11/22 Pimp AMPS 150; +5 77; +10 99; PMPS 111; +2 115; +4 67; +5.25 55; +6 88

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Andy & Pimp

Andy & Pimp

Member Since 2015
yesterday was goood

Skipped last night's shot due to being under 100 and no bounce from the day of greens...then still further reduced to .25u just on a gut feeling (and I needed some sleep, badly). Can't believe .25u took him here again! I had been planning on .5u being the new dose but I guess we'll wait and see how today goes?
 
I know with that 77 Pimp earned a reduction according to SLGS, but I'm wondering if you should hold the dose tonight if his PMPS number is not really low since you just reduced. Pimp looks like he's on a mission, so you may need to reduce tonight. It will depend on his number and if you can stay up and monitor.

The next step down is 0.1. I measured that by holding the plunger of the syringe down and inserting it into the insulin and letting it go. The pressure being released drew a drop back into the sryinge. It's hard to tell it's there. I made sure when I gave Furball her shot to hold the plunger down a few extra seconds to make sure the drop got in.
 
carfurby said:
I know with that 77 Pimp earned a reduction according to SLGS, but I'm wondering if you should hold the dose tonight if his PMPS number is not really low since you just reduced. Pimp looks like he's on a mission, so you may need to reduce tonight. It will depend on his number and if you can stay up and monitor.
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I chose that .25 this morning based on the last 2 weeks of numbers and how far he came down on other 1-time reductions, i.e. when his scheduled dose was 2u he did well on 1u with lower preshot numbers...
I figured if .75 made him dive hard yesterday, that I'd better give him 50% or less of that.
There also seems to be a pattern, that he takes those hard dives after clearing a bounce? Or am I seeing things that aren't there?
 
He does seem to go really low when he clears his bounces. Some cats bounce all the way to OTJ. Pimp may be one of those cats. I understand why you shot the 0.25. You need to keep Pimp safe and take care of yourself. I'm just saying maybe you should hold the 0.25 for one more cycle to make sure he's still in normal numbers. You don't want to rush things. You want him to stay OTJ if he gets there.
 
Go Pimp!

Today's number could still have some influence left over from the depot at the higher doses. Today's preshot reading was probably still being influenced by the 0.75 shot yesterday morning. Because he had a great preshot to work with, he's having really nice numbers today. Would he have hit 70s again today if he had a higher preshot? Would he have had as good a preshot without the 0.75u yesterday? Who knows?

I do think Pimp is doing very, very well but if he was mine, I would try to hold the 0.25 dose tonight if I could monitor tonight. You might need to do some extra feeding if he insists on staying low, but holding the dose will give us a chance to see what 0.25 units looks like without the extra depot. It's really not too aggressive, the chances of hypo are very small on that low a dose and as much monitoring as you do.

When we adapted SLGS for use with Lantus and Levemir, some parts of the SLGS method were intentionally left vague to allow for adaptation for the particular cat and individual. He was in pink just a few days ago, so I would be cautious about reducing too much too soon. He's looking so good that I would rather give him the best chance to stabilize in these numbers before reducing the insulin too quickly and losing momentum.

Of course, Pimp may have his own ideas, but try not to feel like you're bound by what is written in the SLGS sticky. The SLGS reduction number of 90 is intended to be conservative and you might not have to be quite as conservative at this point.
 
Andy & Pimp said:
There also seems to be a pattern, that he takes those hard dives after clearing a bounce? Or am I seeing things that aren't there?
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I don't think you are imagining things. ;) A lot of cats dive hard when they clear a bounce. Someone who used to post here a lot compared it to a rock rolling down a hill, getting faster and faster as it goes. So it's not always necessary to take a reduction based on numbers that happen when they have that much momentum behind them. Sometimes they go TOO low and force our hand, but if you can safely maintain a dose it's not always a bad thing to do so.

