So, May 7th was the day. I had appointment to take my baby into the vet. My baby, Tigger, is 6.5 years old and we rescued him when he was approximately 10 days old. Him and his brother Bailey.
I noticed that my baby had lost a considerable amount of weight. This baby of mine is not the overly friendly or cuddly cat. Most of the time, the only way he graces me with his presence at 4am when he is climbing on me. Complete opposite of his cuddly brother.
Other weird behavior that Tigger was exhibiting was increased thirst and hunger. This cat would sit at the dogs water bowl and drink for a minute and a half straight. He also started eating dog food.
Then, the worst of it all. He was urinating all over the house. His urine was so diluted because he was drinking so much that the odor was minimal and he was finding places he could hide in to do this nasty business. Unfortunately, our carpet is now ruined!
So, the day had come. Now mind you I am a nurse and I work in diabetes research so I am pretty sure that my cat has diabetes. I explained what is going on with my faithful companion and the vet agrees, it sounds like diabetes.
Tigger has lost weight, he is done to 10lbs (from 14). Then the fun part. Labwork. I have to leave my baby so that they can run all the necessary tests and labs to discover if this is truly what is going on.
When I go back to get him around 2 hours later. Guess what. He has diabetes. His blood sugar is 560. WOW. Okay, so now we have to start insulin. Sure, I can do this. I do injections, blood draws etc all the time. So easy as pie. I know how to measure out insulin and draw from a vial to a syringe. Yep, easy.
I leave the vet office with all my supplies and only after paying my $500.00 bill…sigh…and as I drive my baby back home, grateful that I now know what is wrong and I have the fix for him, but sucks that it has to be diabetes, I develop this horrendous headache.
I drop him off and take the family out for dinner because due to my killer headache there is no way that I am cooking dinner now. I start going over everything in my head.
1. Give Tigger insulin injection, 1unit twice daily
2. Order ridiculously expensive prescription cat food that both the cats have to eat now, so it will last half the time. Slowly transition them both to this food
3. Collect Tiggers urine in the morning with these absorbent bead things and place into container and drop off at the vet office
4. Keep Insulin 12 hours apart
5. Do NOT allow the cats to free graze anymore. Need to be on a schedule of twice daily feedings, can start out with three times a day but need to transition to twice daily within a couple of weeks
6. Make sure he eats before you give insulin
7. Bring Tigger back in 3 days for a Blood sugar check to see if his insulin dose is high enough
8. Watch for hypoglycemia (low blood sugar) and if he has any symptoms give him some pancake syrup or Karo syrup on his gums right away and call the vet office
9. Continue with the tablespoon of gushy food in the morning, only now use the prescription gushy food which is more expensive
10. Watch for signs that Tigger is getting sicker, not better
Now, who has actually tried giving an injection to a cat? LOL. So I am a very well experienced injection giver. If it was Bailey, I could cuddle him on my lap and be done with it before he ever knew what was happening.
Let’s just say, Tigger is not the easiest cat to give an injection to.
I think I have written more than enough this time, I will tell you all about how I have tamed my wild beast in the next blog.
