Pets with Diabetes: Rosie's Story

Rosie is a 7 year old terrier mix. She weighs about 30 pounds. Rosie was diagnosed with diabetes on December 15, 1997. She had all the classic signs: drinking a lot, urinating a lot, eating a lot but losing weight. When she was diagnosed, her blood glucose was 626 mg/dl.

Our vet at that time told us that she couldn't handle a dog with diabetes because it would involve a lot of blood glucose curves. That seemed like a lousy reason to dump a patient, but if she was unwilling to care for Rosie, then we didn't want to go there anyway, so we switched vets.

For the first week or so, we had a hard time giving Rosie her shots. She would run and hide under or behind anything that would prevent us getting near her. We finally learned to block off all of her favorite hiding places. Now we have no problems, usually, giving her shots. She just sits in the same place every day and waits patiently. We also give her a small snack after the shot, so that may help.

Our current vet was very conservative in his initial treatment. He started Rosie on 6 units of NPH once a day. We had a lot of trouble getting Rosie regulated at the beginning. We went to the vet for weekly glucose curves and every time after the results came in, he would raise her one unit. This went on until February, when he finally called a specialist, and we went to 2 shots per day. We started home blood glucose testing in January, because we were not making much progress getting her regulated. After we started 2 shots per day and home testing, we were able to get Rosie regulated more quickly. Although dealing with diabetes has been an adjustment for everyone involved, Rosie is now happy and healthy, and actually is closer to us now than she was before she got diabetes.
-- Contributed by Susan D. and Rosie

Read about Rosie's experience with cataracts.

	Rosie's Story