Submitted by MarkusKruber t3_zxmb3v in LifeProTips
I have a 17 year old cat with dementia, possibly cancer, who’s going deaf, and has been getting noticeably more nauseous. She’s also lost 25% of her body weight in the last 6 months, lost her sister within the last year, and I’ve recently noticed she’s begun limping.
For the past several months she’s been extremely vocal yowling throughout the night requiring the family to constantly pick her up and place her on the bed with one of us until she finally decides to stay for an hour or two before going back to yowling.
I have no idea what to do. We’ve taken her to the vet and she’s suggested running a couple more tests (bloodwork) to see if there is a potential physical issue but the root cause seems to be her mind. She has tried numerous anti anxiety medications, I’ve bought Feliway, and playing before bed but nothing seems to work.
I absolutely love my cat but she seems to be getting more confused and anxious and I just want to do whatever the right thing is for her.
Edit: I would also highlight that she’s eating, drinking, and using the restroom normally. The main concern is the excessive vocalization as she will constantly yowl if someone isn’t directly with her, however, even if someone picks her up to sit with them, she’ll often return to a spot in the house and continually yowl. The best way I’d put it is she seems happy when someone is there with her, however, she’s anxious whenever people aren’t around or are sleeping. I’m just trying to figure out what to do if the family is at work X hours of the day, during which she’s panicking, then she’ll eventually settle very happily during the evening with attention, to then be scared and yowl all night.
Note: If she does need to be put down - as many commenters have suggested - it will 100% be at home with a veterinarian, in as painless manner as possible, surrounded by everyone she loves.
clevercalamity t1_j21b3ef wrote
Hi friend. My family had to make the tough decision to put our dog down earlier this year. He also had dementia and cancer. It was a hard decision to make because it was such a slow decline and some days (and weeks) were better than others.
Our vet shared with us this quality of life calculator. There are a few online like it. We assessed our boy once a week until it became obvious that it was his time.
I second was other people have said in this thread about at home euthanasia. It was nice getting to say goodbye in a comfortable and safe environment. The vet was so kind and let us take as much time as we needed.
I’m sorry you are going through this.
For what it’s worth, out vet also told us it’s always better to let them go day to early than a day too late. We really struggled with the “when” and not wanting to rob our beloved friend of any time he had left, but because they can’t tell us what they want all we can do is the best we can do and try to let them go gently without any pain.