All is sweet in the house

A week on, and back to Dr. O we went, to check up on progress. I'd assumed this was to check how Cleo was doing, but it seemed he was keener to see how I was getting on with the daily shots. Truthfully, I'm fine. He'd been worried that I might have been nervous for kitty, not wanted to hurt her etc, but it has all gone well. The daily injections are simple, much helped by Cleo not even flinching with the shot. She gets her injection after her breakfast in the morning, so an hour after feeding (and when I'm done with my "getting ready for work" routine, a mixture of slacking and panic), she's curled up in the chair having a bit of a snooze. The preparing the insulin (carefully inverting it a couple of times) and prepping the syringe so the right measurement is withdrawn without bubbles of air is the simple bit really, there's no rush or pressure or worry, and so far there's been no technical issues at all. Then, finding kitty is easy enough, she's still curled up in the chair, comfy as anything. A little stroke on the head and she'll (sometimes) lift her head a bit, pinch the scruff of the neck to pull the skin up, easy again, no issue there. The only issue tends to be finding where the fur ends and the skin begins in the scruff lifted from the body, so just pushing the finger into the fur and smoothing the fur outwards a bit to "see" the pale skin below her black fur tends to help. Then, jab. And that's all it is, a slight jab sensation, Cleo isn't at all bothered and still doesn't lift her head or flinch. I think I'm really lucky with her, so laid back. The other two kitties would probably be more of a handful. Depress the plunger to release the insulin under the skin is barely a noticable act too, as the 2 units is soooo tiny it's hardly moving it at all. Then withdraw, and carefully dispose in the sharps bin. Easy-peasy.

Time prepping insulin, and syringe: 1-2 mins (probably quicker, but I don't like rushing this)
Time finding cat: 30 seconds (unless she's not in the chair, not happened yet...)
Time lifting scruff and injecting: 30 seconds.

Anyway, back to the plot, the vet was impressed, apparently he had a feeling I'd be quite calm with it all. I guess since Cleo is the one with the medical problem, and if she's dealing with it so well, there's no point me stressing about it. The action of injecting doesn't bother me either, I wanted to be a Vet when I was younger, then a Veterinary Nurse (wanted more interaction with the animals and the care, plus bonus of less study and exams! That said they still have years and years before qualifying), and I'd done work experience in a local vet which was fantastic, they'd seen my enthusiasm and were keen to show me all sides, so I'd watched operations, even helped out with minor bits like putting in a stitch, and developed x-rays, and I'm pretty sure, even done an injection back then. It's a shame I didn't follow that up. The enthusiasm is still there, circumstances changed though and years at University wasn't going to be an option for me, but hey ho, in the end if that means Cleo and me do well with injections now then all is good.

The vet gave Cleo a quick check over, no tests just yet. She looks well, so that's good. Still drinking a lot of water (more than the other 2 cats at least), but she's not hanging around the water bowl as much as she used to, a couple of months ago she'd lie often with her chin in the water bowl, occasionally lapping at it. We've another appointment on the 27th when they'll do a blood test to see how her levels are doing with the injections after 3 weeks of treatment. Depending on that result, Dr O said he'd like to try testing the levels every few hours throughout the day to plot a graph of how her body reacts to the insulin. Usually they keep them in for a day for this, but since it'd taken Cleo 24 hours to settle in during her 5 day vet visit at the start of the month he wasn't sure this would work for her, her stressing out would ruin her levels and spoil the work we'd done, so he did mention that we might do that at home - but either way, this wasn't confirmed yet so he didn't want to go into too much detail or planning or, as I believe, risk worrying me the owner out too much. I'm not worried, the home testing is something I'm still considering from having read up on the FDMB site, where it's highly recommended. I'm still looking at the different blood glucose meters, they all seem pretty much the same, some need more blood in the testing sample than others, so I'm weighing up small samples with ones that have most recommendation from other users, and those that will be easiest to find replacement strips for.

So, with the check up done, and another appointment in a while, all is well with us. Fingers crossed it stays that way.