10/10 Olive PMPS 535

O

OlivesMom

Member Since 2020
https://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB...5-85-5-94-5-5-93-6-115-7.236604/#post-2654221

No sleep last night. I just wanted to cry when after all that hard work to keep her surfing last night she still zoomed to 533 by injection time. She's not a happy girl right now.

Hubby and I need to buy some more DM but we got to examining the ingredient lists for it and compared it to the Fancy Feast Turkey and Giblets pate 3 ounce can. I'd already spoken to the Purina vet line and the doc told me FF contains 3.9% carbs dry matter, which is what's important evidently, and 53% protein. The DM contains 7.14% carbs and 56.9% protein for a 5.5 ounce can. So the analysis is quite similar between them, only we noticed the FF actually has better ingredients. Then I went back into Olive's SS and realized that her levels were actually much better during that period of time when she was on the FF. The only reason we took her off was after that time she threw up for 12 hours and she'd eaten the FF beef at the meal that triggered the vomitting spell.

I also noticed Dr. Pierson said FF pates were okay for diabetic kitties and a better alternative than the DM. So if Olive will accept it, we'll just let her eat the FF instead. We've already got a bunch here that we never took back to the store and it would save us from having to buy the expensive DM right now. We've just got to get her through until the 29th. Also, a little food for thought as I was reading through her website...she's of the opinion that the lowest carb you can find would be the best for your diabetic cat. Or did I read that wrong? So why then are all the vets telling us MORE carbs. More carbs. If less is truly the better way to go with Olive, then why is she not stabilizing when on the raw diet as it's 0.4% for 3-4 nuggets of which she was getting 6 nuggets a day. I just don't understand. Can somebody explain it to me?
 
Most cats love ff and some call it kitty crack. Dr. P does say to feed lowest carb possible. Olive needs more carbs for her to be able to handles the insulin she needs though. Ff makes mc and hc foods as well.

She spent a long time in normal numbers she’s not used to which is healing. That’s why the high bounce. The more time spent there without going to low the shorter the bounces will be. Look at Gideon’s, and Blue’s spreadsheets. Both are starting to clear bounces quickly and spend less time in high numbers. Gideon would be even better if they didn’t have planned vacations and if Shiloh didn’t have to work all nights a few days a week. The cg needs a life but even so Gideon is looking so much better.
 
tiffmaxee said:
Dr. P does say to feed lowest carb possible. Olive needs more carbs for her to be able to handles the insulin she needs though.
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Which leads me to another off-the-wall idea I got by reading this post from someone commenting on Dr. P:


6/30/2020
Dr. Pierson's webpage Catinfo.org was incredibly helpful three weeks ago when my cat was first diagnosed with diabetes. His first blood sugar test was over 500, and the vet immediately prescribed insulin which she said would run $300 a month. I asked her if I took two weeks to research and change his diet if it would harm him. She said no, so I read everything I could find, especially on catinfo.org.

Wow, so much I didn't know about a cat's diet. Long story short, I found Tiki Cat, a wet cat food with 0 carbs. I took him off of dry cat food and treats immediately. He balked a bit at the food, but he was happy when I hand fed him. He's eating it very well now. I possibly switched him over to wet food too fast, taking about a week to do it, but he does seem fine.

We had his blood sugar rechecked Friday night. Normal. His blood sugar is 140 and his Fructosamine is 277. The vet was stunned. She said diet works for cats who have a blood sugar 300 or under, but not 500. She didn't seem very interested in the diet though...just said it had made her day and to continue doing whatever I was doing. I so appreciate Catinfo.org and Dr. Pierson.


So I had this wild and crazy idea that at the moment is just "thought." I know that Olive needs more carbs now to be able to handle the insulin. So what if she went off the insulin for 2 weeks and during that entire time only be fed the raw diet? Just like with the guy above, REBOOT Olive's system to an all new no carb diet and see what effects it would have on her BG. She wouldn't have insulin in her to worry about lows or anything else. She'd skyrocket and stay high, which is exactly where she's been all these weeks anyways. Just like the cat above, Olive was 467 when tested at the vet's office for the first time. She's been much higher than that since starting insulin. It just makes me wonder what would happen. It's like, I can't determine if a no carb diet change would be the answer because I can't go no carb while she's on insulin. Any thoughts on this? Trust me, I know it's an off-the-wall thought...but it warrants some thought too I'd think.

tiffmaxee said:
She spent a long time in normal numbers she’s not used to which is healing. That’s why the high bounce. The more time spent there without going to low the shorter the bounces will be.
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So that's why the high bounce...
 
Good job last night. I'm glad Olive stayed safe. I'd be hesitant to stop giving insulin and switching her diet because if it doesn't work you'd have to start all over with insulin again and work your way back to the nice blues and greens she's getting now. That could mess up her progress.
 
