Just diagnosed 2 hours ago

New to the world of FDMB. My mother and brother both have Diabetes, but I never thought my cat would get it. He's a lovely blue Burmese approx 7 years old. I'll be starting him on insulin next week. My first major hurdle is that he REFUSES to eat soft food. I have to start him on dry food and I'm hoping that will at least help to regulate his glucose. Does anyone else have the same issue of their cat not eating wet food? He's the only cat I've ever had that has not liked it.

 

Sorry about the diagnosis, but you've come to the right place. Maybe you could crush some of his dry on top to help transition him?

 

Here's an article by Dr. Lisa Pierson, we also use a food chart she collected data for: http://catinfo.org/docs/TipsForTransitioning1-14-11.pdf
If you could setup your signature, it will help when you start posting on the Main Health Forum: http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/editing-your-signature-profile-and-preferences.130340/

Do you plan on home testing? It's the best tool in our FD kitty tool belt and I would hope your Mother and Brother know the importance of testing their own before administering insulin . Many of us use home glucometer's like ReliOn Confirm / Micro from Walmart. Test strips are $0.36 per strip. The pet meter; Alpha Trak 2 seems to be preferred for majority of Vet's but test strips are about $1 per strip. Here is the Spreadsheet template that all of the home testers use: http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/fdmb-spreadsheet-instructions.130337/

Glad you are doing diet change first this week before starting insulin because it can have a significant impact on BG levels. The preferred dry food options for diabetic kitties are Young Again Zero (Online only), EVO Cat and Kitten (purple bag), Nature's Variety Instinct Ultimate Protein, and Dr. Elsey's new food (https://www.drelseys.com/clean-protein/). Hopefully, you can get your kitty to eat some wet food with the tips from that article.

Apologies if I've overwhelmed you more . Here's one last thing I like to give new members because it's better to be prepared: http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/how-to-treat-hypos-they-can-kill-print-this-out.15887/

 

My kitty was a ridiculous dry food addict when we started this. It was all I had ever fed him and he refused to even taste the wet food. It was a process, but I just kept reminding myself that the dry food was the cause of all of this, and we persevered. I can't exactly remember how long it took to get him to eat the wet food, but I know it took a full year before he stopped staring at the cupboard where I used to store it. He's absolutely fine now, and eats his low-carb wet food with the same happy purring sound he used to use for the dry food.

The article Yong gave you from Dr. Pierson helped us a lot in the transition. We're all here to help if you have any questions!

 

First BIG HUG! Welcome!

Second - share a grin with me...you'd be surprised how many of us show up with absolutely no doubt that dry food being taken away isn't going to happen. Not to long down the road we wonder why we thought that.

 

Hi! Welcome! Sorry I dont have much advice to offer, except maybe if he really doesnt want to eat wet food, maybe try a higher protein based dry food like Evo or Young Again like stated above? Or maybe switch to those for now as you try to get him to eat more wet food..

I just wanted to say that you are not alone. I just started also, got Gypsy's diagnosis this week and its been difficult so I understand all the random hurdles from things that we used to take for granted. Feeding the cat suddenly becomes quite the ordeal when it used to just be leaving food out the rest of the day, and how our schedules from now on will have to take our kitties into consideration, and such.

 

Thank you everyone! Every bit of advice is appreciated. I want to educate myself so I can better help my guy out. I plan to have a meter at home in case I need to double check. I've actually wet his dry food and he's eating it. I'm hoping it will be a way to transition him. He is very OCD so little steps.

 

Yes, my Mitten and Bailey did not like/et canned. For each I continued to offer them various kinds of canned for 8 or so years.

 

Yes, I have one that eats mice. It's a great way to get nosey people to stay out of your kitchen. ;+)

 

Just don't leave the moistened dry food out for like more than a couple hours. While wet food is ok to stay out for 12 hours, dry food that is moistened can start growing bacteria. The processes are different, even if wet food ingredients started off dry

 

Welcome to the group!

 

It's been a killer couple of weeks, for both me and Duck. I've switched him to Royal Canin Glycobalance and he loves it. I actually tried to put water on it, and he refused. Grumpy cat... Awesome update though! He was 511 at first check. After 1 week of special food, and 1 week of 2 units of ProZinc twice a day and he's dropped to 386. He's even put on almost a pound! Dr Ted upped him to 4 units twice a day and we go back next Friday to see where we're at.
Having this forum has been a blessing. I didn't know until I found this there were so many people that were dealing with the same things I found I was. Every day I see improvements in Duck, and that has been such a relief.
I adopted Duck 6 years ago, and was told he was 1. We think that he's closer to 9. He just weighed in at 15.88 and is not overweight due to his large frame/size.

 

Hi Krista, so glad you're seeing improvements! The jump from 2u to 4 is a huge one, we usually go up in increments of .25-.5 so as not to bypass the optimum dose. Have you decided to home test? It's highly recommended and the best way to see how well the insulin is working and keep Duck safe. If you start testing then you can also transition him to a lower carb food. The RC Glycobalance dry is @25 carbs and there are much lower dry food options. Just be sure you are testing because lowering carbs could cause Ducks blood glucose to go down as well. Come over to the Prozinc forum, read the yellow stickies at the top of the page, and introduce yourself. Hope to see you there.

 

I got my meter today. He tested at 156. Which is a huge drop. I have ordered a bag of Young Again and am excited to see how it will affect him. I will be testing his blood again before his dinner and will half the dosage if still low. My biggest fear is him going too low. I'm going to guess that's probably a lot of people's fear. I will definitely check out the forum tonight.

 

Just make sure he has not eaten 2 hours prior to PMPS. We do tend to worry about going too low than being a little higher . Might want to start a thread on the Main Health Forum tonight if you need help. You can also start your own thread on Prozinc Forum. Please look at the links I first posted to you with Signature and Spreadsheet info, if you need help with the spreadsheet just ask

 

Taking the Duck to a new vet today. I'm not happy with the the old one and how he's been handling my guys treatment. I purchased a Relion machine to check his blood at home and when I told the vet I was going to check at home, he told me to throw my machine away, it was no good and they could sell me the Alpha Trak. The new vet is going to check his blood today and also use mine to see what/where the difference is so I can be more accurate when I check. On the upside, he's doing much better and he's only on the 2 units, not 4 as after 2 days on the 4 units he began to drool and became lethargic. I was lucky that I know his behavior and was able to get some food in him to avoid a serious issue. Fingers crossed the new vet will be more informative and we can continue to move forward!

 

Good luck on the new vet. I disagree on the Alpha Trak. My vet even told me to go get a human meter at the local pharmacy! It is cheaper and easier to get the strips for a human meter which is handy if you handling a bunch of lows and testing every 20 minutes!

 

He DOUBLED the dose!?? That's not safe at all!!! Be careful and have honey on hand for when he crashes.

 

I'm glad you switched vets. While I disagree that you can't use a human meter, I must say that I have an Alphatrak and love it. I hope you didn't over pay at the vet. Amazon and Adwdiabetes.com have decent prices for test strips.

 

Try sprinkle a fine chopped up of his dry food on top of his wet food... Not a lot just enough to get him started... Someone from this site passed that on to me n it worked ... Good luck