New here and breathing easier

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Hello all,
I was so glad to find this forum!
I have just completed my first injection on my cat (well, actually my elderly father's cat but we live in the same house and I care for his cat along with my own lot). I was rather worried as she can be a handful at the best of times and usually doesn't like to be touched but she was actually very good this first time and didn't seem to notice the stick.
Now I just have to look forward to this becoming a twice daily part of our lives.
(Oh please, Bast! Let her always be this good!)
I was wondering how soon I can expect to see her feel a little better? Does it take a few days? A few weeks? A few months?
~Mars
 
Hi Mars and Welcome to the Feline Diabetes Message Board (FDMB):

17mars said:
I was wondering how soon I can expect to see her feel a little better? Does it take a few days? A few weeks? A few months?
~Mars
Click to expand...

Well a lot of that answer will depend on food (low carb options), insulin regulation, and home testing. I am going to direct you to a whole lot of information with this link. It will help you understand what is happening overall and what to expect.

Frequently Asked Questions

Read, read, read! Information is your best health-care tool in managing your cat's diabetes. And ask here if you have any questions or anything is unclear.


Does your cat of a name?

What food is your cat on now?

What is the insulin type and dose?

Are you planning to home test?
 
Good for you for treating your father's kitty. I know there is a lot of info on here to read and absorb, but any questions that you have or anything that you need clarified, just ask.

As for your specific question about how long until she feels better, it depends on a few things, but generally within a couple of days she should begin to feel better.

Can you tell us what insulin she is getting? What dose? What food is she eating? These things will all play a part in how quickly she begins to feel better.
 
Thanks for the welcome and replies!
Dad's cat is called Saffron but usually shortened to Saffy. She is a 12 year-old Abyssinian with a very, very bad temper. In order to get a blood draw from her two days ago, the vet had to put her in an anesthesia cage then wait until she was unconscious. Her current dose is 2 units of ProZine BID. As she also has a UTI, she has once-a-day antibiotics tabs as well. Yesterday she was tricked into taking this pill hidden in her food. I'm sure that won't work every time. Her current diet is free feeding one cup of Science Diet hairball dry over the course of the day and she has one ounce of Blue Buffalo Tuna wet in the morning and again in the evening. The vet did not recommend to change her food at this time as she said her food isn't too bad in calories and it is more important to get her accustomed to the injections. (Hah!) Later we will try to get her diet a little lower in calorie.

This morning's injection was NOT good. It took 45 minutes before I could get any where near her. She isn't falling for any food treat temptations. I have this little fantasy that perhaps the diabetes is to blame for part of her bad temper and if she starts feeling better she might be a little easier to handle. But she has never been a "people" cat. Everything has always had to be on her terms.
When I finally got near her and gave her a few pets to calm her down, she whipped her head around just as I gave her the jab and made it hurt (I think... but she might have been yeowling in anger because I tricked her)
This is going to be a nightmare for years to come I fear.
 
She isn't falling for any food treat temptations.
Click to expand...

One trick to try is to shoot them while they're eating. They're distracted with their food and it's a good time to shoot.

Also varying the places you shoot will help too. Sometimes they get sensitive if you shoot in the same spot. I shoot right side at night, left in the day.

Hope this helps!
 
I just want to comment that I don't believe calories are the enemy, it's the carbs. Dry food tends to be way to high for diabetics.
A switch to all wet can go a LONG way. I have managed to get my Callie Mae's diabetes diet controlled just by diet change alone.
It doesn't have to be expensive food either. Fancy Feast Classic and Friskie's Classic Pate seem to be favorites here. Just have to make sure it is a kind with no sauce or gravy, as those tend to be higher carb.

Not to overwhelm you, but here is a list of wet food to pick and choose from.
We like to stay at 10% or less carb.
http://binkyspage.tripod.com/CanFoodNew.html
 
Thanks for the link. I was glad to see on the list that her regular wet food is moderately low carb. I'll pick up a couple others that are even lower to see if something different will strike her fancy even more. Right now she must be a little nauseated, even though she has had no vomiting, because she is indifferent to food. It's not working as a temptation yet. We're planning to cut back on the dry and eventually use it as a treat only. Too bad as she really prefers dry food.
 
Your location made me laugh! I'm just north of you across the border, and I can totally relate!

There are probably a couple of things making her feel like not being handled - uti (antibiotics?), high bg, and perhaps nausea.

It is really important that she eats. Is she licking her lips at all? This is one sign of nausea. She can have 1/4 of a 10 mg Pepcid AC to help with nausea. My cat loves cheese and so I wrap it in some cheddar (some people use cream cheese) and he doesn't notice that there is a lump in it. Another thing to help entice her to eat is Fortiflora. Its a probiotic powder that is apparently similar in smell/taste to dry food. If my cat is really off, I sometimes roll the cheese ball with the pill in Ff and so far has not been rejected.

If you need more suggestions for encouraging eating, just post. We all have a trunk full of them!

PS Fortiflora is available at the vet - you can usually get 1 or 2 envelopes for about $1 each. Better than buying a box of 30 and finding she doesn't like it.
 
Thanks for the welcome!
Well, she is feeling better already. I can tell because she's a lot more alert and a lot harder to catch.
I don't know whether to be relieved she's feeling better or dismayed that her Tasmanian Devil personality is going to make this a big pain in the bottom!
Food is not a temptation for her. It's going to be a strategic battle.
 
There a couple of us here in Puget Sound area (I'm in Enumclaw).

If you cut back on the dry food, or even remove it all together, her BG will go
down by quite a bit and 2units may be too much.

Also, when the infection is cleared up, the BG will likely go down, also (infections raise BG).

We encourage home-testing, as it gives you the complete picture of how
the kitty is handling the insulin.