The other thing I want to point out is that Pimp's spreadsheet has changed since yesterday. This is the first day he has been all blue and green for more than two cycles, even with a skipped shot. When you look at a lot of Lantus & Levemir spreadsheets, you'll usually notice a point at which all of a sudden the spreadsheet changes to all blue and green and stays that way. We call it the "snap" - all of a sudden the cat is well regulated. Once they snap, a lot of what you have previously learned about his patterns might have to be thrown out the window. Notice that he didn't bounce at all from the 50s yesterday, and he didn't even go very high after missing a shot. That's new for him and it may signal that a lot has changed (and I mean changed in a good way!). We'll have to see what happens and whether he can hold onto these numbers, but it looks good so far.
 
carfurby said:
I'm just saying maybe you should hold the 0.25 for one more cycle
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Libby and Lucy said:
if he was mine, I would try to hold the 0.25 dose tonight
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Sorry I'm horrible at putting my thoughts into text... I was actually fighting myself if we should just take the standard reduction of .25 and go back to .5 tonight. But I think you guys have answered that question ;)
Libby and Lucy said:
Notice that he didn't bounce at all from the 50s yesterday, and he didn't even go very high after missing a shot.
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That WAS a nice surprise:woot:, also the reason I reduced the extra .25 this morning.
 
we'll see what he does! If he loses momentum on the 0.25u dose then I wouldn't hesitate to increase it again. Don't let him get used to high numbers again, keep him here if at all possible. I suspect Pimp will need another reduction very soon, but if we can try to slow the reductions down a bit it will help him. The idea is to help his pancreas with insulin as much as we can so it can heal and hopefully become strong enough that we can stop giving insulin and he'll still be ok.
 
Time to hop on your surfboard Pimp!!!

Catch a wave!!
surfing black cat.PNG
 
Wow that he dropped that low even after the skipped shot last night!!

Since you've done two reductions pretty close together, it may still be a little of the higher depot "talking"

If he's high enough in the morning, I might try the .25 again before reducing again but others may have different opinions (since you're doing SLGS, the drop below 90 says reduce, but the depot has to be considered too)

Let's see what @julie & punkin (ga) @Wendy&Neko @Sienne and Gabby @Marje and Gracie have to say too
 
Chris & China said:
If he's high enough in the morning, I might try the .25 again before reducing again
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Was contemplating the same thing, but I'm confusing myself. I know that Lantus can show depot action up to 3 days after the last shot, and it becomes weaker over those 3 days, so why did he go so much lower tonight?
I don't have to go in to work tomorrow, so I can monitor, but if he goes low again (under 70? 90 just seems ridiculous) it's definitely time for that 0.1u.

I'd like to hear everyone's opinion on what "high enough to shoot" is. 100? 120? Seems like ANY dose would take him under 90 from those numbers.
 
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I think I would try the 0.25U in the morning. He's on a lot smaller dose than he was 6 cycles ago. That 1.1 dose depot could theoretically still be impacting tonight's dose, as could the 0.75U one.

For SLGS, it is recommended not to shoot under 90. And you have shot 96 before when you were home to monitor. Often when you shoot lower, the cycle is very flat. With Neko, I really like it when she gives me a preshot in the 80's. That seems to be her magic spot where she stays flat and often will go the entire cycle moving no more than 10 points. Take a look at Carla's Furball's SS. She followed SLGS and Furball is recently in remission but Carla decided to lower her no shoot value. However, Carla has a ton of data behind that decision. I suggest looking at the spreadsheet to see what can happen with a cycle when you shoot low, not to encourage you to shoot lower than 90.
 
Since you'll be home to monitor and with Pimp looking so good I am absolutely going to encourage you to shoot under 90. I'm thinking that 80 shouldn't take you too far out of your comfort zone. Lantus does a much better job of keeping a kitty in normal numbers than it does of dragging them down from higher ones. As others have mentioned shooting a lower number often results in a really flat cycle. They don't tend to dive like they can from higher numbers. This is looking very very promising, it would be great if we could keep him on a green roll :D
 
I agree, as well, As for shooting under 90, you need to make that decision. If you're following SLGS, then the recommendations in the Shooting and Handling Low Numbers sticky sort of apply -- although you would use 90 vs 50 as your cutoff value.

 
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