of the night sometimes. Sneakers just used that as an opportunity to gobble up another can :lol: :roll: .
 
I know the feeling -- Jackson was RAVENOUS when first diagnosed -- it goes along with the disease in an untreated cat.

The good news is that it subsides once you get them to a good insulin dose and get them regulated.

Just so you can see another example of feeding, Jackson gets 2.5 cans of FF everyday (so does his civvie brother Ollie) -- he's a little under 13 pounds.

3/4 can at AMPS (morning time pre-shot)
1/2 can snack around my lunch time (sometimes I split this up into two snacks)
1/2 can at PMPS (around 6:30 pm)
3/4 can at +4.5 (that's 4.5 hours after shot time -- around 11 pm)

This, in combination with the tight regulation protocol, have suited him just fine -- he's on day 5 of an "off-the-juice" trial and then will be in diet-controlled remission! I think we're going to work on decreasing their food a little bit, but we found this to be a good routine for us. I had better luck NOT splitting up into small meals too much -- he seemed to do better when he could get good and full earlier in the day, but ECID (each cat is different) -- so do what you need to for Squeak -- you'll figure it out!

Keep up the good work!
 
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