Intro and Food Question(s)

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lesliewinga

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I am new to this board but my cat has had diabetes for a while now - maybe two years. He gets 2 units every 12 hours and this has remained consistent since diagnosis. Our vet has given us the Science Diet food and I've tried the Royal Canin Diabetes food. I never knew about the problem with high carbs until doing research yesterday and today. I always felt guilty about giving him the FF classics instead of Science Diet, and here, I never should have felt bad!

My question is about free feeding and quantity. He's ALWAYS been free fed dry although I switched to Royal Canin's high protein dry last month. I also give 1 FF can morning and 1 can at night for each cat. If I remove the dry, how much wet am I supposed to give so that he doesn't get hungry in the middle of the day/night? He is overweight 16/17 lbs. I also have another non-diabetic cat that is heavy but not as heavy as him - 12 lbs. maybe? How much FF am I supposed to give? @-) If it's more than one can per meal wouldn't it be cheaper for me to get bigger cans of something else?

I'm so torn and upset about figuring this out. I can't spend boatloads of money on cat food and I've got to get my dogs off of Purina and Alpo to something better too. But I LOVE my pets and want what is good for them, and I especially worry about my diabetic kitty - he's 13 years old, btw.

Thanks for any help and suggestions.
 
Welcome Leslie & (what do we call your extra sweet boy?)

As of this Saturday when my 3rd adopted diabetic kitty arrives there will be 14 cats here (3 diabetics & 11 non-diabetics) as well as 97lb dog. Now with that many mouths to feed I'm not about to open that many 3oz Fancy Feast cans..lol So everyone here eats what my diabetics eat, just good old fashioned Friskies Pate style canned cat food.

My one diabetic Maxwell who is currently in remission is also 13 years old and a lean 17lbs, he's a big guy probably a Maine Coon mix if not mostly Maine Coon. He goes through about 2-2 1/2 (5.5oz) cans of Friskies. Most of my other cats are between 6lbs to 12lbs and they eat about 1 to 1 1/2 cans of Friskies. roughly as they all eat together and as cats will do like to exchange dishes to make sure no one is getting something better than they got..lol

But that said to feed everyone here we go through 14 cans of (5.5oz) or 8 (13oz) cans of Friskies. This is the same diet that got my Maxwell into remission and Musette flirting with it.

Now for a couple of questions for you...what type of insulin does you boy take?
And are you testing his BGs at home? If not would you be interested in us teaching you how we do it? It would really be a good idea if you are getting ready to remove all the dry food from his diet because we have found that many times just the removing the dry food will drop their BGs about 100+ points thus lowering their insulin needs.
So you will want to stay on top of that and be ready to lower his dosage so as to prevent a hypo.

Mel, Maxwell, Musette & The Fur Gang
 
My cats were always given dry food as well. Once I learned about dry/diabetes/etc. I changed to wet food. As mine are grazers, I leave the wet food out all day.

What I do is add water to the food, this keeps it moist longer and ensures they get plenty of water in their systems. As to the amount of food to leave out. You will need to experiment. Start with one or two cans and see how quickly he eats it. There may be days when you need to put out more, and days when you put out less.

When Maui started, she could eat 2 - 2 1/2 cans of FF in one sitting. Now, that she is in remission, I will put out two cans of FF at one time. This is for two cats. I also supplement with freeze dried raw food (Stella & Chewy's) that I also leave out in it's dry form.

Sometimes they will eat the two cans sometimes not.

Also, for the times when you won't be home, you can take the canned food with added water, freeze it and put that out in addition to fresh. By the time it thaws, it will be nice and fresh for the cat. And he may be hungry for it.
 
My sweet cat's name is Barsik, which is a Russian cat name. (My oldest daughter is Russian). My insulin is at home, but it is either Vetsulin or ProZinc, I think. We changed it when one stopped being produced.

MommaofMuse, no way opening that many 3oz cans. Made me laugh!

Just the thought of going through double the amount of cans of food to remove from dry, ugh.

No haven't been testing Barsik at home. I have been reading about it here though and have printed out the names of the testers so I can bebop to Walmart. When I first started giving him the insulin injections I was freaked - I'm a total needle freak and can't stand 'em. But we've gotten through that and he's a champ, so I imagine we can tackle the testing just fine. I just have to work up the courage. :shock:

Hillary & Maui - thanks for the tip on the water mixing for moisture. He drinks, but should probably do more.

I appreciate the feedback!
 
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