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[Christina2113]

Hello!
I'm Christina and have a kitty, Bella, that has been diagnosed with Diabetes for over 2 years now. Finally, we're making progress with the right insulin and the right dosage, but we're still having a lot of problems. We are awaiting results to see if she may have acromegaly. She is ravenous with food and has recently developed pica - she's eating tissues and paper towels, if she can get ahold of them. She urinates outside of the litter box and her voids usually leave large puddles/clumps in the litter box. She is not drinking excessively though. Her diet for about 3 weeks now has been only wet food with high protein (69-75%) and very low carbs (0-7%).

I'm reaching out to educate myself and to figure out what in the world is going on with her to get her well. Support and ideas from others' experiences are much appreciated. I'll be perusing the boards as well to hopefully figure this all out.

 

[JanetNJ]

Welcome! For dosing help write on the lantus forum. Glad to see you're testing at home.

 

[Idjit's mom]

Welcome to the Board, I'm sorry to hear you and Bella are still struggling with treatment. You will want to get a spreadsheet going to record shots and test results, so that members can give you some input about the Lantus and dosing. Here is a link to the spreadsheet instructions and understanding the spreadsheet.
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/forums/suggestions-tech-support-testing-area.6/

There is a wealth of information for you to read, and I'm so glad you are willing to educate yourself to help Bella feel better.

 

[FurBabiesMama]

Welcome!

 

[Sandi and Toby]

Poor little Bella! We are glad to have you here, Christina. One of my late kitties loved to eat tissues as well. We got so used to having to turn the Kleenex boxes upside down, that even after he passed it was a hard habit to break. Not sure that it was actually pica, I think he was just a bit of a weirdo

If Bella is positive for acromegaly, there are plenty of folks here to help you with that as well. You've probably seen that there is both a specific forum for Lantus, as well as one for IAA/Acro, and the Main forum gets everything else.

One quick note though: Because of the way that you described her diet over the last few weeks, I assume that this is a change from the past diet? If you have changed from something higher carb in the past, particularly from a dry food, to a low carb wet food now, keeping the same Lantus dosage as before could be concerning. In other words, your insulin dosage might need to decrease now if the carb load has also decreased. Can you talk about the diet briefly and whether it was a change (if we get into it in depth, we might want to move to the main forum but let's catch it here to put all our minds at ease...we are worry warts ), and whether you are testing at home so that you can know for sure whether it is now too much insulin? A lot of people keep the same dosage while modifying the diet, because their vet doesn't warn them otherwise, and all of a sudden it is now way too much insulin. Of course, it would also depend on how high your blood glucose levels were before.

Best,
Sandi.

 

[Christina2113]

Poor little Bella! We are glad to have you here, Christina. One of my late kitties loved to eat tissues as well. We got so used to having to turn the Kleenex boxes upside down, that even after he passed it was a hard habit to break. Not sure that it was actually pica, I think he was just a bit of a weirdo

If Bella is positive for acromegaly, there are plenty of folks here to help you with that as well. You've probably seen that there is both a specific forum for Lantus, as well as one for IAA/Acro, and the Main forum gets everything else.

One quick note though: Because of the way that you described her diet over the last few weeks, I assume that this is a change from the past diet? If you have changed from something higher carb in the past, particularly from a dry food, to a low carb wet food now, keeping the same Lantus dosage as before could be concerning. In other words, your insulin dosage might need to decrease now if the carb load has also decreased. Can you talk about the diet briefly and whether it was a change (if we get into it in depth, we might want to move to the main forum but let's catch it here to put all our minds at ease...we are worry warts ), and whether you are testing at home so that you can know for sure whether it is now too much insulin? A lot of people keep the same dosage while modifying the diet, because their vet doesn't warn them otherwise, and all of a sudden it is now way too much insulin. Of course, it would also depend on how high your blood glucose levels were before.

Best,
Sandi.

Hello, Sandi!
I understand your concerns, and thank you for asking!
The Lantus and diet change occurred very close - we changed her food before the switch to Lantus. After these changes, we did glucose curves at home for the past few weeks to monitor her sugar. The great news is that her sugar has finally gotten to a normal range, but her behavior has not changed much.
Her diet before was Hills Prescription Diet w/d with dry and wet food. She was on this since Jan and we weren't seeing much improvement, we decided to switch her to a higher protein diet with 0-7% carbs. She seemed to be bloated before and now she is not. She is dehydrated though, and we have been adding water to her food for months now.
Once I get the spreadsheet, I guess I'll call it, up and running, I should be able to put her past curves and such into this to give everyone more information.

 

[Rardito]

Hello!
I'm Christina and have a kitty, Bella, that has been diagnosed with Diabetes for over 2 years now. Finally, we're making progress with the right insulin and the right dosage, but we're still having a lot of problems. We are awaiting results to see if she may have acromegaly. She is ravenous with food and has recently developed pica - she's eating tissues and paper towels, if she can get ahold of them. She urinates outside of the litter box and her voids usually leave large puddles/clumps in the litter box. She is not drinking excessively though. Her diet for about 3 weeks now has been only wet food with high protein (69-75%) and very low carbs (0-7%).

I'm reaching out to educate myself and to figure out what in the world is going on with her to get her well. Support and ideas from others' experiences are much appreciated. I'll be perusing the boards as well to hopefully figure this all out.

My diabetes cat used to have pica tendencies too! She ate paper, cardboard, and sliding glass door blinds.