DoLou's blog

Happy 9th Birthday Do Lou

2012-02-27T10:11:00.002-08:00

Its his 9th b-day today whoo hoooo

2/11/12

2012-02-11T12:20:00.001-08:00

Well Do Lou continues to do well he is now on 4.5 levemir and overall numbers been staying in blue for most part still been itching way too much so finally gave him a sulfur dip hoping it helps poor thing has had several baths in last couple of weeks and now hides when I put the portable heater in our room a sure sign of a upcoming bath.....more later

1/26 what he up too?

2012-01-26T16:40:00.000-08:00

Well not sure what Mr Do Lou is up to these past couple of days on 1/22 he went low 3x in a 24 hour cycle something he has never done and now we have since skipped 3 shots reduced his dose by 1.75 and he is still doing well yeah the Bean here is just totally baffled. He is still itching way too much I ordered a bottle of cortisoothe shampoo and he will get yet another allergy bath when it arrives. Gave him a dose of pred today and I think I will have to use low dose pred off and on again to slow down his attack on his face he is just going to tear his muzzle up he keeps itching it so much. I have a soft e collar on him but its not enough. He has also slowed way down on his dry not sure why?? more bafflement for the Bean until next time.....

Happy New Year

2012-01-01T16:10:00.001-08:00

Well we are starting out our new year with a nice blue day today

some progress 12/24/11

2011-12-24T18:34:00.000-08:00

Well we went back on levemir on 12/14/11 and ever since then we are slowly seeing better numbers right now he is staying at or I should say around 6.75 with some varying of skinny vs fat he has seen greens several times as well as blues and is staying out of pinks for the most part overall doing much much better urinating and drinking is way less now we are still using the glucoard 01 or relion confirm which are bascially the same meter and comparing to the alphatrak every other day now. I do not intend to ever go back to the FSL again it just cannot be trusted. Do Lou was cute today he was trying to take some ornaments off the tree so will post them to the blog soon

Meter nightmare begins

2011-11-21T08:00:00.000-08:00

OMG how can meters be so far off well it has come to our attention in a big way how inaccurate the freestyle lite meter is with cats... for weeks now I have thought he was doing well until recently as noted in previous post that he was showing signs of needing more insulin even though the FSL meter said he was doing great. Well as anyone who goes to his SS can see he is doing poorly its almost back to square one I think jeez I am so annoyed and I am not the only one on the FDMB board having issues. We are slowly getting back up in dose I am upping him every 4 doses for the most part to get him out of the 300 and 400s I mean 400s of all things scary for his kidneys. Been using R pretty much 2x a day a least as well. Hope to see some changes by the end of this week maybe... using A trak for reference and relion confirm and arkray glucocard 01 meters. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AiSqUFZ4jesAdGx5cmJDVDd5TnM5U0VId1k3SDFnYVE&hl=en_US&pli=1#gid=0

11/11/11

2011-11-11T11:49:00.000-08:00

well Do Lou has not been doing too well when I reduced him so much about 3/1/2 weeks ago for our 2 day trip I did a very drastic reduction to avoid him going low and when I returned my FSL meter gave me the impression he was still doing well BUT he was drinking and peeing way too much finally got a keytone test and had a trace he never has before so I tried jumping up to half his dose before our trip but 2 doses of 3.5 sent him to 37 so I was baffled you could tell he needed more insulin so ordered more alphatrak strips and got some for my relion and both of them told the story looks like he has been in high 200s to low 300s sigh.............. so I am now going to use relion/arkray for daily and alphatrak as always for my reference I no longer can trust my free style lite and will donate them I think to neebies on FDMB soon hope to get him feeling better soon we are up to 2.75 as of this morning figure he needs to be up to 4-5 at least still got a ways to go

first time leaving him overnight

2011-09-07T14:21:00.000-07:00

Well we went to a cat show in Simpsonville, SC from friday night 9-2 until sunday night 9-4 and taught John my son how to test and I reduced his dose way down to 2U which was too much I know from what he had been on (6.5) but I did not want him to go low while I was out of town. John did super even testing him far more then I asked since the required tests were only amps/pmps time but I am so glad he and Do Lou now have a testing routine and this will give me more chances now to go overnight be it a cat show or just a weekend away. Do Lou is now on 6.75 I am trying to get his shedd up and him back down to lower blue numbers we are getting there he was urinating and drinking more from running mid 200s all weekend happy to see that slow down.

