Hi all, new cat here

I discovered this board two weeks ago when my cat was diagnosed with diabetes, but so far have been lurking. I decided I might as well sign up in case I need advice!

Starbuck is almost 11, and she was presenting as totally healthy at the vet at her annual until I mentioned she was drinking a lot of water lately. He did a senior cat panel and her glucose was 385. There was glucose in her urine but no sign of ketones, so he thinks we caught it early. She isn't a large cat & about 4 years ago she started to put on weight until she was up to 14 lbs at her heaviest. The vet wanted me to get her to lose the weight, so I reduced portions and instituted feeding times with not much luck. So he started her on 2 units of Lantus.

I have another senior cat with a history of urinary blockage, so they were all on Royal Canin Urinary SO. And looooooved it because I suspect it is very salty to make them drink and pee a lot. So he suggested both cats can eat Royal Canin Glycobalance, which works for both conditions. However, I've been doing reading and decided to switch all 3 of my cats to a high protein low carb wet food only diet. I've been working on that this week, although my youngest has been on kind of a hunger strike, so I've been sneaking him handfuls of the SO because I have to use it up anyway. I've been doing Friskies pate but I'm going to try the Purina urinary because it looks like it has both the low carbs for Starbuck and the low phosphorus for Jolee.

I have anxiety and I decided to buy a glucometer and start home testing because there's no way I could get through my day if I didn't. I have just begun to work from home, so it works with my schedule right now. Which is lucky because I'm basically terrified to leave Starbuck alone in case she gets hypoglycemic. For the first week, I kept waking up in the middle of the night. Once I started to test, I realized she was WAY too high still for me to be worried about that.

I just started a chart, but you might notice there's a big hole in it, so here's what happened. Did a week of insulin shots with Starbuck and then had to travel for a week for work. My husband didn't want to test her, but he practiced giving her the shot and I figured I have cameras where I can see the cats, so that would have to be good enough. Well, the second day he freaked her out by yelling at her when she scratched him and hid under the furniture, and she basically was off insulin the next 3 days because he couldn't or wasn't willing to catch her again. Then that weekend, he had to go out of town, so he took her to be boarded at the vet. The vet did a glucose curve there and said he wasn't seeing enough of a curve, but he wasn't going to up her dosage because she'd been on and off insulin and we weren't consistent enough yet. I mentioned I was home testing and he said let's check back next week, either bringing her in or using my numbers, before we do anything with the dose.

So upon getting back from my trip I started to transition from dry food (combo of SO and glycobalance, which they did NOT LIKE anyway, so I'm fine with telling the vet that and going with wet). I finished that transition two days ago, and Starbuck immediately started getting into numbers under 100 in the middle of the day. Because I had read, I knew this might happen with a diet change. Today I got a 64 at +5 and she's been slowly coming up from there. I can't help but be freaked out finally seeing lower numbers. If this stays the same, I'm going to send the vet her numbers and talk about maybe getting on a lower dose instead of a higher one.

Anyway, this was TOO LONG for an intro, but I'm glad I found this forum because there's some great advice in here! Hopefully when I get more comfortable I won't be panicking all the time. And hopefully once she settles in her numbers won't be jumping all over the place, anywhere from 420 to 65!

 

Welcome! We can help you to help your kitty.

• Congratulations on making the food switch - you've seen the impact on BG already.
• Congratulations on testing blood glucose at home. It's the best way to keep your kitty safe.
• I suspect the 2 unit dose is too high. That can lead to the erratic numbers you've seen.

Please post all your questions and concerns on the main health forum but especially on the Lantus forum. It's a large group with a lot of very experienced people in it who can advise on dosing, etc.

 

Welcome!