Original Post

When to say Goodbye

A lonely decision

We have 2 cats - a ginger tabby Oscar and a black shorthair called Minty.

Minty has reached the grand old age of 19 and a half. Over the last year she has suffered from a range of intestinal problems including frequent vomiting and what is euphemistically called "inappropriate defecation." She howls a lot although some of this is due to feline senility according to the vet.

She still has a voracious, almost uncontrolled appetite and this evidently exacerbates the vomitting. She has been tested for hypothyroidism but all the tests have proved negative. She recently had a very bad day including fowling the carpets and our bed and vomitting copiously.

The vet has said that we have come to the end of line as regards treatments. He suspects tumours cause the vomitting which often occurs when she strains to defecate. He has advised against any invasive investigations such as biopsies which, in a cat of Minty's age, would be worse than the actual disease itself. He said that we might want to consider allowing her to die with dignity.

So the die was cast. An appointment was made for her to be put to sleep this Monday at 11.55. The vet had said he would do it earlier but we wanted the weekend to come to terms with it and to tell our grown up daughters whose childhood pet she had been.

Over the weekend, she had a remarkably trouble free time - she did not vomit once (although we are now feeding her tiny but frequent amounts on advice and ensuring Oscar's food is lifted so she can't gorge on his). She went out into the garden for the first time in weeks.

So we cancelled the appointment with the vets and she is still with us for now anyway. We simply could not bring ourselves to wake her up from her little bed under an old IKEA chair in the spare bedroom, load her in the pet carrier and take her to vets.

The day can't be far off now and we ask ourselves this - how bad do we let it get before we take her for her final journey? There is an argument that, whilst she is relatively OK, it would be best to let her go now rather than wait for some real emergency and take her in a distressed state to the vets.

Never easy is it? Minty has always been a feisty cat and not always the most affectionate. But she has been a part of our lives for nearly 20 years - a third of our time on this earth. We have a fund of memories tied up with the kids growing up and her antics.

I am sure many will have been down this route before. For us, it's the first time and much much harder than we ever imagined.