Back to his old self... (and what worked for us)

Greetings from Jackson (Jax) and his human (Kevin)...

This is basically a summary of our experience through the first 6 months of finding out Jax was diabetic through today and having been off insulin for the last 2 months.

We found out that Jax was diabetic back in July and next week will be almost two months now without needing insulin. He’s back to being his old self (which in his case means gettin’ up into everyone’s business and being an occasional asshole)... we knew he was starting to feel better when we started hearing the cats fighting upstairs. ha!

I found the info in this forum helpful while going through all the initial learning back then and wanted to thank the forum contributors for giving us a resource to help us learn as well as tell a little bit of our story in case anyone finds it helpful.

Jax is a Maine Coon, Orange Tabby mix that I adopted in the summer of 2007 when he was estimated to be 1-2 yrs old. He’s somewhere around 9 yrs old now. He was a big boy and ended up getting too big. He was fed a dry food diet and we tried a number of different ones that were supposedly for fat cats, splitting meals up, smaller portions etc. I’ve done a lot of learning over the past six months but didn’t now any better back then. I have since experienced and gotten through the cat-food-research-fatigue step. Anyone else experienced that?

So here’s what we did and what worked for us... so far. (this of course comes with the caveat that this is not advice and you should seek that from your vet).

One of Jax’s highest readings back in the summer was over 600 and this morning tested at 95 after breakfast. This is a brief summary of our journey from then to now. Hopefully some will find it either helpful or encouraging.

we home tested... a lot. I wasn't very good at it at first and it was frustrating. He didn't want to sit still and I had to try over and over again. I then found a few helpful tips online and it began to get a lot easier/routine. Jax is now awesome about it and let’s me test him all the time. He actually sort of likes it. That may sound weird but I love on him quite a bit and usually give him a treat or food. I get the meter out and walk over to the spot and here he comes. I got to know what his daily curve looked like and it helped me adjust his doses. I have no idea why anyone wouldn't benefit from home testing if their cat is cooperative and it was of great help to me and I firmly believe it made a big difference for us. (e.g. I was able to tell if a certain kind of food was better than another or how he responded when I switched). I have a massive spreadsheet with graph and log also (yes, I'm a geek).

I used the Alphatrak 2 meter with the matching test strips at first. Then I read that the Freestyle Lite strips worked with the meter also. Left the meter coded for Cats (38) and after doing several tests became confident that the Freestyle Lite strips (which were more readily available and a lot cheaper) were working well enough. The readings using both strips were pretty close. If I was ever wanting to make sure it was accurate, would use the Alphatrak branded ones.... haven't used an Alphatrak branded strip more than twice in the last several months.

The vet that owns the clinic we go to didn't seem to know much about diabetic cats and didn't seem to want to spend the time with us that a vet might need to spend. I began to research online. Another vet in that office did know what he was talking about and I gained confidence in him.

He and I agreed that we’d use Lantus. Obtained at the human pharmacy and used the matching syringes. Kept the Lantus in the frig and used it for 5-6 mos. I still have some left from the initial bottle but would go get a new bottle now if Jax ends up needing it again. It’s probably 7 mos old now. It was expensive (like $300.00); but it worked and lasts a while.

There’s a protocol here in the forum that I read through and what we ended up doing was one most similar to the Roomp Rand one using the table for the meters calibrated for cats. I believe this document is available here in the forum somewhere although my bookmarked link no longer works (I can provide the pdf though if someone wants it).

Jax was 16 lbs when we started insulin. He had previously weighted as much as 26 lbs. As noted, we had been trying to get him to lose weight anyway so this went unnoticed. He was also peeing a lot; but this was dismissed because he was on a Urinary diet after having trouble peeing prior (but wasn’t diabetic then). We don't know how long he was diabetic (less than a year though).

Once diagnosed as diabetic, the vet prescribed Hill’s M/D so he was immediately switched to M/D. I was hoping the food switch would bring his numbers down by itself but it didn't. We started him on 4 units of Lantus twice a day. Like everyone, I was not looking forward to having to give two shots a day every day; but it really wasn’t too bad. Jax didn’t even notice.

His appetite, which had diminished greatly as I don’t think he was feeling well, came roaring back and he was eating everything in sight. His readings shot sky high. Dose was increased from 4 units twice a day to 5.

We immediately initiated portion control and separate feeding of Jax and the other cat.

Due to the prior bladder issue, I had already started trying to get Jax to eat canned food but he wouldn’t eat it consistently.

The first week we started insulin, we also gave him a pill. His stools were really runny/diarrhea and remained soft for a while.

FOOD: Jax’s readings were all over the place at first and for the first month or two. The M/D food wasn’t a hit with our other cat so we ended up switching them to Wysong Epigen 90 which they both liked and Orijen Cat which supposedly had a low glysemic response, etc. Threw out the M/D (one cat wouldn’t eat it plus not a fan of prescription diets for pets that are suitable for multi-cat households.... WTF?) and stopped feeding Orijen (he wasn’t responding as well on this or the M/D). He did pretty well on the Epigen 90.

Peak readings started to come down but the lows were also coming down.

