Oh sweetie, don't lose hope! As Tricia said, you've comed to the right place for help. Home testing is vital to keeping your sweet kitty safe. Some vets don't approve of using a human meter to test your cat because they do measure blood glucose differently (you cannot compare the two) but the test strips definitely are cheaper and more accessible with a human meter. It isn't the number so much that we focus on (unless it's too low!), but the range of numbers. If you look at my "Signature" at the bottom of this post, you will see a link to my kitty's spreadsheet; click on it and look at his spreadsheet. You will see, up at the top, the ranges we look at when we test. (Just please don't try to copy my dosing, I use a different insulin than you and a very aggressive treatment method)
Please DO pick up some ketone test strips! It's so important to test for ketones, especially if Alphie has already had diabetic ketoacidosis. They are easy to use - I just wait til I catch my guy peeing and wave the stick through his urine stream. Most of them say to read them at 15 seconds, it'll tell you in the directions, so make sure you read it when they say to. If it sits much longer it can turn darker and give you a false reading.
Kitties who have unregulated diabetes tend to be hungry very frequently, because they cannot process their food properly. It's okay to feed him a little more than you might usually, especially if he needs to gain a little weight. Cutting the dry food out of his diet will help a lot, but please don't make that transition til you are home testing regularly. It's best to transition gradually over the course of several days. This will probably cause a drop in Alphie's blood glucose. We want you to be testing so you can catch this drop and keep him from dropping too low, which can be very dangerous (I'm not trying to scare you, just stating a fact).
When my cat was first diagnosed he started on Vetsulin, too. Four units is a pretty big dose. Most cats start out around 1 unit, and we suggest only raising the dose by 0.25 units at a time. This way you don't pass over the best dose for your cat. Sometimes a cat who is receiving too much insulin will have high numbers because of something we call bouncing. This happens when kitty's bg drops very low, or lower than he is used to, and his body goes into panic mode; when this happens, the liver starts dumping glucogen into the system, thinking it needs to bring the bg back up. (That's the simplified version, anyway!) This will result in high bg numbers. I'm not saying that's what's going on with your Alphie, just something to keep in mind, and another good reason to home test!
One last note on cat food! You absolutely DO NOT need to buy the fancy, expensive "prescription" foods, there is nothing at all prescription about them, a lot of them are full of junk fillers like cellulose (sawdust), and they are mostly higher than 10% carbs. The food list Tricia gave you the link to is a great help for choosing foods for our sugar kitties, and includes foods in all price ranges
I hope we haven't overwhelmed you! I'm sure you will have more questions. Don't be afraid to ask, everybody here is very helpful, and there are no stupid questions.
P.S. Alphie is gorgeous!!!