Do Lou doing well

2011-08-22T19:06:00.000-07:00

Well he has been on lantus several weeks now and we have also just restarted him on a small dose of pred to help with this itching for this time of year and he has been doing well staying mostly in the mid blue range which suits me fine. He seems to be feeling better overall and has been eating well mostly cowboy cookout. He also of course always has his diabetic dry on hand if he wants it.

Return to Lantus

2011-08-01T15:31:00.000-07:00

I decided to return him to lantus today just fill like overall he responds to it better I could be just totally wrong but switched him back anyway we shall see how he does. Its been 7 days now and he is doing well other then he has been drinking more last 2 days not sure whats up with that I will check for keytones soon just to make sure all is ok with the urine. His appetite was down 2 days ago but its better today.

Back to Lev

2011-06-20T18:26:00.000-07:00

Well he went back on Lev tonight with 6U we shall see how he does I only gave it about a month last august and it did not seem like he did very well but I want to give it another go and see if he can respond better to it plus with his dose rising higher and higher I know its supposed to be better for the high dose cat we shall see anyway
we have kinda been stuck as of lately not seeing much green he is up to 7U on lantus and we did go low yesterday down to the 40's which is too low and bounced today. Would like to get him steady and low blue I could care less about green really

ups and downs

2011-06-06T20:18:00.003-07:00

Well its been almost a month since my last post and really he has been up and down right now we are back up to 6.25 and still not seeing a lot of green its so frustrating I am thinking about the use of R soon its sits in the frig staring at me asking when its going to get its chance to fight FD as well we shall see ??

5/10

2011-05-10T14:31:00.001-07:00

well he is bk up to f5.75 almost to 6U again which had dropped him to low not too long ago this seems to be our pattern reduce and go back up but I want to keep him safe so its the game we play. He is doing well otherwise eating and plays some and acts like he feels pretty good. Would love to see him with a lower insulin dose but just does not seem to be happening with his resistance I am not willing to keep him in the low numbers that it may take to overcome this it makes me to afraid.

4/27/11

2011-04-27T00:42:00.000-07:00

well we are down to 4.75 at the moment last time I posted we were up to 6U but he went low on 3 occasions so I have gone down the dose ladder for now. Will it hold doubt it most of his reductions do not hold but he has been at least eating well, and seems to be feeling better been playing some. He has become really hard to bring up once he drops now last 2x its taken me 2 jars of baby food mixed with karo to get him up and they he still just barely rises until the bounce hits. He is still also eating dry d/m has it out without reach almost all the time and its just not hurting his numbers I do not think.

Red Ferne Judah Ben Hur aka my Do Lou getting the camera

2011-04-11T17:22:00.000-07:00

Red Ferne Judah Ben Hur aka my Do Lou taking a bath

2011-04-11T17:20:00.000-07:00

4/11/11

2011-04-11T17:18:00.000-07:00

well we are up to 6U never thought I would see the day he would be on 6U this is the highest amount I have ever used since he was dx'd. I tell myself that whats important is he is happy and seems overall to be doing pretty well considering all his health issues and now knowing he is IAA pos++ well the whole OTJ thing just kinda disappears from ones goal and now the goal is just to get his resistance under control so he is not on 6U

4/6/11

2011-04-05T23:38:00.000-07:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTvMNbclPz4well not a lot to report he is still on S5.75 going down to 5.5 a dose or 2 which is so close to the Skinny dose anyway only about 1 drop different. Last couple of days his appetite has been a bit off so watching that closely he was given 1/4 pred again yesterday for his allergies. But overall I think he is feeling good and doing good he has been playing each day which is always a good sign. I am still letting him have dry dm each day in small amounts and it has not made any changes I do not think with his numbers.

