Jen & Westley
New Member
Hi everyone,
Longtime lurker, first time poster, so I'll give some history. Wes was first diagnosed in November 2023. It took a while (about four weeks) to get him regulated on Caninsulin -- in the meantime, his legs deteriorated rapidly and we believe he experienced a heart failure after a stressful vet visit. He rallied, and eventually we got him down to 5 units Caninsulin, but after a suspected hypo incident, the vet dropped us to 1 unit (probably way too low, though he was stable at 1 for a while), and we eventually climbed back up to 5 units before ditching it and trying Lantus, as recommended here. For further context, at that time he was still eating about half his usual amount of kibble, because of past urinary problems and a lot of pooping trouble, so the vet didn't want to change his diet dramatically.
We've been on Lantus since the beginning of July, and while we've gotten him out of the scariest numbers and are generally trending downward, he's a bouncy kitty we're having a lot of trouble getting to the "breakthrough" dose and I'm very anxious about the fact that a breakthrough seems so elusive despite high dosages. You'll notice that we're generally testing at +5, because we're still working with our vet and that's the number he wants, though we do have a sense that his nadir is around 8 hours. We've weaned him off basically all kibble very slowly, so extra frustrating that we can't seem to get in the zone. He eats a combination of FF and PC wet food (see Canadian food charts). So all under 5% carbs. His legs are bad again, though he can still do small jumps and use a litter box, but this gives us a lot of anxiety, because the heart failure was so traumatic (though he's now on daily benazapril for heart support). We've been giving the recommended B-12 for about two weeks. He is a big kitty, at around 16.5 lbs, but the vet has never said he needs to lose weight. All of his lab tests for kidney and liver function etc. are good, it's just the BG that has been a real challenge. (He has not been tested for IAA, Acro, Cushings yet, but we may have to push for this soon.)
We've guided increases according to our vet, and I know they're bigger jumps than TR, though we've held everything for minimum of 6 cycles.
We've now gotten to the point where the vet seems baffled, which is very stressful, so what I'm looking for is some compassionate insight/encouragement, especially from others who have had to enter the 10+ units range. This whole thing has kind of broken me.
His spreadsheet is linked in my signature and in my profile
Longtime lurker, first time poster, so I'll give some history. Wes was first diagnosed in November 2023. It took a while (about four weeks) to get him regulated on Caninsulin -- in the meantime, his legs deteriorated rapidly and we believe he experienced a heart failure after a stressful vet visit. He rallied, and eventually we got him down to 5 units Caninsulin, but after a suspected hypo incident, the vet dropped us to 1 unit (probably way too low, though he was stable at 1 for a while), and we eventually climbed back up to 5 units before ditching it and trying Lantus, as recommended here. For further context, at that time he was still eating about half his usual amount of kibble, because of past urinary problems and a lot of pooping trouble, so the vet didn't want to change his diet dramatically.
We've been on Lantus since the beginning of July, and while we've gotten him out of the scariest numbers and are generally trending downward, he's a bouncy kitty we're having a lot of trouble getting to the "breakthrough" dose and I'm very anxious about the fact that a breakthrough seems so elusive despite high dosages. You'll notice that we're generally testing at +5, because we're still working with our vet and that's the number he wants, though we do have a sense that his nadir is around 8 hours. We've weaned him off basically all kibble very slowly, so extra frustrating that we can't seem to get in the zone. He eats a combination of FF and PC wet food (see Canadian food charts). So all under 5% carbs. His legs are bad again, though he can still do small jumps and use a litter box, but this gives us a lot of anxiety, because the heart failure was so traumatic (though he's now on daily benazapril for heart support). We've been giving the recommended B-12 for about two weeks. He is a big kitty, at around 16.5 lbs, but the vet has never said he needs to lose weight. All of his lab tests for kidney and liver function etc. are good, it's just the BG that has been a real challenge. (He has not been tested for IAA, Acro, Cushings yet, but we may have to push for this soon.)
We've guided increases according to our vet, and I know they're bigger jumps than TR, though we've held everything for minimum of 6 cycles.
We've now gotten to the point where the vet seems baffled, which is very stressful, so what I'm looking for is some compassionate insight/encouragement, especially from others who have had to enter the 10+ units range. This whole thing has kind of broken me.
His spreadsheet is linked in my signature and in my profile
. Nadirs are important because we change the dose based on how low the dose is taking the cat. 