New Member

Hi, my name is Adam. I am new to the group but a diabetic myself so I know something about diabetes, but I have never owned a cat with diabetes until last week.

I was on my way to Petco to get a collar for a friend's dog when I passed by a Last Chance Animal Rescue event and saw a beautiful cat getting not more than a glance from the dozens of people crowded around every other cage. Everyone would take one look and move on. The poster for the cat said "Diabetic" and nobody wanted anything to do with him. It broke my heart when his foster mom told me his story and how long he was up for adoption without any interest once his disease became known. I called my wife to come meet me, introduced her to "Rex" and I told her with tears in my eyes that this cat had diabetes. She looked back at me with tears of her own and said, "then he must be ours". So now we are a proud family of five; Myself, my wife, 12 year old son and two cats, out Lola and her new brother B-Rex, or Rex for short (B is for Butt-Head, because he head-butts everything). He is very loving, affectionate, and an absolute pleasure. He has won all of our hearts and managing his diabetes is becoming a way of life for us. I came hear to learn more about proper diet and the possibility of home testing, along with hearing other experiences that may help me better take care of Rex.

As a diabetic I know plenty about diabetes but nothing about feline diabetes. We brought Rex right to our Vet and he saw a different doctor, as ours was out of town, and I am concerned about the rapid change in diet without regular blood testing and insulin dosage modification as a result. I am hoping to browse around here and learn more about feline diabetes diet and blood testing, diabetic friendly foods for a finicky eater, and to learn how other people have better managed their cats with the same issues.

Thanks for reading, and thanks in advance for sharing your advice and experiences.

Adam

 

Welcome, Adam! Your story made ME cry! Such a beautiful story and so much love from all of you with a good heart in taking Rex in.

The basics behind Feline Diabetes is not much different than human diabetes so, you're going to catch on quickly. Testing is pretty much the same as in humans (hubby is diabetic as well) except in cats, we use the ear vs a finger prick to get it. Most of us use human meters and strips but, some prefer pet meters (more costly). Simply your preference or wallet capabilities.

We have spread sheets that have been created for us, thanks to a generous member here and can enter our readings then post a link to it in our signatures so that the more experienced members can take a look any time you need them to and give you their advice/opinions. Your regular vet will be weighing in on this as well so, combined, you'll be getting GREAT advice, tips, tricks, hints and methods to use to help your Sugar Kitty.

Post any questions that you have now on the "Main Forum" as that's where most of us post our questions and get help with our needs. Just start anywhere you have questions and as many of them as you need answered. The members here are fabulous, kind, helpful, friendly and always ready to jump in to help. I'm blessed to have found this site as well.

Welcome with open arms and putting away my tissues now.

 

Welcome to FDMB, the best place you never wanted to be.

There are 4 things you'll need to manage your kitty's diabetes:
- You - without your commitment, the following won't work.
- Low carb over the counter canned or raw diet, such as many Friskies pates. See Cat Info for more info. If already on insulin, you must be home testing before changing the diet.
- A long-lasting insulin such as ProZinc, Lantus, BCP PZI, or Levemir.
- And home blood glucose monitoring with an inexpensive human glucometer such as the WalMart Relion Confirm or Target Up and Up (the pet ones will break your budget!).

 

Welcome Adam and Rex. It is a wonderful thing you have done Adam and I am sure you will be rewarded by a loving and faithful Rex in the years to come. Everyone here is generous with their time so ask all the questions you want.
Rex is a very handsome boy!
If you look at the bottom of our posts you will see we have information about ourselves and our cat which is very useful for others when they are helping you. If you go into your signature section you can add useful info.
Looking forward to seeing more of you and Rex

 

When you have a moment, could you add a few tidbits to your signature? It will help us give you feedback without having to go look in all your past posts.

Editing your Signature

In the upper right corner of the screen, within the dark blue bar, you will see ID, Inbox, and Alerts

Click on your ID.

On the left, under Settings, Click on Signature.
This is where you will put information that helps us give you feedback.
This is where you paste the link for your spreadsheet, once it is set up.
Add any other text, such as
your name,
cat's name,
date of Dx (diagnosis)
insulin
meter
general location
any other pertinent issues like if there are any food issues, history of DKA, hepatic lipidosis, pancreatitis, allergies, IBD, etc.
Click the Save Changes button at the bottom.

Always click the Save Changes button at the bottom when you have changed anything.

 

What a wonderful story!! He was meant to be living in your home, that's for sure!!

The general things we start with are getting them of any dry kibble and onto canned or raw food with carb % needing to be under 10%. There's a list of pretty much all available foods in the US and you can concentrate on finding canned or raw that's all under 10% .

Go to www.catinfo.org and you'll learn a lot about the types of foods your going to want to feed. Dry kibble needs to be totally out, so you need to pick out some low carb canned foods from This Food Chart (Column C shows the percentage of carbs)

Just dropping from a high carb dry to a low carb wet food can lower the blood glucose up to 180 points. A lot of us just eat Fancy Feast Classics or Friskies Pate's

Keep asking questions!! The people here just love to share their knowledge with others!!