Anybody have/had a pet with diabetes?

[BillyVance 34]

I'm typing after the fact, but my wife had to put our Siberian pure breed cat down at the vet this morning. Only had him since this past January. The cat was a bargain from the breeder who took him back from the original owner who went through a divorce and moved to an apartment complex that didn't allow pets.

Anyway, he was fat when we got him but still active. He was only 4 years old and turned 5 last month. We'd noticed he always left gigantic pee balls in the litter. I mean like fucking softball size. I'd never had a pure breed before but I knew that was odd. So the week before Thanksgiving we had him checked out at the vet, who told us after that he was diabetic. Well.... fuck....

So he spent two weeks at the vet clinic while the staff worked to stabilize his blood sugar. Then he came back home and we had a routine to follow... give an insulin shot and then get him to eat. Problem was, he didn't always eat what he was supposed to eat. Three times he went into insulin shock over the last week and a half.

The first one we caught pretty early, when we couldn't find him anywhere until I looked in the most unlikely places and pulled him out. A fat syringe of water with Karo mixed in it fed to his mouth and then some food hand fed to him, and he came out of it nicely.

The second time was worse. It took us a bit more work to get him back to normal but we could see it wore him out a bit.

Last night I gave him a shot and made him eat. He ate maybe 75% of what he needed but wouldn't eat any more. Figured that would get him through the night. Then when I woke up at 5 am to get ready for work, I smelled cat shit, but the litter was clean. Oh... fuck... Looked under the bed where he liked to lay down, yep. Seizing... badly. Pulled him out and got my wife, and tried to work him back, but we just couldn't get him to lick or swallow anything. We both agreed that it was probably time to put him down.

I went to work and my wife took him to the clinic, and the dr was able to work him back up to a somewhat lucid state, but his prognosis was really poor. Only good thing was at least he was purring during the last moments until the dr put him down.

I'd never had any pets with diabetes so it was a weird experience. All I was told was that cats are hard to treat and keep stable. They eat when they want, which clashes with the shot schedule sometimes. If I had to do it all over again, I'd probably take away the food until its time for the shot, then give the food, so the cat would be hungry enough to eat all of it, rather than leaving food out all day for him to nibble on every hour or so...

Anybody else have experience with this?

"Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban

[wmw999 2,166]

My cousin did, and while she was able to manage it for several years, the vet was amazed. He said that about a year is typical for all the reasons you mentioned. But hers was old when he got it, so he was way more set in his ways. He even came to her when she called for his shots.

Sounds like you did the best you could; what a shame.

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[Niki1 1]

I'm really sorry for your lose. I know that's a tough thing to do.
I just recently discovered that animals can have what we consider "human" medical problems. Our dog, an Akita, (sp?) has epilepsy. It scared the shit out of my wife when he had his first sizure. She thought for sure it was rabies. So now he gets a phenobarbitol morning and evening. He seems to be getting used to this dosage so the script needs to be increased. I'm not religious at all but what I'm doing would be considered prayer. The unconditional love we get from our non human family members is worth all the lengths we go to to keep them healthy.

Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossilbe before they were done.
Louis D Brandeis

Where are we going and why are we in this basket?