Neville newly diagnosed

Hello,

My 17-year-old domestic short-haired was diagnosed on 9/4/19. He also has Neuropathy in hind legs. Like most, I am experiencing overwhelm and I am grateful for all the information on this site. His vet has not started insulin wants to see him in a week recommended change in diet to low carb.

 

Neville!!! Omigosh, he is so cute! Loving those round white paws. Welcome to FDMB, you have found a wonderful resource and support base to help you help Neville to better health and wellbeing..in addition hopefully to calm and quell that overwhelmed feeling.

Do you know what insulin Neville will be getting? And what is the low carb food you are feeding now? Those (insulin therapy and proper diet) are two of the three main components of effective diabetic treatment. The third is home testing his blood sugar so you know it's safe to give the insulin injections and know how the insulin is working for him.

We can provide links to home testing tips, videos and pictures to help you learn this process, as well as what supplies and where you can get them. Testing does not have to be expensive, many of us use an inexpensive but dependable human meter and strips from Walmart, as when you are learning to test you might use a lot of strips. And having an affordable and available option means that you can have a good supply on hand in case of any low blood sugar events.

Home testing also saves expensive vet visits for curves, as well as the blood sugar raising stress from travel and just going to the vet!

A good place to start, and begin de-stressing yourself is to read the Getting Started and the Education sections on the Home Page.

Going forward, you can start a thread in the Main Health forum HERE, as it is more heavily monitored than this Introduction forum (the welcome mat ) Ask lots of questions, we all started just where you are and we will help in every way we can.

 

Thank you, Idjit's mom. I don't know yet what insulin he will get. I have borrowed my mom's glucose meter and was able to get a reading of 270. I will go to walmart and buy a meter for him. The low carb food I feed him is Fancy Feast Pate's and some Friskies pate's. I bought a bag of Hill's glucose/weight management dry food from vet. Thanks for advice.

 

You are entirely welcome. I am so glad you have already begun home testing, it's going to help both of you so much!

You can set up the spreadsheet so you can record the testing results you are getting and then the insulin dose when you start that.

You will see how the trends and patterns emerge, and members can review his/her progress before offering suggestions or advice:
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/fdmb-spreadsheet-instructions.130337/
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/understanding-the-spreadsheet-grid.156606/

Here is are links to home testing and some shooting tips:

http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/hometesting-links-and-tips.287/
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/testing-and-shooting-tips.85113/#post-1377750

One suggestion, don't feed the dry food. Dry food, with a very few expensive exceptions, are much too high in carbs than sugar cats need. Hill's Rx dry food is not one of the lower carb varieties.

If Neville is a dry food addict, there are ways to persuade him to eat the low carb wet food. You can return Hill's products to the vet for a full refund. I know..I did the same thing..bought both canned and dry Hill's DM because it was recommended and it was very expensive. Yes, Idjit liked the dry (not the canned) but when I found it was over 30% carb it went back for refund. It's like feeding a human diabetic donuts or ice cream. If you can offer Neville more frequent small meals to satisfy hunger, especially since unregulated sugar cats can't effectively process the food they eat, that would help. We can offer lots of suggestions for being able to leave canned food if you work during the day, or for nighttime feeding.

 

Oh thank you Idjit's mom. Neville does love dry food, because of his IBD he was eating Hill's Venison & Pea dry kibble, which I have stopped giving to him because of carbs. When I looked up the carbs on the Hill's m/d dry on Hill's website it said 1 cup was 15% carbs so I thought it was ok but I am stopping immediately now. So he will only be getting wet food now. I have started giving him wet food whenever he looks hungry. Thank you so much for the info.

 

You can gradually reduce the amount of dry food, wouldn't want to cause Neville too much anxiety. He is having and going to have a lot of changes in his life pretty soon. Just start cutting back on the amount and adding more wet food. Sorry, I wasn't clear on that. He's a good boy and deserves as much coddling as we can give him. We have members here whose kitties are also IBD or IBS, and if you ask about diet for diabetes and the IBD, I'm sure you will get response.
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/transitioning-your-cat-from-dry-to-wet-food.956/

Testing treats can be freeze dried meats, Pure Bites or Orijen are brands I know of. Or you can offer small pieces of plain cooked chicken.

I don't know how well Neville responded to your first test, hopefully he's laid back enough and cooperated. Idjit still doesn't agree that it needs to be done, but we don't have to test multiple times a day, or even daily. How's that going?

 

Thank you for advice about dry food cut back. I only gave him about twenty pieces of kibble yesterday. He is really eating wet food so I am happy about that. I'll be sure to check out the diet details for diabetes and IBD on the message board.

He was pretty cool about me doing the bg test since I gave him some wet food after.

Your Idjit is a real cutie. My second fur baby was a Maine Coon stray who would come to my backyard and sleep all day. So I adopted her and she lived to the ripe old age of 21. She's was a great cat.

 

I am so glad Neville eats the wet food w/o problems. Good for him, and good for you. We found that a treat after every test, successful or not, really helped. Idj still fusses a little, but he always sticks around for the treat.

Thank you for the compliment to Idjit. We think he's pretty cute. He thinks he owns the universe.
If you can set up the spreadsheet we can see what sweet Neville is doing on his "off time" besides also ruling the universe.

 

Thanks for all your help. I ordered some treats, ones you suggested Orijen and Pure Bites so I could reward him after BG test. He let me test him again today and his reading was 184.

Tomorrow I plan to tackle how to set up the spreadsheets.

Again thanks for all your help. I feel so relieved now. Your kindness when you replied to my introduction post brought tears to my eyes. I was very touched and I didn't feel so all alone.

 

You are definitely not alone. So many of us here to support and offer help.

I would really like you to start posting in the Main Health forum so that other members can meet and get to know you and Neville...but remember I saw him and lost my heart first!

 

Welcome to FDMB. Lou has advised you on all the relevant topics and she is SO good at it. Lou was the person to respond to my first post and I felt exactly like you did I was suddenly not alone and I knew then I had found the right place to be. This is a fantastic community of people all trying to do what is best for their fur babies and there is a wealth of experience and knowledge. I look forward to seeing you around the boards.

 

I just re-read your first post, and wanted you to read this link for Neville:
Neuropathy: Feline Diabetic Neuropathy (weak back legs)

There are others here dealing with neuropathy issues and can share experiences and progress. There is hope through getting the blood sugar regulated and with the Zobaline (Methylcobalamin - aka - methyl B-12) supplement.

 

Thank you for the warm welcome. You guys are awesome.