Good morning Paula!
First, he's high this morning because you skipped last night's shot as well as him "bouncing" from the 103 yesterday.
Bouncing happens because Michael's body has gotten used to living in those high numbers, so when the insulin brings him down, his liver releases stored sugars and hormones to bring him back up to where it's gotten used to being. It will just take time for the liver to re-learn that it's OK to be in those lower (normal) numbers.
Stay at 1 unit UNLESS he goes below 50 for at least 6-8 cycles. Lantus is a "depot" insulin which means it needs to "fill the depot" before you will see the full action of the 1 unit dose.
This is just an example to try to explain...you shoot 1 unit of Lantus...a small part of that goes to work quickly, while the rest goes "in the depot". The next shot repeats that...and the next..and the next...eventually, the "depot" is full. When the depot is full, that small part of each shot that goes to work quickly continues, but the depot "releases" the rest of the dose (so like if 1/4 of the shot goes to work quickly, the other 3/4 is released gradually from the depot over the rest of the 12 hour cycle). Until the depot is FULL, it can't release the full 3/4 so you're not going to see the full action of that dose.
If you skip, you drain the depot and have to start over. If you increase the dose, you have to wait until the depot "catches up" (fills to the "new full") before you will see the real effects of the new dose
Does that help make it more understandable? If not, please say so....there's more than one way to explain the depot and it can be a hard concept to grasp.
How do you tell if a bounce has cleared? Well at this point, it's easiest to let us tell you, but you'll eventually start to see what we see when we look at your spreadsheet, but basically, when they bounce, the number will go high and then we watch to see it start to come back down. It can take up to 72 hours to clear a bounce
If you look on China's spreadsheet (link below in Signature) on 7/21 you'll see a good example of a "bounce".....she dropped to 56 in the AM cycle, then "bounced" to 326...but then in that PM cycle she started to come back down and by 7/22 she was back down in green numbers....so she "broke the bounce" in about 18 hours. China's been at this awhile though, so she breaks her bounces fairly quickly....she used to take the full 72 hours
On the link....do you know how to copy and paste? If you do, I put together a little document on
Linking your prior day's condo that might help explain.
A "condo" is just what we call our daily posts. Each day you start a new post (condo=condition report). When you move to the Lantus Tight Regulation forum it'll be more important for you to do a daily condo.
I'd like to invite you over to the
Lantus Tight Regulation Forum now anyway. You have your spreadsheet set up, you're home testing and you know the basics, so by moving over there, you'll get the most experienced eyes watching out for you and Michael.
Each day you post a new "condo". The subject line will start out with The Date, Cat's Name, AMPS ##
In the "body" of the condo you give the WCR (Whole Cat Report)....basically how Michael is doing. Is his appetite good? Are the 5 "'P's" in place? (preening, purring, playing, peeing, pooping?) Any questions or concerns? Anything that helps us to get to know you and Michael better! You can also start reading other people's condos! You will learn a LOT from that as well as maybe making you think of questions you want to ask too!
You're not required to go to the TR Forum...you can continue to post here in Health if you want, but over there, you'll have the benefit of the years of experience of everyone here than uses Lantus. We become very much of a "family" there.
Let me know how else I can help you!
