At $1000 for a single visit we are having a conversation about it and weighing our options. But $2000 is my hard line.

I have a 20 year old indoor cat and I refuse to take her to the vet again unless it is definitely time to go.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If i am being honest, I would drop 50k on my dog if it meant she could live 7-10 more years.

I do view them as family members and my daughters most definitely do.

We're lucky to be in a position to do what is needed.

this is wild! I just responded and we have a HHI of ~800k and I think 10k is my limit. For me i whenever we spend money on shoe thing the decision point is never from a standpoint of financial position, it’s a matter of what we feel is prudent. I love our pets, but at some point when you are engaging in medical contortions to keep your pet alive it becomes unfair to the pet IMO.

It’s not about keeping a pet alive who is suffering or doing medical contortions as you put it. It’s about an operation or something that will make the pet well.

People don’t put a money limit on a pet that is part of the family. And coming up with a random number that you’d spend says a lot about you. None of it good.

Our young, healthy dog was diagnosed with a rare gastro issue and had we known what we were going into, I would have made vastly different decisions.

The emotional, financial and physical toll it took on our family, not to mention the horrible end, would have changed my mind if I could have looked in a crystal ball. The vet bills, the food and medicine expenses (i.e. simple day to day) were astronomical. I felt as if I was a large part of Chewy's profits.

But I empathize with anyone who is going through it. The vets make it seem like "We'll just do an X-Ray, or this procedure, or that procedure, and then we'll have some answers." In my experience, that was rarely the case. And I was made to feel (at least at the beginning) like a terrible pet owner if I did not just go along with a $5K expense.

I think that's the good and the bad of advanced veterinary medicine. Back in the 80s or even 90s, the neighborhood vet would have drawn on their limited knowledge or rare or complicated diagonosis and said, "We've done everything we can to make them comfortable." Maybe that's oversimplifying it, but I'm not sure knowledge is power in the prolonging of animal life era we're in now. Especially when it comes to the expense (not only financial) of it all.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If i am being honest, I would drop 50k on my dog if it meant she could live 7-10 more years.

I do view them as family members and my daughters most definitely do.

We're lucky to be in a position to do what is needed.

Same. A lot of people would take out a loan if they didn’t have the cash.

I spent about this amount on my first dog and I’ll never do it again.

Anonymous wrote:If i am being honest, I would drop 50k on my dog if it meant she could live 7-10 more years.

I do view them as family members and my daughters most definitely do.

We're lucky to be in a position to do what is needed.

Same. A lot of people would take out a loan if they didn’t have the cash.

Anonymous wrote:Everyone I know (educated, wealthy, etc) treats their pets like non-humans. Ie, they are not child proxies. After a certain age, they do not get expensive cancer treatments that might or might not work, or invasive, unpleasant things done to them. They get palliative care and if need be, euthanasia.

I have yet to meet a pet owner who treats their pet like a human, frankly.

I’ve never heard of a person who only knows wealthy people. Is there a line drawn somewhere that you can’t cross? Is your world that small?

But thank you for letting us know that wealthy and educated people treat their dogs like the animals they are. Funny though, you go on to describe what most people do which is make decisions on what’s best for the dog.

Anonymous wrote:Everyone I know (educated, wealthy, etc) treats their pets like non-humans. Ie, they are not child proxies. After a certain age, they do not get expensive cancer treatments that might or might not work, or invasive, unpleasant things done to them. They get palliative care and if need be, euthanasia.

I have yet to meet a pet owner who treats their pet like a human, frankly.

+1 That said, the cost of care if your pet gets seriously ill can be astronomical, and it is good to have a discussion about how much you're willing to spend on its care before you're in an urgent situation (sort of a pet living will). We did an expensive surgery to save a pet that we shouldn't have (the health outcomes were not good), because one spouse was travelling and out of reach when a pet got suddenly deathly ill and the other spouse didn't want to make the decision to euthanize without consulting with the other.

We are ultra high net worth. There is no limit to what I would spend on my pets for healthcare. At the same time, I would not ever want to selfishly prolong their lives and make them suffer because we weren't ready to say goodbye.

Anonymous wrote:What if my dog is not sick but obviously slowing down and starting g to have lots of minor issues and is 12 years old. Can I euthanize them? I dont want to give them for adoption because I think they will be so upset. But I can no longer afford to take care of them and work full time and can’t even give them the attention I used to since now I’m also divorced.

YES. It’s not about their health issues. But if you can’t take care of a twelve year old dog, I think it’s better to euthanize them than to surrender them. I say this as a person who has adopted and loved and cared for a senior dog before. I’m not at all convinced it wouldn’t have been better for that dog to have euthanasia before all the trauma of rehoming began.

I think you’ll find that most vets are very understanding and supportive about this.

Anonymous wrote:What if my dog is not sick but obviously slowing down and starting g to have lots of minor issues and is 12 years old. Can I euthanize them? I dont want to give them for adoption because I think they will be so upset. But I can no longer afford to take care of them and work full time and can’t even give them the attention I used to since now I’m also divorced.

I would do everything to keep the dog for as long as you can but if you decide it's time, better a week early than a day late. Don't let your dog suffer.

Routine vet care is $400 - $1000 a year depending on if teeth cleaning is needed. Are you counting that over the lifespan of the dog?

I probably would start to get hesitant above the $2500 mark for a single procedure / treatment. I love my dog but not more than I love being debt free and supporting my kids.

No limit to what I would spend on my pets. That said, I have two dogs and would not get another -- it's way too expensive. We also had a cat, who passed away about 6 months ago. And the financial burden of a third pet is part of why we haven't gotten another cat. For now anyway.

Pets are certainly expensive.

Anonymous wrote:If you have a pet, do you have a limit that you would spend on its care? At what point would you say the expense is unreasonable given the fact that the patient is a pet vs a human? I love my pet, but vet bills are astronomical. After this one, no more pets for me.

Depends on age and quality of life of the pet. We have spent SO MUCH on some of our younger pets over the year. But the older ones who are at end of life or who have something incurable, we just keep comfortable. For example, I had a pup who was older and had cancer. We did a year of non-invasive chemo. No side effects with this particular form. Doggo lived another year with great quality of life. After that, the cancer was back and spread and, though we could have done more chemo and radiation, my vet said dog would have suffered and not been happy in her remaining days.

Vet bills are high. But insurance can sometime help. This is just one of those things you accept with animals. Care credit can also help. And finding low costs vets like Ancira in Manassas.

Anonymous wrote:If i am being honest, I would drop 50k on my dog if it meant she could live 7-10 more years.

I do view them as family members and my daughters most definitely do.

We're lucky to be in a position to do what is needed.

this is wild! I just responded and we have a HHI of ~800k and I think 10k is my limit. For me i whenever we spend money on shoe thing the decision point is never from a standpoint of financial position, it’s a matter of what we feel is prudent. I love our pets, but at some point when you are engaging in medical contortions to keep your pet alive it becomes unfair to the pet IMO.

What if my dog is not sick but obviously slowing down and starting g to have lots of minor issues and is 12 years old. Can I euthanize them? I dont want to give them for adoption because I think they will be so upset. But I can no longer afford to take care of them and work full time and can’t even give them the attention I used to since now I’m also divorced.