2/28 Minnie PMPS 361, +2 316 +9.5 88

Yesterday's wild ride. Today, back to black. I look a fright, she looks like butter wouldn't melt in her mouth.

 

Wow. I’m sorry about your rough day yesterday. She really got back up to black quickly, didn’t she?

 

Exciting eh, after all these days getting frustrated stuck up in red/black and worrying about ketones? I guess I wasn't surprised she went up to black, she inhaled that can of FF gravy lovers in the time it took me to post the 911. Seems that she is a cat that is extremely sensitive to the different carb levels in food?! Just hope it doesn't take long to recover. Of course, she seemed fine throughout the whole thing. If I hadn't been testing her I wouldn't have known. Me however...I look like a wreck.

 

I thought DM was a little too high in carbs. What’s the carb percentage— I don’t recall right now.

 

And try to get some rest today!

 

Opportunity to implement last night's lessons learned! There is definitely something dodgy with the AT / strips. Tested with AT strip, got 67. Luckily had a big enough droplet of blood that I could do a second test so I used the Petsure strip in the AT meter, 476. I took a second poke while she was still sitting calmly and grabbed my first reading with the Novamax which was 278 (human meter).

Freestyle Lite is arriving late this week. I'm a bit stuck til then, typically only get enough blood for a 0.3 microliter so I can't use the Relion and Truemetrix I have, and only have 9 more Novamax strips. In the meantime I will continue to double check as needed.

 

DM Selects (which they prefer, of course) is just over 10%. DM pate is 5%.

 

I wouldn’t trust a reading from an AT meter with a non-Alpha Trak strip in it because meter strips are not interchangeable. I’d go with the Nova Max reading for tonight. I have a Nova Max and use it for ketones mostly. I have a ReliOn Premier, which uses .5 microliter of blood. And I have a ReliOn Prime as well which I sort of keep around for emergencies. But you must’ve gotten a good amount of blood that time to use different meters! Good job!

 

Always recheck if you get a number that seems really atypical to you... just a number that you doubt... re-check to make sure. I had to do this just this morning when Darcy was about 100 points above his normal AMPS. I didn’t have to re-poke him though because I try to never use the little paper towel square to stop the bleeding so I could quickly get a new strip and re-test. My daughter held his ear though (extra hands) If she wasn’t there I would have just scraped The remaining blood off onto my fingernail.

You are doing really well!

 

Thank you for all the support!. The Petsure strips are off-brand designed for AT ...I just did a search again and see mixed opinions with general consensus not to trust them at low numbers. However, I'm wary of relying on NovaMax tonight because I only have 9 strips (another $18 bargain 100 on order - a lot of packages for Minnie arriving this week) and no baseline from a human monitor to compare against.

Just got a 274 +5.75 with the AT which seems about right compared to the last few days. I am just going to be extra diligent with the re-testing tonight. What a rollercoaster, worrying about all the blacks going straight to worrying about the blue/greens! Still, at least making (exhausting!) progress.

 

Yes. I was just thinking that, when Darcy was first diagnosed, I thought ... well... he's just diabetic... how bad can it be.... I'll give him insulin and he'll get back to normal quickly and everything will be just fine! I was so relieved that he didn't have kidney disease because that was the other thing I suspected based on the weight loss and excessive thirst. Soooooo..... 9 months later... here we are an unregulated diabetic with Acromegaly... and lots of stress, DKA, hepatic lipidosis, debt on the Care Credit card to pay for it all... the emotional roller coaster days and nights... loss of sleep. Little did I know! I hope your Minnie (I love that name...I had a foster kitten named Minnie 6 months.. she was just adopted a week ago) will be more easy to regulate now that you are here on the FDMB.

 

What an educational couple of days...2/28 Minnie AMPS 540, +3 476 (?), +5.75 274, +8 378, +10 407, +11 397, PMPS 361. Hopefully back on track, will try and get another reading before bed.

I've been applying Ledum to her ears after every poke, I think it seems to be making quite a difference. I wasn't expecting an immediate/obvious improvement but she really does seem to be less bothered by the poking (or it could be that I'm finally getting better with all the pokes I've had to do in the last 2 days!!)

 

All AT readings with AT strips ?

 

All except the +3, the AT +3 was 67 so I retested with Petsure strip getting 476 and re-poked, Novamax (human) gave 298. I've been busy shopping all day, many deliveries of Freestyle Lite and Novamax strips arriving this week.

Thanks again for all your help last night. I think we get to sleep and let you help everyone else tonight! (today)

 

Minnie wasn't interested in bedtime food at first, but eventually ate some BFF tuna. Then woke me a couple of hours later puking, clear with a few specks of food. This morning got an 88 so retested with the Petmate strip, got 90. She ate a bit. Fingers crossed it holds til AMPS in 2 hours. Our first green!

 

AT strip said 88 at +9.5 and Petsure strip said 90. Both on AT meter?

Hopefully the snack at +9.5 will prevent her from dipping too low at AMPS. Start a new condo for today with the AMPS

If you get a lower number than you are comfortable shooting, put something eye-catching like "PlS HELP! STALLING!" on your thread title.

 

The Petsure strips should not be used with the AT. This can’t be trusted. We have seen crazy results. Please don’t do that and consider getting a human meter.

 

Yes, both on the AT meter. And YES I will definitely post, you can be sure of that. I am crossing fingers about the snack too...she was being picky so I opened 3 different cans until she ate.

Understand completely about Petsure and AT. This is a stopgap and backup til my Freestyle Lite arrives, and additional BG strips for the Novamax. Over the weekend had some crazy readings (we think) with the AT strips in the AT meter so when I get odd numbers I am repeating the test with the Petsure strips. For me, with this container at least, the Petsure strips seem more reliable than the AT strips but I'm only using them as a crosscheck to the AT strips. I have Relion Prime and Truemetrix but still can't reliably get 0.5 size drops out of Minnie, barely getting 0.3

 

The old discontinued Relion meter used a tiny drop. I wish they hadn’t discontinued making it. I’ll be on the lookout for today’s condo.

 

Thanks for confirming that on the Relion. Weirdly Walmart.com just says 'out of stock' and not only lets me put in my address to get an in-stock notification, but I keep getting emails that it's back in stock! Though when I click on the link, it's not.

Still, the Novamax seems pretty good with my 2 attempts so far. I got it for ketone but it also only needs 0.3 for glucose. Do you have an opinion/reputation of Novamax for BG? (I also have Freestyle Lite on the way but Novamax strips cheaper $17 for 100)

 

I don’t know which meter to tell you to get. I only used the old Relion micro and the Arkray from ADW which was the same meter but they discontinued it whenWalmart did.

 

No worries. I figured it wouldn't hurt to ask! I have a Freestyle Lite coming this week which takes 0.3 & has the same design of strips as the AT, blood sample on the side instead of middle at the end and at about half the price (still expensive). Also have more strips coming for the Novamax which I bought for sbut does BG too and only needs 0.3. It came with 10
BG strips so I've tried that and it seems good, those strips are only $17 for 100 on Amazon.

 

I have a Nova Max and like it, but -- like I said -- I usually use it for ketones. I haven't read anything bad about the Nova Max. That price for strips $17 for 100 is the same as what I pay for my Relion Premier strips at WalMart.