3-17 FROSTY amps 624, +2 441, +4 312 ... trying hard not to freak out

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I die a little inside every time I see numbers in the 500-600s.

I’m thinking of going up to 2 units instead of 1 tonight if the nadir is over 200. He was in 2 units when he first came to us, it’s not in his spreadsheet.

 

Go from .75 to 2? Quite a jump!

 

I don't think I'd do that. Wait for some input from the experts here. If you don't get it in time, go to 1 u.

 

+6 274, +7 220 +9 232 ...

 

Please don't jump up that much! I agree that Frosty needs more juice, but to jump ahead like that could mean passing the best dose. Raise systematically within the SLGS guidelines and you will get there . He hasn't been on insulin that long and sometimes it takes up to 4 months or so to start getting them back into better numbers.

Maybe you would rather try TR and then you can move him up every 6 cycles as long as you can meet the requirement for testing. It appears that you are mostly testing enough all ready with just a few days without any. That might be a better option for you now so you can see progress faster.

 

Just an opinion based on many years worth of observations made in this forum...
Increasing to 2u bid tonight will likely do one of two things:

• set Frosty up on a roller coaster of highs and lows
• throw him into consistently high numbers

At that point it'll end up requiring more time and insulin to get you right back to what you're seeing now. Why waste the time and effort? Treating our kitties is process. You're seeing some low to mid-yellows now. I wouldn't be surprised if an increase to 1u bid results in blues. I know this isn't something you want to hear, but a little bit of patience will go a long way...

 

Bobbie and bubba -
Thanks for your response.
What worries me about the TR protocol is that the goal BGs are much lower.
Also, I was lucky these past few weeks bc my boyfriend had off work during the week. I don’t know what his schedule is gonna be like during the next few weeks, so I’m not sure we will be able to test enough. I’ll read over th TR protocol again to see what we can do, but I am pretty sure it won’t work because we are normally away for 12 hours during the day between the insulin doses.

jill & Alex- i guess we’ll go up to 1 tonight and then I’ll test him tomorrow night as much as I can so we can get an idea as to what’s happening.

Thanks.
Ana

 

I understand with being away long days does make it hard to do TR. I am happy to hear that you will only raise to 1 unit tonight. As Jill said, you could set Frosty up into higher numbers by raising up too quickly as sometime too much insulin looks like not enough and it becomes a roller coaster of ups and downs. AND because you can't always count on someone being home to test and keep Frosty safe, you are doing the safest thing. Remember, a hypo event that you aren't around to help him is much worse than some of the higher numbers you are seeing now. He will get there. It's a marathon with this Feline Diabetic Dance, not a sprint.

 

What I don’t understand is how did this happen after the beautiful numbers I was seeing on 0.5 and 0.25 units only 1 month ago? He was steadily going down and wasn’t fluctuating 400 points either

 

Remember that insulin is a hormone not a medicine and their needs change constantly. It has happened to us all that on lower doses we got some good numbers only to hit a wall of higher and have to keep moving upwards in dose a bit. Their bodies have to learn how to work with the exogenous insulin and new low carb food that is being fed. What worked 2 weeks ago is ancient history in the Feline Diabetic dance. Slow and steady.......you'll get there.

 

There's a little thing called Glucose Toxicity. Cat's bodies get used to higher numbers once they've seen them for a while. It sounds worse than it is, but it does mean increasing (safely) until you get good numbers again.

A cat's insulin needs change for many reasons. Neko was a little complicated, but over 5 years she varied from 1 unit up to 8.75, down to .75 units and back up to 7.0 units then back down to around 0.25 units. I just looked at the BG numbers I was getting and used the dosing method to tell me how to change her dose. As you get closer to a good dose (or good for that point in time), the numbers will flatten out.