My husband and I were accepted by our feline overlord Jink when she was a kitten, almost 17 years ago. She was our Fuzzy Cat Baby before we had human children, and has supervised the household ever since.
My family never had pets when I was growing up (apart from the occasional fish), and Jink has been our only cat all these years. So this is our first experience with having to consider putting a pet down, and I feel at a loss trying to figure out just when to say enough is enough. So I am hoping for some Dopers to give me some help/advice here.
Jink has had arthritis in her hind legs for a few years. Recently it has gotten much worse. She has a really hard time walking and spends most of the day under the bed, only coming out one or twice a day to eat or use the litterbox. She has trouble grooming herself (again, due to the arthritis), and for the past month or so she has been pooping outside the litterbox, despite our best efforts to make it easily accessible. We took her to the vet, who prescribed some medication for the arthritis, but it doesn’t seem to be helping any. She seems to be in pain when she walks.
She still eats and drinks well, and is alert and purrs when petted. So how do I know when it is time to say, “You’ve had a good cat life, but it’s time to go”? It’s hard to tell exactly how much pain she is in. It’s not like she is in some obvious steep decline, but she is slowly getting worse and I just don’t have any experience in drawing that line. Any advice/experiences would be helpful.
Geez, I’m crying just typing this. This just sucks.
My son brought Kitty home 17 years ago. She was at least one year old at the time and a stray.
She seemed to be doing good for her age until she started falling over. We took her to the vet and she had lost almost half her weight in less than a month since her last checkup. Blood tests were negative and no obvious tumors or other problems. Therefore we had her put down. It was hard but she’d had a great, long life especially considering she had been a stray and probably wouldn’t have lasted 10 years.
Our collie had hip problems and gradually couldn’t walk much and was in much pain even when on heavy medicines. In retrospect, I should have made the hard decision to put her down at least a couple of months earlier and saved her much pain.
Difficult decision. You’ll feel better in the long run. I wish we could treat humans as humanely when the time comes.
It’s a tough call. Seems to me if she is alert and apparently happy, except for pain when moving, then she might have a few more weeks of acceptable quality of life left in her. When she completely looses interest in her surroundings then it’s definitely time. I’ve been through this many times and it is never easy. I wish your kitty a smooth passage and you many happy memories.
Cats are really good at hiding pain. If she’s showing discomfort, I’d say it’s time. Better a few weeks earlier rather than wait until she’s miserable.
It’s a very hard decision and hardest to make with a first pet. from what you have said right now your cat is not having a great quality of life, however she is responding to you and eating and drinking. What I would say is talk to the vet and ask for their advice. If there is an alternative painkiller regime available try it. Otherwise give you and the family a few days to say your goodbyes, give her all her favourite treats and say goodbye.
It’s hard to think you may be sending them to their rest too soon but the one that I most regret is when I waited too long.
In my experience, every time I’ve had to ask that question, I’ve known deep down that it was time. What I really wanted was for someone to confirm it for me.
Jink is a lucky kitty to have such a caring family. I’m truly sorry.
I suspect almost everyone who loves a pet that faces such a choice (the gradual decline) has probably waited way too long rather than done it “on time” or “too early”.
At least the first time around.
I remember my old old kitty a few years back. He was old and thin but he still looked not too terrible to my biased eyes. After he was still and dead it was as if a fog had lifted from my vision. He looked like a cat version of a concentration camp victim.
It sounds like Jinx is pretty miserable, over all. Even if she purrs when petted and all, it’s just that she’s welcoming the comfort.
I wouldn’t tell you to put your cat down, but I would say that if it’s inevitable in the fairly near future, do it earlier rather than later.
My cattledog, Rudy, was tentatively diagnosed with Cushing’s Disease when he was only 9-10 years old. Dogs with Cushings get “pica,” a condition where they will eat odd things. I remember that at one point I paid $2000 for radical abdominal surgery to remove 9 of my kids’ dirty socks from his stomach. His recuperation was excruciating, but he lived another 6 or so months. When we finally put him down, I remember thinking, I went through $2k and put him through all that, just to watch him suffer for an additional 6 months. What a mistake of a decision.
My opinion is to put your pet down when they are no longer able to enjoy life in a regular, even daily way. The wait is not worth it, for you or them. Cut the suffering. They’re just confused and bewildered by their condition. Being peacefully put to sleep in March beats suffering more and more until September.
It’s often about getting yourself ready to say good-bye. Have a little going-away party. Give them all their favorite treats and pet and love on them. Then take them in for a peaceful way to go. For you, it won’t be easier early or late. This way Jinx will be able to enjoy the loving good-bye.
Just went through this a few months back with my beloved Fuzzy. He took a sudden turn for the worse at the worst possible time (during a ice storm when no nearby vets were open). He didn’t seem in any particular pain, but he couldn’t walk or use the litter box, which has got to be unpleasant for a cat.
His passing was pretty peaceful, as these things go, but I think sooner would have been better than later. YMMV.
Thanks, all. I really appreciate the input. I was thinking that it is probably time to put her down but I wasn’t sure about my judgement. But it sounds like from others’ experiences, that it is probably the right call.
