Newly diagnosed with diabetes

Status
Not open for further replies.
C

christmas2006

Member Since 2013
Hi, My name is Molly and my cat Christmas was newly diagnosed with diabetes. I wrote yesterday and am unable to find the message I wrote. I had to re-register as well.....Anyway, I had the demo at the vet last night and she received her first injection. This morning though she is under the bed and won't come out. Idesa? I tried food, but I think she has already caught on. She is also heartworm postive. She is 9 years old and a sweetie! She has lost half of her weight. She was 22 lbs. and is now 11 lbs. How much canned food can she have a day? I am also wondering if it is correct that she can have fancy feast classics? She also is on wd diabetes food, dry. Any info would be greatly appreciated....Hugs to all!
 
I am glad to see you back. The board is experiencing issues and all am posts yesterday disappeared. First question: what kind of insulin and how much? I hope your vet started on a nice low dose (like one unit). If more that that, I am going to suggest dragging her out from under the bed (use gloves or whatever) and putting her someplace where you can observe her. Not to scare you, but too much insulin can make them feel awful and hide. And it can be dangerous. It can also be that yesterday was just scary in general and she wants to feel safe, but you want to make sure.

It is vital that she eat. Yes, the classics are great. Sometimes adding a little warm water and making them soupy helps. Sometimes heating them a little till nice and stinky helps. Until you start hometesting and figure out what is going on, you might dress the wet with dry crumbs if she will eat that. Dropping half her body weight means she has to eat something.
 
Hi Molly,

A few questions, before answering yours - ok

1) what insulin did the vet prescribe
2) what dose and frequency of dosing
3) did the vet discuss/teach you about testing the BG's (blood glucose) levels yourself? we call this home testing. If not, are willing to learn?
4) where are you located - there may be members close by to help in person

there are three key factors to diabetes - food, insulin and home testing

Low carb wet food is best - anything that is less than 10% and even lower such as 4 or less carbs is perfect - and yes fancy feast classics (pate style) are low carb.

However dry food is not and something that we highly recommend you stop feeding altogether. Prescription food is not necessary as you can purchase better quality and lower carb foods in the pet store - fancy feast, wellness, etc.

food/nutrition links: viewtopic.php?f=14&t=115

Home testing is vital to ensure the safety of your cat when administering insulin. Home testing is not hard, but it does take you to be calm and some practice for you and the cat to get used to it.

home testing links: viewtopic.php?f=14&t=287

We also believe in the start low, go slow approach - meaning starting insulin at a low dose - such as 1 unit or less and slowly, over several days, with home testing on board - adjusting the dose as needed in small increments of 0.25 or 0.50 units at a time.

There is a lot more information, and please answer the above questions and ask us everything. we are here to help!
 
I am giving Christmas 1/2 a unit of humulin n twice daily. I live in Vernon, CT. We have 2 other cats as well. Can I switch them to the same food as Christmas? I am willing to learn whatever is necessary. My vet said she wants to see Chris in about 2 weeks. She will spend the day and do a curve or something. I know nothing of doing anything at home as of right now besides the injections. I will be back later today....I have to go pick up the kids.....
 
The dose is nice and low. We are not big fans of Humulin. It is old school and harsh and fast acting. We like milder, slower acting insulin. but I'm glad it's a low dose. With some cats, switching to the wet low carb makes a huge difference downward in levels. That is one reason we urge you to test.

What we think is that we would not get insulin from the doctor for our two legged child, shoot and then come back in 2 weeks. We would test at home like human diabetics do and monitor how the insulin is working.

Let us know how we can help. Get her eating and observe her carefully.
 
A curve is something that you can do at home - once you learn how to home test.

A curve consists of testings the BG's every 2 hours over a period of 12 hours. Doing this at the vet, is honestly a waste of your money, as the results may not be accurate due to the cat not being in home environment and stressed out in the vet's office.

A curve is not necessary to do if you don't want to - I never did a true curve on Maui. I did home test and got enough tests in that I did not feel it was necessary to test her every hour.

As Sue said, the insulin you were given, is not one that we recommend.

We prefer the longer acting, gentler insulins such as Lantus, Levimer or Prozinc. Lantus and Levimer work in very similar fashion and are both human insulins. While Prozinc is a little different and if you have schedule issues, such as being able to give insulin every 12 hours, this may be a good option for you.

Forgot to ask, how was your cat diagnosed, what symptoms did you see? What tests were done to determine diabetes.
 
To answer your question about food...yep you can switch them all to the same food as Christmas eats. I have 2 diabetics as well as 12 non-diabetics and everyone here eats exactly the same food as my two diabetics...now with 14 I don't feed FF classics since I'm too lazy to open that many little 3oz cans per day...lol So everyone here eats just regular Friskies Pate Style canned food. One of my diabetics Maxwell has been insulin free and diet controlled for over 2 years and my other one is well regulated on a very low dose of insulin on this diet.