OlivesMom said:
REBOOT Olive's system to an all new no carb diet
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Nope, it doesn't work like that. Given how high her numbers are, there no way going down a few points in carbs will make that much difference. There's a huge difference in the carbs in the story above, a lot of dry foods are in the 30% carbs range. In the mean time, she'd be super high all the time off of insulin, developing glucose toxicity. Hopefully she's not ketone prone. :nailbiting:

And seriously, a few points carb difference is really noise. Manufacturers don't always produce produce with the same carb% due to processing/supply differences. As long as it's close enough, that's all we care about. We have had plenty of cats on zero carb raw diets, nothing wrong with that.

The other thing to note, a cats insulin needs can change over time. An experiment you did a month ago with food may not be relevant to now.
 
Wendy&Neko said:
There's a huge difference in the carbs in the story above, a lot of dry foods are in the 30% carbs range. In the mean time, she'd be super high all the time off of insulin,
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Before going on insulin she lived on a kibble that was 24% carbs for the 8 years we had her prior. It was only when going on insulin she went to canned food so it was quite the switch on her system.
Wendy&Neko said:
We have had plenty of cats on zero carb raw diets, nothing wrong with that.
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At the start of the insulin switch we were trying to find a canned food, raw food, whatever wet food she'd eat. Now that she's on insulin regularly I keep getting varied opinions on what to feed her. Loads of people/vets say absolutely NO raw because she's on a raw @0.04% and they say she needs at least what's contained in the DM which is 7.14% . As far as I'm concerned Raw is healthiest and I would think the turkey she loves at .04% would be best then since it does have so little carbs for a diabetic, but then people say she needs MORE carbs, not less in order for the insulin to work right. So how do I ever get her on plain raw turkey?
Wendy&Neko said:
The other thing to note, a cats insulin needs can change over time. An experiment you did a month ago with food may not be relevant to now.
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Shoot. That throws a wrench in all the data I've been collecting as I look back at the past and what did and didn't work back then.

She's so high today I'm not going to bother testing anymore until shot time.:(

Calgon, take me away!:confused::arghh:
 
When Olive was on 0 carbs she would tank on the tiniest amount of insulin. She needs some carbs on the higher end of low so closer to the 10% end of low carb. Once some carbs were added she started to handle insulin. I would not mess with what is working. If she runs high for two weeks or whatever you were considering she could have ketones or worse. In my opinion not a wise thing to try.
 
Wendy&Neko said:
Who says that?
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mainly talking vets...I've had two of them tell me that now. They said she would NEVER regulate on the raw food or even mixing the raw food 50/50 with the DM like I was. I'm looking forward to reading that article. Thank you!
tiffmaxee said:
She needs some carbs on the higher end of low so closer to the 10% end of low carb. Once some carbs were added she started to handle insulin. I would not mess with what is working. If she runs high for two weeks or whatever you were considering she could have ketones or worse. In my opinion not a wise thing to try.
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Isn't the higher end of low still too high for carbs? She's NEVER had a consistent diet with anything near that amount of carbs. Makes me wonder if the switcheroo from DM back to the FF she LOVED far more, would offer that higher end of the low you spoke of and what effect that would have with the insulin. Oh, and it was just a wild idea I had in rebooting her cuz of that article...I always weight things out a while before taking plunges like that in life...I like to roll ideas around.
 
When she starts to go too low is the time to experiment with slightly higher carbs until you find the best for her. Otherwise low carb is fine.
 
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tiffmaxee said:
When she starts to go too low is the to experiment with slightly higher carbs until you find the best for her. Otherwise low carb is fine
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Okeedokee. I think I'm understanding this a bit better now. I've been under the assumption that any amount of carbs over 2-3% was terrible for her, so I went as low as I could at first. But then she needs more carbs to balance the insulin so it totally messed with my head. I'm getting it now. Thanks, Elise!
 
Read the post on carbs Wendy linked too. We need to figure out what she needs to keep her from dropping under 90, the lowest amount of carbs that will do it. It’s usually 10-20% but ECID. That’s why you need different carb amount foods on hand.
 
I just finished reading the article and found it very enlightening to say the least. Looks like I need to do some different experimenting with carb counts/food. Especially now that I'm not so afraid to take her to a higher carb percentage after reading that article. So it's going to be a game of trial and error I see. She tanks on straight raw...so been doing the 50/50 with the raw and DM and she's stayed high a lot. I noticed last night she simply wouldn't climb very easy when giving her that ratio a tsp at a time. So I'm thinking the next test should be to decrease the raw and add more of the lower carb food into the mix. As I mentioned this morning we decided to go the FF route instead of continuing on with the DM since both ingredient lists as well as analysis is practically the same, only the FF has better ingredients and a whole lot more affordable (plus Dr. P is cool with it). So what I think I should do is increase the FF ratio ( once I've transitioned a bit over the next week ) and see how the added carbs do in conjunction with her insulin. I know both the DM and the FF are similar in carbs, but she likes the FF better and I 'm betting on the fact she'll want to eat more of it which will give her the increase in carbs. As she really switches over to all FF we'll know even more what that carb percentage is going to do. If that doesn't seem like it's lowering her BG then we'll find a higher carb food and see what that does, depending on the BG. Or something lower than the FF but higher than the current raw if it goes that route. Am I finally on the right thought process now?:)
 
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