Pita's Dosing Party: 5

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Caitlin M

Caitlin M

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135 AMPS. Decided to NS because I'd like to see if the midday snack will help at all. Since he's been getting it for so long, I feel like it was a pretty big change not to eat it. But who knows! I also go back to work tomorrow so I won't be able to do any testing between PS times.
 
It's been nice that you've been home more during his slide down the dosing scale! Hopefully last night was just weird and he'll get back to those greens today!
 
Caitlin M said:
135 AMPS. Decided to NS because I'd like to see if the midday snack will help at all. Since he's been getting it for so long, I feel like it was a pretty big change not to eat it. But who knows! I also go back to work tomorrow so I won't be able to do any testing between PS times.
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Maybe he was just stressing about not having it ;)
 
He does have a bit of a history of roller-coastering up and down and up and down on the dosing, doesn't he? I really do hope he can hang onto the NS's though! Have you been setting the feeder to give a +9 snack during the night? It seems to be really helping with your PMPS's.
 
Djamila said:
He does have a bit of a history of roller-coastering up and down and up and down on the dosing, doesn't he? I really do hope he can hang onto the NS's though! Have you been setting the feeder to give a +9 snack during the night? It seems to be really helping with your PMPS's.
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I have been! So hopefully he'll go back down.
 
I'm trying to figure out what this means for our kitties. If they are above 120 at pre-shot, but are in greens on their own the rest of the day, do they need insulin? Should we be giving them something so that their pre-shots are under 100? 120? But if their pre-shots are under whatever number, then we shouldn't really be shooting anyway, should we? So it ends up in cycles of sometimes giving a little insulin, and sometimes not?

I think I could get away with giving Sam small doses right now because he's only getting into the high 90's on his own, but Pita is dropping into the 60's and 70's by himself, despite the pre-shot numbers, so I don't know if you could safely give him any insulin anyway, especially since you're going back to work and can't monitor.

This part is so perplexing!
 
Djamila said:
I'm trying to figure out what this means for our kitties. If they are above 120 at pre-shot, but are in greens on their own the rest of the day, do they need insulin? Should we be giving them something so that their pre-shots are under 100? 120? But if their pre-shots are under whatever number, then we shouldn't really be shooting anyway, should we? So it ends up in cycles of sometimes giving a little insulin, and sometimes not?

I think I could get away with giving Sam small doses right now because he's only getting into the high 90's on his own, but Pita is dropping into the 60's and 70's by himself, despite the pre-shot numbers, so I don't know if you could safely give him any insulin anyway, especially since you're going back to work and can't monitor.

This part is so perplexing!
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You took the thoughts right out of my head and made sense of them so much better than I could! I forget which member it was, but they recently went into remission and I looked at the SS one day. There were a few mid/high 100's in the 14 days where she didn't give insulin and he still made it through without any doses. I agree though, if he's getting this low, I don't feel like I necessarily need to dose him! We'll have to see PMPS but I also agree that since I'll be back to work tomorrow, I'd be hesitant to dose on a 130's in case it drops him below 50. I know last night and this morning are the highest he's been with no Insulin but yeah...he's still getting low on his own. :: Shoulder shrug::
 
101 PMPS. No shot. Will test before bed! I'm so sad I have to go back to work. I actually liked getting all these midday numbers and he's doing SO well with them. Oh well, real life calls :cool: Oh! I also think that snack definitely helped!
 
So I've been digging around and reading a lot of threads and spreadsheets for OTJ kitties. What I'm finding is that over on the Lantus forum, they really push for kitties to run between 50-80 without insulin. It's a little trickier on Prozinc since we have smile curves instead of flat curves. We can't dose our kitties as low as they can on Lantus since we don't usually shoot on greens, and if we do we have to be very very very careful about it. From what I've read over in Lantus, the lower you can get the pre-shots before stopping insulin, the better chance that the remission will "stick" instead of just being temporary. Apparently letting a kitty hang out in the lower blues leaves them more susceptible to relapse. So while you can call a kitty OTJ with pre-shots in the lower 100's, it might not be as successful. That seems especially true for longer-term diabetics and kitties on their second diagnosis. Pita isn't exactly long-term yet (under six months), and is on his first diagnosis, so he has a better chance of continuing to work his way down than Sam does.

Also, I still don't know how you could safely be dosing Pita right now anyway with the mid-cycles he's getting on his own. Even a drop would probably send him into the 50's. So I kind of think for Pita you need to just keep watching and hoping that the pre-shots come down. And keep an eye on the mid-cycles whenever you can to make sure they are still dropping. Since Sam isn't getting those mid-cycle drops like Pita is, I think I'm going to give him a few more days, and then probably start Lantus to see if I can't get him into some better pre-shots that might give a better chance at long-term success. If he drops lower I'll stay with the NS's, but if he stays where he is, I think we've got enough room for some safe downward movement now.