Mel, Maxwell, Autumn & The Fur Gang
 
hi Molly

so glad you found us! This is a great place to be with a diabetic cat :-D
Lots to learn - so check out the stickies at the top of the board.

Not sure if you've visited catinfo.org but there's lots of info on everything but very good for nutrition.

Fancy Feast classic pates are great.
I switched my other 2 cats over to canned when Honey was diagnosed. Best thing for them.
They were all drinking so much water but now, they hardly ever touch the water bowl as they get what they need from the food (I add a little water to it also).

Post with any questions/concerns as often as you like - we all started off being overwhelmed but diabetes is actually very manageable.

Denise & Honey
 
Thanks os much for all the responses. My husband is leary of the canned food because the vet said dry is better. I'm trying to what is best for all my babies. Is it okay to finish th Humulin? I can't afford another brand right now....Also, how much canned food shoud the kitties be eating?
 
Have you read this website by a vet: www.catinfo.org. She makes an excellent case for why cats, being carnivores, need to eat meat, not wheat. Maybe it will help convince your hubby. What I can share personally is that we stopped dry food one evening and the next morning Oliver had dropped 100 points. It made a huge difference in his blood glucose levels from that day on.

This phenomena is why we urge you to start testing. If we hadn't been testing and didn't realize Oliver had dropped so much, and gave the usual amount, he would have hypoed. Wet Lo carb food can really impact their levels downward.
 
My husband was skeptical at first due to the cost - the dry food was a lot cheaper (we have 3 cats) but I told him that I was convinced it was responsible for Honey's diabetes - she was on Hills R/D weight loss for years which is 35% carbs cat(2)_steam cat(2)_steam . The vet prescribed it to help her lose weight so she didn't get diabeties. cat(2)_steam

I told him that getting her onto wet would help regulate and maybe get off insulin and this would be cheaper in the long run.
I also told him that the other 2 cats needed to go on it because its not just diabeties that dry food can cause there's also a host of other illnesses that dry food leads to and they all have associated vet fees!

He agreed and now Honey is almost OTJ, he's very happy he listened to me :mrgreen:
 
Thanks again everyone, you have all been so helpful so far! I'm going to go check out the info a couple of you suggested. One other question is someone to watch the kitties when we are away. We have 3 cats. Normally a friend does, am hoping they are willing to learn about the injections. That's another reason why my husband wants dry food, but I told him someone would have to come twice daily anyway for Christmas.....I hoping to convince him of the canned food totally. I already have Christmas eating it....
 
Well I can tell you from personal experience...I have 14 cats (2 diabetics). That not only did my diabetics improve on the all canned diet (1 in remission and one headed that way) but you should see the changes in the civies!!! They have glowing coats, sleek well muscled bodies, and energy of kittens again, plus I don't go through nearly as much litter as I was when they were all on dry. I went from going through nearly 5 (40lb) boxes to 2 (40lb) boxes a week..why? Less garbage in...less garbage out. No one is peeing or pooping nearly as much as they were and yet they look and act better than ever. I have one guy here Bert who was born here and always had a course rough coat, or at least he did until the food switch, now he is as soft as a bunny to pet. My chunky ones lost weight effortlessly, and my skinny minis gained weight.

At first my husband was exactly like yours until we actually sat down and crunched the numbers. Yes we spend more in food, but that cost is off set by the reduction in litter cost, fewer vet visits for sick cats, and of course having one go completely off insulin and one well maintained on a very tiny dose with hopes that after her dental this wednesday she too will give up the juice. Since changing everyone's diet we have had no more allergies requiring pred or allergy shots, no more ear infections and beautiful cats...what more could a kitty mom ask for than healthy happy furkids.

Mel, Maxwell, Autumn & The Fur Gang
 
hello and welcome, you have found the best place on earth for you and your dc.

http://www.felinediabetes.com/dear-mom.htm
this link is something you should read now, then breath

i can not offer advise except, read read read everything on here. Not sure if your home tesing but that is the first thing you should learn about, gives you more control on the disease.
heres some links that will make it easier to find things
http://binkyspage.tripod.com/faq.html

http://felinediabetes.com/FDMB/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=60261

i will try not to overwhelm you, as there is so much to learn, but your in the right place, the only advise i feel comfortable giving is listen to the advise of the experts on here, you can usually tell who they are by how many posts they've made
also, my vet was way off on some of the advise she gave, not to say all vets will, but treat here and your vet as info sources then make your decision, do not take everyhing your vet says or we say as law. ultimalty its up to you.
you can't feel it now, but coming here is like walking inot a big hug. its gonna be ok
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top