Billy's story (the importance of diet)

My cat Billy Boy is about 11-12 yrs old. He was a stray that adopted me 6.5 years ago. At the time the vet thought he was about 5-6 yrs old. So his age is a guess. His story is evidence to how much diet can affect BG in a cat.

Last May, I took him in for his annual checkup. He had been loosing weight but had put a little back on which made me happy. I mentioned to the vet that he was wheezing some. He has a slight heart murmer so I was concerned. They said they would do x-rays and see if they found anything. At the same time they took blood for a senior screen. So I left the cat for the x-rays and a manual tooth cleaning. I got a call from them a while later saying he was ready to pick up. In the x-ray they noticed he was constipated and had given him an enema (didn't charge for it) and had given him a steroid shot (which they also didn't charge.) It was horrible, the poor cat couldn't stop trying to go to the bathroom. He has 2 litter boxes and he would go from one to the other. This kept up all night. The next day it was so bad that he could barely walk. He wouldn't purr and was in obvious pain. I took him back in. They didn't do anything other than say to give it until Monday... it was then Saturday. They also told me that they had done a test for pancreatitis and it was way high. Saturday night it got worse. He was crying every time he tried to use the litter box and he would stumble out of the box. He wasn't eating. I took him to the emergency vet. They kept him the night, put him on an IV and pain meds and got him eating again. His BG was a little high but wasn't so high that the vet was concerned given what he had been through. There was no sugar in his urine. Of course, they had to do all the other tests that had just been done at the other vet 2 days earlier since the other vet was closed. The next evening they sent him home with Purina DM wet and dry food.

He did fine for a while and then I started noticing he wasn't walking too well. He would take a couple of steps and stumble. He would try to turn around and fall over. He was off the pain meds by that time but he was acting drunk. I took him back to the emergency vet, which also has a regular practice during business hours. They gave him fluids and did more tests, all came back ok except his BG was 440 and there was sugar in his urine. She also ran a fructosamine test and it was also high. She suggested I start him on insulin soon. Oh &^%!. I'm out of town a lot for my job and I had no idea how I was going to handle it. So I did some research and found out that the DM food, especially the dry, wasn't a good option. I bought a glucometer and started testing. For 2 days he tested at 315. I took away all dry food and switched to FF classic pate. After 24 hours his BG dropped to 180, at 48 hrs it was 140, 72 hours 120. I never did put him on insulin. I called the vet and she was thrilled. She was also happy I was willing to home test. She said most of her clients weren't. I was a chemist in a previous life and I'm into numbers . I still check him about once/week or if he's acting weird or if I change to a food I'm not sure about. He runs between 85-125 and usually around 95-110. He's had a couple of reading that were higher but only after stress situations. Needless to say, I'm no longer going to my old vet. I'm still trying to get him to gain some weight but otherwise he's doing fine. I'm so glad places like this exist.

Recently I've been trying to find a dry food I could feed him so I can leave him for more than a night. EVO was a no go, BG went from 115 to 195 almost immediately. I couldn't find epigen-90 locally so I ordered some Young again zero carb and it doesn't affect his BG at all. I only plan on using it for a day or two here or there.

 

Hi and welcome to the forum.

That is a great story and wow doesn't it just go to show you the importance of diet in a cat 's health. When remi was first diagnosed I found myself hanging around the dry food aisle ready to warn anyone who caught my eye.

You want to try to keep billy boy nice and slim and only feed a food that has less than 10 % of calories that come from carb. I assume you have seen the cat info website and chart.

http://www.catinfo.org

 

Billy's mom, thanks for sharing your experiences. So glad that insulin was not required.

 

Thanks phlika29, The cat info page is what got me to change his diet. It was a life saver and an eye opener for me. I was amazed at how quickly Billy's numbers dropped and I think so was the vet. I initially did it because I figured it was better to change his diet before starting treatment. I didn't expect it would come down so much! I would like him to gain about 1.5 lbs and I would prefer his BG to be a little lower but since he seems to be stable I'll take it. He's back to his normal pesky and loveable self. He really wants to go outside, but not long after this happened he disappeared for 3 days (I think he was trapped somewhere since he normally stayed close to home, he had cobwebs on his whiskers and his BG was 68) and I'm worried he will seek out the wild kibble . So he's an indoor kitty now.

I too have been telling all my friends to stop feeding their cats junk food!