We had one episode where he went hypo on us, acted disoriented. I had been giving him the same dose in the morning as at night. I started using a lower dose in the morning with a different, higher dose at night. This part was sorta hard to figure out.

We continued the trial and error phase of getting him moved over to a canned food diet. Try this, nope, this, nope, this, nope, nope, nope... .... picky bastard.

After trying a bunch of the more expensive kinds on the recommended lists, thought we’d just try the cheap kind thinking that they probably flavor that stuff up like crazy.

We ended up finding that he would eat Friskies Special Diet Turkey and Giblets and the Salmon flavors.

I cut his Epigen 90 portion back and half of his meal was the Turkey Special Diet Friskies cans. Insulin dose came down.

Then we tried the Salmon which has lower carbs than the Turkey one... insulin dose came down again.

Then dropped the Epigen and went to all canned Friskies. Insulin requirement dropped again. The other cat won’t eat canned food so she still gets Epigen 90 and sometimes EVO (we never fed Jax EVO or Young Again but those popped up as possible, decent dry options).

Then to all Salmon Friskies. By now he was requiring less than 1 unit per shot.

Fast forward to today: Jax is now on an all canned diet and through getting him to eat the Friskies, I think he began to recognized the canned foods as food. He might actually eat some of the prior kinds we tried but not sure. This is what he gets now and what’s working for us: Weruva’s Cats in the Kitchen brand – Chicken Frickazee, Weruva Mack and Jack, Weruva Marbella Paella, Soulistic Aromatic Chicken and Soulistic Shrimply Devine. All of these are under 2% carbs and lower fat than some. He gets 2 cans a day or sometimes an extra serving. These have lower calories than a lot of foods which is good for Jax since he has a weight probably anyway. One thing I noticed in home testing (now after he's gotten better) was that his reading actually goes down after he eats which I found to be counter intuitive so would be something to watch for in improving cats still getting insulin (e.g. is the insulin bringing down the reading or would it have come down anyway?).

Jax now weighs 20lbs (a healthy, albeit high-end-of-the-range weight for him) and hasn’t had an insulin shot for 2 months.

I’m still on the lookout for non-fish alternatives to add to the rotation if any suggestions. I am very familiar with the catinfo.org food chart which is great but it’s getting a bit out of date so wouldn’t mind a few suggestions. I’m particular interested in those choices where more calories come from the protein than fat as is the case with the choices above.

Hope this helps someone.

Cheers and thanks,
Kevin and Jax.

 

Hi Kevin and welcome to you and Jax.

I really enjoyed reading about Jax's journey back to wellness. There are lots of ups and downs in this sugar dance and sometimes it can be disheartening in the early days when some things don't work. I'm sure that Jax's story will both inspire and reassure all that read it.

What a great picture of the two of you!

 

Have you tried the Friskies Special Diet Beef and Chicken flavor? My sugardude Wink loves that flavor as well as the Turkey and Giblet flavor.

Have you tried any of the Wellness grain free foods?

Fancy Feast classics Beef Feast, Beef & Liver, Liver & Chicken, Chunky Chicken Feast, are higher in protein.

Tiki Cat foods tend to be a lot higher in protein.

Have you thought about making your own cat food?

Keep a close eye on his weight, and think about cutting back a bit on how much food you give Jax. Too much of a weight gain can cause a cat to fall out of diabetic remission. You may only need to feed a teaspoon less a day to get Jax to lose a bit of weight.

 

Digital baby scales are great for home weight monitoring, you can get good deals on eBay. Wish I'd bought one years earlier...

 

Deb & Wink - thanks for the food suggestions. The Friskies Special Diet Turkey and Giblets flavor was the first canned food Jax would readily eat. I'll look at the Fancy Feast and Wellness lines as we haven't tried those and I'm still in search of a few more to try. We tried a sampler of the new Tiki Cat Gourmet Carnivore foods and Jax liked them but the kinds with beef made him throw up. He got into the beef dog food once also and threw that up so I'm a little leary of beef. I do like the Tiki foods though but they're a bit pricey given that Jax eats 2, 6oz cans/day. I really like the Weruva & Soulistic foods because all the nutritionals are posted on their websites where few companies actually post all that info and it seems high quality (e.g. the chicken seems like something I could eat). We tried raw once but he wouldn't eat it; however, that was a while back before he was a little more adventurous with the food. Not really keen on making my own food but have read about it a little bit. I am keeping a close eye on his weight as that's what got him into trouble to start with. Through all the trial and error and tighter portion control, I know about how many calories he can have. We bought one of those "mom and baby" weighing scales and I use that to weigh him. He's staying steady at 20 lbs and if he starts creeping up from there is when his food gets cut back. 20lbs is the line in the sand the vet said was where he wouldn't let him get too much above (he is large anyway) and he's stayed in a tight range now for a few months. Part of the reason I switched from the Friskies to the other kinds is because the other kinds are lower calories (100-150 per can vs closer to 200) so he's getting between 200 and 300 calories a day depending on which 2 cans he gets. All Friskies was closer to 400 calories a day. All of this 'how much food is the right amount and what kind?' was tricky.

Critter Mom - thanks for the nice comments.