As difficult as she is, that may not be possible right now, but you should think about it.

And do you have what you need on hand in case her BG goes too low (hypoglycemia):

Here is a link that explains that:

http://www.felinediabetes.com/hypogly.htm
 
Hi Mars,
Most of the replies have covered the bases, but I'll pitch in a couple things that I've learned along the way so far -

Sounds like you have a bad-attitude kitty. I've got one too, and lucky for me, he isn't the one that has diabetes! My Bob is a softy, and the only treatment he's objected to is 100cc sub-q fluids I've had to give him several times.
-I have found that anything and everything that you are able to do yourself at home is preferable to having it done at the vets office. The stress levels caused by a drive to the vet, along with the unfamiliar surroundings, smells, noises and people can be avoided if you can manage to home test and treat.
-lose the dry food as soon as possible. Saffy will adapt to a wet diet.
- as much as you can, using binky's list, offer her variety while keeping the carbs as low as possible. All tuna/seafood may not be the best thing. Great protein and carb numbers, but also can be high in mercury. I posted here about a week ago for the first time, and you can read that thread and see the advice I was given (thankfully!) as far as alternatives to tuna. I've been going with poultry and beef this week, and Bob is loving it. His bg numbers have improved as well!
- eventually, and I've seen this with Bob and I'm sure everyone here has seen it as well, your kitty will come to associate the tests and treatments with "feeling better", and at some point in the not distant future, you'll be amazed at how much easier that part of her day becomes for you. Bob knows that after ear pricks comes a treat, and right after the injection comes the meal, and he actually lays down in front of me on the floor and waits for the ritual twice a day.
- I'm also wondering, although it sounds like her appetite has improved in the past couple days, if the indifference to food might have been due to his infection (or the meds to treat that) may have affected her sense of smell at all. With my cats, if they can't smell well, they won't eat well.

Anyway, just wanted to say "welcome" and let you know that things will get easier!

Carl in SC
(edited because I had Saffy's gender wrong!)
 
Mars -
One thing I meant to ask, and not sure if anyone else already did -
what size needle/syringe are you using for the shots? I'm not sure if they are uniform or not. Mine are U-40 29 g, 1/2cc 1/2" long, and Bob hardly notices the stick. He's more upset with having his leg held than with the needle going in. (Having to do intermuscular injections due to other factors). When I was using sub-q shots when I started home treatment, he didn't even notice I'd shot him.

Carl
 
I'm not sure what insulin syringe you're using (Bandit is on Lantus so we use a u-100 syringe), but I found switching to a 31g, shorter needle made the shot undetectable. I can seriously jab him over and over with these things and he has no idea, unlike the 29g where he tolerated it but you could tell he could feel it and didn't like it. I also have less fur shots with the short needle. I also shoot while he is eating.

Have you ever tried pill pockets to give the pill? http://www.greenies.com/en_US/Products/felinepillpockets.aspx

The duck and pea flavor (allergy formula) is safe for diabetics (low carb, no sugar). Bandit thinks he's getting a treat. Even if the cat figures out the trick, they're handy for disguising the pill and then rolling it in something the cat thinks as a treat--like tuna, chicken, even a crushed regular treat.
 
New issue going on now. After doing better yesterday, she has decided not to eat this evening. Seems nauseated. (No V or D though) This is getting very frustrated. She actually doesn't mind the U-40 needles (although she is not getting one tonight because she refused to eat). It's the fact that I'm touching her that she hates and catching her is what makes it hard.
Some day I'll get her profile up but she was diagnosed years ago with hyperaesthesia and so has a history of going into fits when stressed. These fits can have her chewing up herself, me or anything that comes near her. Then she flings her body around. Although this has gotten better as she has aged, we need to keep her calm. She is near impossible to handle at the vet. In order to get a blood draw out of her, the vet had to put her in the anesthesia chamber and get her groggy.
I hope she's better tomorrow because I don't fancy taking her back to the vet so quickly. I think it's the antibiotics making her nauseated.

Oh yes, pill pockets are a blessing!
 
One thing I found with both my cats was if they associated feeling crappy with their food, they would stop eating that food. However, if you gave them a different food that they found appetizing, they would eat that. I just went through this with Bandit this week where he had a dental that didn't go so well, and then he stopped eating his EVO. On a hunch I got him some Fancy Feast and he gobbled it up, and has been eating fine ever since. So he's getting Fancy Feast until he recovers.

So this is just a suggestion that might work, but maybe run out and grab a few different types of food that she might find appetizing? I found that Merricks and Nature's variety instinct foods were very palatable for my cats, and many cats LOVE Fancy Feast (it's Bandit's favorite food).

If she's not eating, you definitely don't want to shoot insulin, so any food you can get in her is good. And if she takes to the low carb wets foods, you can ditch the dry. Just make sure if you are shooting insulin and change the diet that dose is lowered. Many cats drop 100-200 points once the dry is eliminated. The best thing you can do is to start to hometest, but I understand your hesitance with a difficult kitty. It's worth trying, though, because Bandit is super difficult but after a week or so he calmed down and let me do it. There are ways to restrain the cat that they get used to and not so stressed out--like with Bandit I put him in a basket lined with blankets so that it was comfy, and then tucked him in it with a soft fleece blanket with just his head sticking out so he couldn't run or claw me. After a week of that (and getting a treat after each test) he calmed right down and I didn't even need the blanket, I could just set him in the basket and he would sit for me.

The ear pokes don't hurt the cat after a week or so once they're used to them. So they start cooperating once it becomes a routine for them. I don't even have to put Bandit in the basket anymore. I can walk over and just get a test and he doesn't even flinch or move.

You might also want to pick up some FortiFlora from your vet--it's a probiotic. It helps calm the digestive system when taking antibiotics. I've had great results with it.
 
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