Hello from Andrea and Moxie!

Hello! My cat, Moxie is 5 years old. We adopted her from the humane society 2 years ago. When we adopted her, she was overweight (16 pounds). We took her to the vet for checkups and they always said she was healthy, but needed to be put on a diet to lose weight. My boyfriend and I put her on a diet and she lost 1 pound slowly. Last week, I took her to get groomed and I had noticed that she looked slimmer and the groomer noticed as well. I asked the vet tech to weigh Moxie and she was down to 10 pounds. I immediately made an appointment to see a vet and she was diagnosed with diabetes after some testing the next day.
We were instructed to test Moxie's glucose in the morning, give her 2 cc's of Prozinc insulin and test her glucose again (same at night but 1/4 cup of glycobalance wet food). We followed the directions religiously and took her for a glucose curve today. The vet increased her dosage to 2.5 cc's per day because she was not regulated enough quite yet. We have to do another glucose curve in 7 days.

This has been an emotional rollercoaster. I am a teacher and my boyfriend works 60-70 hour weeks so we can just get by. Of course Moxie's health is my priority, but financially we are already struggling between vet bills and diabetic supplies. I need some advice. The vet does not want us to get off of the Prozinc or switch foods. I am praying she will go into remission. Any advice or stories will help. Thank you.

 

It's great that you're testing at home. Are you using a human meter or a pet meter?

Do you mean 2 units of ProZinc? The usual starting dose is 1 unit twice a day. She's only been on insulin a week and you're already up to 2.5 units twice a day. It's possible that you've skipped over her good dose by starting at a high-ish dose and increasing already. Kitties are stressed at the vet clinic so any curve done there can give elevated BGs and if dosing is based on those numbers, the dose might be too high. You can do a curve at home to save money and get more representative BG numbers that aren't stress-inflated.

This prescription food is fairly high in carbs. Wet food is best and there are economical grocery store brands that work well, like Friskies and Fancy Feast pates.

Getting a cat regulated is rarely accomplished in a week. It usually takes many weeks or longer.

We have many tips to help you save money. Testing/curving at home tops the list. Also, most of us use a human glucose meter because the test strips are much more affordable.

Please post any/all questions you have on the main health forum where they'll be seen by more people. I've addressed the main points here but this is only a welcome forum.

Welcome to you and Moxie!

 

Welcome to you ! I just started online here yesterday with my little girl named Moxie, 17 years old and just diagnosed diabetic in Mexico. I commend you for passionately looking after your younger Moxie. I hope she stabilizes, she is young and probably good and strong. The dose sounds strong to start off, what is her glucose readings ?

 

Welcome Andrea (I think ) and Moxie!
Come on over to Main Health to post any more questions you might have and you could post a thread on the Prozinc forum too!

 

Welcome... I replied on the other forum

 

Welcome! It is certainly an emotional rollercoaster, but it does get better.. really.

 

Welcome Andrea and Moxie.

Ive just adopted a diabetic kitty. Lets ride this roller coaster together. With the support of these amazing people, we'll get through this. ((Hug)) xx