I'm sorry you have to go back to work! Time off is so lovely!!! And it has been nice to get a really clear picture of what Pita's doing in the middle of the day right now so you know how low he's getting. Have a good first day back!
 
Rachel said:
Hopefully Pita does just come down gently on his own!

Lantus for Sam might be the best tactic since you have it already....and as you say they can shoot lower than we can so maybe that will help push Sam back into...well I won't say it, but you know! :)
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Sam has been having a few low cycles, and then a few high cycles, so I am trying to wait this out for a couple of cycles to see if he drops again. If he hasn't dropped in the next couple of days, we're busting open that L pen. (sorry for hijacking your thread, Caitlin).
 
Djamila said:
Sam has been having a few low cycles, and then a few high cycles, so I am trying to wait this out for a couple of cycles to see if he drops again. If he hasn't dropped in the next couple of days, we're busting open that L pen. (sorry for hijacking your thread, Caitlin).
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Good plan! :) Maybe just showing it to him will help.
 
Djamila said:
Sam has been having a few low cycles, and then a few high cycles, so I am trying to wait this out for a couple of cycles to see if he drops again. If he hasn't dropped in the next couple of days, we're busting open that L pen. (sorry for hijacking your thread, Caitlin).
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Wave it around in front of him a little....

Yes, sorry Caitlin! I kind of jumped in and hijacked it. :oops:
 
190 AMPS. Giving .1 and forgoing the gym this am so I can at least get a +2 before work. We'll see what it does again!
 
Oh no! Pita!!! Of course he does a 190 as you head back to work for the day! Good call on the shot/dose today, but I'm sorry it messes up your count :(

Have a good first day back at work! :bighug:
 
154 AMPS. I'm a bit mad at myself because I slept through my alarm to test him last night, so I honestly have no idea how low he's getting. I will do everything I can to take one tonight. Holding the .1 because I'm not feeling too confident .2 would be good yet. And of course this happens when I'm back at work and can't midday test! Oh cats....
 
I think Pita will be fine (always a fan of leaving food though!). If you look at the AM cycle on 6/26, he didn't drop much after the +2.

I think sticking with the 0.1 (or less) is the way to go until the weekend. You have enough data from last week to know that he's responding to just a teeny tiny amount of insulin, and to know that he's able to bring himself down pretty well, so regardless of the pre-shots, I wouldn't raise the dose.
 
Djamila said:
I think Pita will be fine (always a fan of leaving food though!). If you look at the AM cycle on 6/26, he didn't drop much after the +2.

I think sticking with the 0.1 (or less) is the way to go until the weekend. You have enough data from last week to know that he's responding to just a teeny tiny amount of insulin, and to know that he's able to bring himself down pretty well, so regardless of the pre-shots, I wouldn't raise the dose.
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Thanks Djamila! I agree about not changing doses until after this weekend when I'll probably do a curve also. Always exciting!!
 
165 PMPS. Giving .1 and definitely plan to do a curve this weekend. He's acting like he was with no shots in the fact that he's waiting for his brother to eat first. When his numbers and dosing was higher, he would either eat at the same time, or barge in first and Brat would wait. But he's waiting/second to eat again. Just an interesting observation. Part of me doesn't even want to shoot tonight just to see what happens.
 
I wonder how low he got last night, but only went up to his +4 from PMPS! It's been a crazy week so far!
 
What in the.....!!!???? 227 PMPS. The last yellow he had was the end of June. Just strange to see. Will test before bed tonight and definitely, definitely doing a curve this weekend.
 
I'm so stumped because his behavior is back to his pre-diabetes days! The way he's eating, his playfulness, it's all just a tad bit different than he had been when he had higher numbers. Aaaahhh!! :confused:
 
I should say that I know his numbers have been great lately so I understand one higher number probably won't change his behavior. It's just all an interesting place we're in!
 
Hopefully it'll just be a one off. Usually when they start down the scale like he has, they have fits and starts where they get some higher numbers...unfortunately remission doesn't usually happen all at once. With luck, this will just be one yellow and more blues will follow!
 
Rachel said:
Hopefully it'll just be a one off. Usually when they start down the scale like he has, they have fits and starts where they get some higher numbers...unfortunately remission doesn't usually happen all at once. With luck, this will just be one yellow and more blues will follow!
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I think I just assumed it would happen all at once, so that gives me so much hope! Thanks Rachel.
 
Pita has also shown this pattern before. He went down the dosing scale for awhile, then back up higher, and then slid way down this time, so this may just be part of his up and down pattern before he slides right off the end. Hang in there!
 
Happy Friday everyone! 142 PMPS. I'm home all night and am doing his curve tomorrow. My question is, should I give .2 this evening and get a test before bed/maybe run the risk of a bounce? Or give .2 tomorrow morning and at least see where he goes throughout the day? I think I should maybe go back to .2 again....?? Yeah, any advice would be lovely!
 
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