NEW to Board and Diabetic Kitties :(

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She gets 1u in the AM and 1u in the PM. We would go down to .5u each while we are away? That seems like nothing. Changing it like that won't mess her up?

I can try to get a shot tonight--but not during the day. We work and can't be home during that time. Maybe on a weekend when we are around.
 
Well maybe not all the way down to .5
See how it goes this weekend and maybe you will just skinny up the 1unit. Like .75
 
This morning Cali tested at 407, which discouraged us a bit given the progress she's made (went into the 200's last night!).

We will test this evening and see where she is. We think we may need to give her an additional unit at night, as she tends to be higher in the morning. That would mean 1 unit in the AM and 2 in the PM. Any thoughts?

We also received the new insulin today. Nervous about starting it while we will be away, but maybe tomorrow would be a fresh start. any thoughts on that as well?
 
While I don't use your insulin, we seldom raise a dose by a full unit at a time, usually we only go up by either .25u to .5u. Hopefully someone with more experience with your insulin will chime in, but if you are going to raise the dose you want to do it in small increments, not full units. Another thing that might help keep her numbers more stable overnight is to get her a meal during the night. What I do for mine here is a feed a fresh meal 3 times a day and then right before I go to bed for the night, give them a small snack fresh and then put out another meal frozen so they can nibble on it all night as it thaws out.

Mel, Maxwell, Musette & The Fur Gang.
 
Don't know if anyone has already mentioned the dreaded "meter variance" to you or not....

Meters can have a degree of error/variance of up to 20%. That 364 you had yesterday morning and the 407 you got today could in fact be right around the same number. I know that is frustrating, but you do have to keep it in mind, especially when considering changes in dose.

From what I have seen, the more "constants" there are, the easy it is to keep things straight in your head. One of those constants is with dosing amounts. It is best, especially at the start of treatment, to keep the doses AM and PM the same. What you don't want to do this early in the "dance" is to start "chasing" the numbers you are getting. I agree that her PM readings have been lower than the AM readings. But, it's only three days of data, AND you just are starting a new insulin too.
For now, my advice would be to go ahead and start her on the Prozinc either now, or after you go away for that one day. And, keep the dose at 1u for now, AM and PM, with a possible reduction for those two shots you know you aren't going to be around to test for.
If you start the prozinc now, we might have a good idea by then what that dose should be. If you decide to hold off until after your trip, then we can try to determine what the dose of the Humulin should be for those two shots.

But I would not, no matter which insulin you use, start shooting different amounts AM and PM. Like Mel said, sometimes you can manipulate BG levels using food and timing of meals, which is easier than making dose adjustments. And the important point she makes is that when you do decide to raise or lower, you should do so in little amounts like .25 or .5, not in whole units at one time.
Carl
 
Thanks everyone, especially Carl. Very helpful!

Is there an issue with starting the new insulin tonight? the reason being is that we will be around, should she have some reaction. Small change but it would make me feel better than if we were at work and something happened. I imagine tonight would be okay. We will keep the units the same with the new insulin for right now and try giving her that nightly treat.

Thanks!
 
Switching tonight would not be a problem.
You should expect a slower onset with Prozinc, and a more gentle longer lasting curve. If you can get a couple of tests after the PMPS shot, that will be helpful.

Carl
 
We've started her on ProZinc last night (11/17), remaining at 1u. So far, she continues to share a common theme in her readings - High in the morning (mid-to-high 300s), lower in the evening (high 200s, low 300s), and even Lower (mid-to-high 200s) before bed (~5 hours after eating). We have begun to give her about 1/2 a can of Fancy Feast before bed, as of yesterday evening. The link to her spreadsheet is in my signature, so you can see her progress here.

While it's certainly MUCH better than earlier in the week, we still wonder how we can continue to progress. I'm sure we're too ansy and are simply dealing with too small of a sample size, but how should we continue the downward progress seeing as though she read higher on Thursday than she did on Wednesday, and Wednesday & Friday were about the same? What are we looking at - keeping her on the same track for another week before making any changes? Or trying a small increase in dose (.25)?

THANKS!! You've all been so helpful. We're getting better every day with the shots and the testing. Cali has been wonderful - way better than we ever would have expected. It's like she's the mature one and we're still scared of needles and blood!
 
Becky - Where are you located? The treats in the newbie kit came from me through work (Three Dog Bakery) - you may have a bakery locally or the We Pity the Kitty treats may be sold in some of your local stores (Hyvee, Walmart etc.) I would be happy to check for you.
 
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