Red Ferne Judah Ben Hur aka my Do Lou

2011-03-26T14:25:00.000-07:00

Do Lou meets spinball

2011-03-26T14:20:00.000-07:00

3/25/11

2011-03-25T20:55:00.000-07:00

played a lot this morning love it when he plays and went up to 5.5 with his pmps doseDo Lou at play

3/24/11

2011-03-24T15:20:00.000-07:00

Well he is up to 5.25U now he has seen green some lately I am trying to manage his curve to keep him from dropping with a combination of LC,MC and I am now using a dry DM also about 1t at a time with his food depending on his number and I think its helped him not go too low or could be me just thinking its helping but anyway we shall see how he does over the next month. His allergies are really bothering him I sulfur dipped him again this week this was his second dip for allergies and it helps some I am trying to avoid putting him back on pred if I can but he may end up on pred again if his itching does not improve soon, took some pics today with the new camera cannon xs, love it already and I have a long way to go on learning how to use it but already it takes so much better pics of the kittens with it being just on auto mode I hate my cool pix camera its just garbage for animal pics

Simon's Cat in 'Sticky Tape'

2011-03-02T17:20:00.000-08:00

sad news

2011-02-23T04:27:00.001-08:00

well had a email from Do Lou's relative, he is diabetic now hate to hear this they are trying to home test and I pointed them to the FD board, they did join but so far have only posted a few times. I know from a email that hometesting is not working out, it appears Louie is not too in favor of it but their vet had a tech that is able to stop by to so some BG checks for them and they are taking him to their vet for curves. I was told that he is doing better and acting like he feels so much better and they are working on his diet this is the latest news I have on him

sigh......

2011-02-17T21:26:00.000-08:00

well today I was supposed to ride to TN with Walt to pickup Bluebell who was with a fellow breeder who had been showing her since Oct and we were also taking her the little fawn kitten that is out of Voodoo and Tigress she is going to show him. But Do Lou was green all night not real low by any means but enough to make me paranoid about being gone for over 12 hours when will I ever get comfortable leaving him? sigh... good thing I do not work full time I guess I would be in big trouble. Here is a picture of Red Ferne Sundance of Ashaby hope he does well for our friend in the show ring.

Results are in

2011-02-12T20:08:00.000-08:00

His results from the Michigan state tests came in on 2/7/11 his IGF was 44 being normal and his IAA was 64% being positive for insulin resistance anything below 20% is positive so what does this mean to me?? I wonder this myself some I am told I need to be more aggressive with the dosing and try to get him to greens and stay there to overcome the resistance but it scares me since I am more comfortable with him in blues so IDK honestly its not like I really ever truly believe this cat will go OTJ so its a lot to think about......His urine cysto was negative.

Do Lou and some of my other cats

2011-02-06T21:50:00.000-08:00

His Labs recent and past to Nov of 2009

2011-01-31T20:22:00.000-08:00

Bloodwork Link

Do Lou meets spinball

2011-01-13T15:46:00.000-08:00

1/2

2011-01-02T08:52:00.000-08:00

Well yesterday was the first time he has ever gone below 40 2x in a cycle so he was reduced to 3.5 last night of course he is bouncy today I doubt he will hold the reduction but felt it was the safest thing to go with after yesterday and all that up and down you could tell last night he was not feeling as well

12/9

2010-12-09T08:45:00.000-08:00

where does the time go anymore here we are Dec again and if I reflect upon this past year with Do Lou and FD well at first I know I had hoped he would be OTJ by now and that has not happened when I first met D on the Diabetic board she felt he has a good chance of coming OTJ so I do think I got my expectations way way too high and maybe he will one day who knows I have since brought myself back down to earth and now realize I must get my son to do more shots so I can once again go somewhere overnight its been over a year now since the hubby and I went anywhere overnight and its just long overdue at one point I had thought to travel with Do Lou and maybe one day but for short trips I feel like with his blindness that staying home would be less stressful on him. Hope to go to the smoky mountains soon for a weekend to combine it with a kitten pickup. His ears are acting up put tresaderm in his ears today. He is on 3.5 right now he has went low to the 20s again recently do not like that. Guess thats all for now.

