I had a fat cat. His name was Benny. He was awesome! A bit of a prancer, a tad bossy & gave me lots of love everyday!
Benny was diabetic.
A few years back Benny was drinking so much water he was flooding the litter box on a daily basis. He slept most of the day sleeping & was downright lazy & maybe even a little depressed. I took Benny the Fatso to the vet & discovered that the poor little guy’s pancreas wasn’t working the way it should any more & he needed insulin, every 12 hours (EVERY 12 HOURS!!), to get better. In addition he had to be switched to expensive, special, low calorie, diabetic cat food that can only be purchased through the veterinarian.
Bummer.
But I learned how to give Benny his shots twice a day, switched his food… we managed.
Until one day my other kitty, Trixie, got very, very sick. I rushed her to the emergency clinic. A couple of hours & a $1000 charge to my credit card later, she was gone, having been full of cancer.
I was completely devastated. I have been fortunate that I had not yet had to cope with any significant loss in my life & this was my first experience with the death of a loved one.
Through my devastation from the loss of my pretty girl too early (she was only 9), I was blaming myself for her sickness. I took to the internet & read up on cat health. What I found would change the fate of the Fatso & bring him genuine health and vitality again.
Enter YourDiabeticCat.com, a site created by American veterinarian Elizabeth Hodgkins. It was on this site I learned all about the truth of cat diabetes & the protocol: a means by which I could improve Benny’s condition & maybe even eliminate his need for insulin all together!
I followed this protocol to a T. I took his blood sugar levels with the same tools diabetic people use & recorded the findings religiously. I tossed the expensive diabetic food in exchange for high protein/high fat canned cat food & I weened him off the insulin. It was really quite quickly that Benny’s need for insulin fell away. Meeting his carnivorous needs with proper meat made a huge difference!
Within a month or so my Benny was insulin free & acting all kitten-y again, lots of energy to boss me around again. It was so wonderful to have him back! Changing his diet to what is logical for felines to consume is really all it took.
Looking back I wonder how I could have been content to feed any of my cats that corn kibble garbage, no matter the price tag. I’m sure my Trixie met an early end with cancer because of the poor diet I provided. Never again will I feed my cats less than meaty-meat-meat! Cats are carnivores & only meat will suffice. Corn is not meat. I usually fed Benny really expensive food from ZiwiPeak… rabbit!, but also found that the pates from Fancy Feast were quite good at meeting the protein/fat requirements of the protocol.
