Welcome! Are you Thomas and your kitty Joel or the other way around?
It is very scary at first, but diabetes is really not a difficult disease to treat and can be treated mainly at home (just like humans do) Here is our very successful plan:
1. A slow, long lasting insulin. Lantus, Levemir and ProZinc are popular as they have a slow onset; they are not harsh and they are easiest to use for regulation. Humulin and Canninsulin are less popular because, in most cats, they have a rapid onset and don’t last as long. We like new diabetics to start low and go slow. That is, start at a low dose of .5 or one unit twice daily every 12 hours. And increase slowly, by .25 or .5 units as the numbers indicate.
2. A low carb, wet diet. We like to feed under 8-10% carbs. There are several food charts you can use:
Dr. Lisa’s food chartHobo’s Food Chart Rhiannon’s 8% and under list
You are right that dry isn't good for diabetics (see this website by a vet:
www.catinfo.org) Purina will take back the food; just say your cat won't eat it.
Whatever food you can afford that your cat will eat in that lower range.
BUT do not change over to wet until you are hometesting. With our Oliver, the switch meant an overnight change of 100 points downward. If we hadn’t been testing and had given our usual amount., he could have hypoed.
2. And most importantly, hometesting. We think cats tend to be stressed at the vet
and we know stress raises blood glucose levels. So we test our cats at home. You want to know what the number is before you give the shot to be sure the amount you are planning to give is safe. And testing midcycle will show you how the insulin is working. We use human glucometers and test on their ears or paws. Here is a video that shows you how it is done:
Video for hometesting
Everyone who replies to you was overwhelmed and scared at first. They are all paying it forward for help they received. We survived and so did our kitties!