11/15

2010-11-15T18:58:00.000-08:00

been very frustrating lately to say the least I know part of it was maybe the bad insulin but still his numbers have not been the best and we are up to 4U again feel like we are going backwards instead of forwards have not been posting as much on the FD board just been so depressed and busy with other things too. He is still doing better so I know I should not complain since his pu/pd is still OK and he eats good most days but my dream of him going OTJ has pretty much died. Now I just would like to see better numbers with a smaller dose.

Its been one year today since Do Lou was dx'd

2010-11-02T07:37:00.001-07:00

well this time last year I was at the vets waiting to be seen to see if Do Lou was diabetic and then came the shock he was. 4 months of being on N would pass and I would see him decline in this time finally on March the 7th we start on lantus and he starting to feel better then in April I got him off dry which made a big change in his numbers I had hoped to have him OTJ by now but he is not who knows if he ever will be at least he is doing so much better and I know thats what I need to concentrate on

Do Lou in his spider outfit

2010-10-18T20:05:00.000-07:00

plugging along

2010-10-18T20:04:00.000-07:00

well we are currently on 3U as of today up from a s3U numbers are good some days and on others he seems to have high yellows still keep hoping we will one day just start to have straight blues but that day has not arrived yet he has been eating good for he most part today he did the cutest thing I was cleaning our bedroom and he had gone out into the rest of the house and next thing I know he is beating at the door to get back in to his room and he came in dragging a candy corn bag leaving a trail of candy corn behind him it was just the cutest thing and he dropped the bag when he came in like he had found something really cool this bag was up on the microwave so he had to have jumped up on the counter and then drag it over the puppy gate LOL and all this with a cat that 90% blind he is such a character, we had gone down to 2.5 recently then his numbers required we go back up to 3U slowly

a month later

2010-09-28T01:39:00.000-07:00

well here we are a little over a month back on lantus and he has been doing so well we have hit blues and greens just recently and his bouncing has not been near as bad and he has been clearing the bounces quiker he is up to 3U now as of 9/27 his SS says it all. He is still eating Merricks really well loves cowboy cookout and surf and turf both 4% in carbs he likes most of the 8% flavors as well such as ocean breeze and Grammy's pot pie I still hold on the the OTJ dream but even if he does not go off insulin he certainly is doing so much better seems to be feeling good weight is 15.6 as of last week.

back to lantus 8/25/10

2010-08-25T05:59:00.000-07:00

well he has been very sick since 8/23 with some kind of stomach thing wondering if the nuggets were bad I had just opened a bag of beef/salmon and I had noticed they looked a diff color but smell of OK he had eaten 2 of these prior to getting sick no diarrhea so far. Feeling like Do Lou today got me up in the night again YEAH Mama Bean doing a happy dance over that!!!!! went back to lantus starting with .5U with last nights pm dose started really low since he has been eating so little I am sure a increase will arrive soon with starting so low.

SS link

2010-08-18T11:04:00.000-07:00

Do Lou's SS

We finally have had our breakthrough today hoping he does not bounce too bad since he is such a bouncy boy

A very great vision is needed and the man who has it must follow it as the eagle seeks the deepest blue of the sky. Crazy Horse

A GIANT SIGH.....