I will talk to the vet first, and of course discuss it with my husband, but it sounds like good advice to take a few days or a week or so to say goodbye and then let her go peacefully.
What medication was she given? There are a number of them. Perhaps she needs a different one, or a different dosage. I’ve had a number of cats with arthritis and have been able to control the pain for a couple years. There’s Buprnenex, Gabapentin, and one of my kitties was on Tramadol for awhile. A number of people I know have had luck with Adequan. Please consider further researching pain management before you make the big decision.
I think there’s a lot of good end-of-life advice in this thread. However, if you are happy to talk to your vet about further options for pain management, Helena covered that. It sounds like it wouldn’t hurt at this point to try further management. Now, these days, buprenorphine is fairly expensive for long term use, but I’ve seen good results with gabapentin and tramadol in cats. Kitties are tough because they don’t tolerate anti-inflammatories as well as dogs and people do, so they don’t have as many long-term options available.
Personally, if there aren’t any other issues found in her labs or x-rays (ask your vet about those if they haven’t been done yet - locations of the arthritis can be seen, and if it’s in the hips and spine those are areas that call for stronger pain control for sure - but, your vet may hesitate at doing x-rays just to look for arthritis and that’s not unreasonable) at this point, I’d try an aggressive pain management regimen for a couple weeks to see if there’s any improvement. At that point, if I still feel her quality of life is impaired then it’s time.
So, I’d ask about getting her on gabapentin, tramadol, and even the supplement Cosequin (she can be kept on the start-up dose, it’s glucosamine-chondroitin and people debate over whether it’s helpful/effective, but we see positive results in our shelter cats that get it, where it’s harder to have bias - it’s certainly not harmful to add and could possibly help).
SeaDragonTattoo, just FYI that roadrunnerpharmacy.com has miracle pricing on Buprenorphine. For me, it was $30 for 30ml of 0.3mg/ml. It lasted about six weeks. I learned about it years ago on my Yahoo Groups kidney kitty list. My vet just had to call in the prescription. He said it was less expensive than even he could get it, and he’s now using it for other clients, as well.
Find out if there is a vet in your area who does in-home euthanasia, and get some references to be sure it is someone you will be comfortable with. When the time does come, it will be more comfortable for you and for your cat if it doesn’t involve a stressful car trip or a vet clinic full of barking dogs.
Thanks again for the replies. I just hate trying to figure out the right decision. It’s good to know there are other medications out there, but I’m not sure we’re willing to spend the time and effort to exhaust every possibility. I kinda feel like she’s had a good long cat life, we’ve tried some medication, and now it’s time to let her go. But then again I feel guilty for not trying harder to find something that might work. The vet is looking into some other possibilities but doesn’t seem optimistic.
I have heard from several friends that this vet is great for putting pets down, so at least I don’t have concerns on that end.
I wish I had a little pop-up indicator for the cat - when it pops up, it is time to take her in to the vet for her trip to Cat Heaven.
I like the popup indicator idea… somebody should invent that.
I lost my 18 year old cat last October, and in the year leading up to that my vet told me that what he judges by on pets is three things:
Are they eating and drinking?
Do they still seek human interaction and attention?
Are they eliminating properly? (cats with litterboxes and dogs outside)
He told me that as long as any 2 of those 3 were in place, there was still some quality of life for the pet and they were still enjoying life, but once you lost two of them, it was time. That’s just a general thing, but it helped me to know for my cat. Maybe this will help you too - but also yes as others have said, check with your vet and see what they say.
As a veterinarian very interested in pain management, I strongly urge you to look into low level laser therapy and medical acupuncture (not woo woo type, but actual medical acupuncture) as adjuncts to your cat’s pain control. I have feline patients that almost act like kittens again after 1 or 2 laser treatments, and cats seem to have a nervous system that is very receptive to needling.
Also, gabapentin and amantadine, and if her kidneys are good, then Onsior.
With the first 2 cats I had, I let them suffer waaaaay too long. As others have mentioned, cats will instinctually hide their pain & suffering, so if you are noticing any at all, it’s the tip of the iceberg. You can spend thousands of dollars just to keep your cat comfortable and alive for another year (I’ve done it!!), but it really isn’t practical unless you have money to burn. At 17, you’ve done an amazing job and your kitty has lived a good, long life, so don’t feel guilty about giving her eternal peace.
Update: So, we said goodbye to Jink today. The arthritis in her hind legs just kept getting worse, and the past week or so she was only able to walk a few steps at a time. So we decided it was time to let her go.
I knew it would be traumatic for the family (we have kids ages 9 and 11), but I still underestimated how bad it would be. For the kids, who have known and loved Jink their entire lives, and have never known our house without her. They are devastated. For my husband and myself, who had to make the awful decision, even knowing it was the best thing for the cat. And trying to help the kids with their grief while we are mourning her ourselves - she was our Fuzzy Cat Baby before we even started thinking about kids.
I know we did the right thing, and I know the grief will lessen in time, but I really really miss her. She was a good fuzzy cat.