2010-08-15T07:15:00.001-07:00

well guess I somehow thought Lev would be like the miracle insulin and he would just all the sudden have great numbers instead his numbers have been much worse overall and not getting better even with each dosecrease so I am really getting sooooo frustrated over what to do

Levemir

2010-08-04T15:56:00.000-07:00

We started levemir tonight 3U hope to see him improvement in numbers

Maybe making headway

2010-08-01T07:40:00.000-07:00

well we have seen some better numbers mixed with some bouncing we are now up to a F3.5 3doses so far and he is dropping a lot today so shedd maybe is getting too full have to wait and see since to me its so pointless for him to go low and then bounce for 3 days

7/17/10

2010-07-17T10:13:00.001-07:00

well we did have a few nice blues the other day but had gone 6 cycles on f2.75 and so I thought it was time to go ahead with 3U so far he has been on the high side today hoping to see his numbers turn around soon I hate to keep climbing back up the dose ladder:(

Dental day 7-13-10

2010-07-13T20:32:00.000-07:00

Well its been a while since I posted guess since his numbers have been up and down he had a few nice ones last week and then he bounced and we have yet to get back into better numbers as of yet. Today he went to see Dr. Joe had his teeth cleaned and complete chemistry which was normal except BG and chol we also ran a CBC and T4 and HCT all being normal. He came home hungry and is doing ok tonight being very needy more so then normal, have gone back to using freestyle lite on a daily basis after seeing how much I was going to be spending on alphatrak strips but I have been using it as comparison if I have doubts but overall its numbers are not much different then my freestyle

going nowhere it seems

2010-06-21T11:00:00.000-07:00

well I have not posted in a while not much to say we are just stuck in the 200's we raised the dose from 2U to f2U without any changes I have ordered the alphatrak meter to use for him some since its coded for cats and I want to see if this makes any diff since yesterday when I tested voodoo he was only 31 on my freestyle and I was kinda shocked by this makes me wonder still about meter accuracy. He went up to 2.25 this morning but still sits in back of mind are we stuck in chronic RB??

June 8

2010-06-08T14:49:00.000-07:00

Increased his insulin to 2U last night but his numbers are still all over he did dip to 180 last night but D is still trying to figure out why his curves are all over will see what he does this evening its just so frustrating.

June 7

2010-06-07T11:00:00.001-07:00

Well I had planned to go up to 2U this morning and then his amps was 152 so stayed at f1.75 got all hopeful hoping for a nice cycle but his numbers have not been good once again today again frustration sets in he is feeling good though eating well still not drinking or peeing too much so I know these are good signs still

June 1

2010-06-01T07:25:00.000-07:00

I am so frustrated right now I numbers just keep staying in the high 200's to low 300's I am wondering if either we are A in RB where you have too much insulin which can make this pattern develop or B not enough and of course the only way to find out is to change things around and see what happens and if his pattern does not break by tomorrow I intend to try something not sure what yet I even shot last night at +11.5 in hopes of it doing something and numbers only went up so I am wondering if he is actually getting too much ???

May 30

2010-05-30T16:37:00.000-07:00

went with a dosecrease today and our numbers have gone up so hoping he has a empty shed or something IDK but he is getting high 300s some again and I sure do not want to see that he is on 1.5U today
no changes otherwise

5/29 frustrated over 346

2010-05-29T04:11:00.000-07:00

..... started our day out with 346? did we bounce in the night or is this a food spike he did want food about 4 ish I fed him a bit of wellness turkey and salmon but he hardly touched it so really do not think its food related wish we could get our numbers back in blue and green he is feeling great and ate all his breffis.

May 28, 2010

2010-05-28T15:24:00.000-07:00

well I am still in the 200's today Mom is wondering if this is a bounce or not D thinks it could be from my low amps the other day of 111 guess time will tell? At least yellow is better then pink but would prefer if we can get back to blues if not greens just not too low greens. Dose is 1.25 as of now. Eating well and drinking very little and only peeing about once a day

Do Lou month 6

2010-05-27T15:45:00.000-07:00

well have to admit I have been getting frustrated lately with his numbers he has been off dry now for getting close to a month we have gone down in insulin dose from 5.75 to as low as 1U and seems like all we do is RB D says its all part of the healing of the pancreas and I think I just need to go with the flow he went to the 20's 2x last week gave me heart failure but I do not want to bk off want to keep going forward since my goal is OTJ we have made so much progress in a months time since getting him on raw and freeze dried raw and some FF. He has been acting like he feels so much better he has even ran up the wall with his tape measure something he had not done in many many months. 5/27/10