How much would you pay?

[Kiia]

I was speaking with another lady here at work before, telling her that I will be taking Teeko to the vet after work to get that bump on his leg checked out.

She ended up asking me how much I would pay if in fact it is something bad? I said I wasn't sure but I'm willing to pay alot since he's still young and a big part of my life. She says what $700-$800, I said yes I would be willing to pay that and more. She looked at me, started laughing and said I was crazy. I asked her why I was crazy? She said animals are animals, it's not like they are kids. I told her I loved Teeko very much and he is like my child (he sure gets spoiled like one ).

She said in her opinion, they are two different things and she wouldn't spend that much money on an animal. Our conversation went on for a few more minutes, a little more heated because we both saw it differently.

Anyways, I'm not crazy, I just love my boy Teeko!

How much would you pay for your pet?

[Logan]

I have a friend on another group that is facing close to $10,000 in vet bills for surgery and care for her rescue dog that was hit by a car in a freak accident. She has gotten much help from friends who wanted to contribute, but she had to pay half the balance in order to bring her boy home for a weekend. I can't imagine that kind of expense, but watching her boy thrive has made me realize that I would do just about anything that would help one of my dogs or cats and preserve their quality of life. I can't stroke a check for $10,000, for sure, but I do know that my vet knows me well enough to know that I would pay him and he would work with me to make it work out for my pet.

[PJ's Mom]

My stray cocker, Opus had heartworms when we found him. I paid close to $1000 for treatment only to have to put him to sleep a week later.

I'd pay any amount of money necessary for my babies.

[Uabassoon]

I would spend whatever it took if my babies were sick.

[BitsyNaceyDog]

I'm glad you love Teeko so much. You are certainly not crazy, I would do what ever I could no matter the price for my fur-babies.

[aly]

I have no limits. All of my money already goes to them In the case of an emergency, I would hope I could work out a payment plan with the vet

[Aspen and Misty]

I acctually have bank acount set up at the bank that I add money to incase of emergency. Yea, I'm only 16, but I still have animals and a day may come when they need expensive care done and I want to be able to do it.

I would pay however much to save any one of my kids.

Ashley

[Glacier]

While in general I agree with the sentiment of money not being an object to saving one of my critters (my vet bills are thousands of dollars a year!), I also need to know that the treatment has a reasonable chance of success and that the animal will have some quality of life afterwards.

For example, I have a cat, Pete, who two & a half years ago I spent over 4000 dollars on. He needed surgery that couldn't be done in the Yukon and he had to fly to the University of Saskatchewan for treatment. At the time Pete was just over two years old, he was otherwise healthy, except for the chronic urinary tract blockages. My vet gave me two options--1. take Pete home and enjoy him until the next blockage at which time he would be euthanized. At that time, Pete was blocking every couple days and could no longer be cathaterized. Option #2 was put him on a plane to Sask, have the surgery with an 90% chance of forever preventing the blocks. Given that Pete was young, generally healthy and that the treatment was almost guarenteed to work, I went ahead with it. Had Pete been older, had other health issues or if the surgery had a low success rate, I probably would have made a different decision. Twicket is almost 15 and I know I wouldn't put him through that, but it doesn't mean I love him any less than Pete.

My husband and I have talked about what we would do should one of the dogs be diagnosed with a major disease, such as cancer. It's morbid, but I think it's important to talk about those kind of things beforehand. While we put no price limit on their lives, we have agreed that they won't be put through invasive, painful or limited success treatments. We will keep them comfortable and happy for as long as possible and gently let them go when that is no longer possible. We had discussed long before we lost a dog what we would do with the body. So when Hoodoo died, we didn't have a big debate and we didn't make a rushed decision in the midst of a crisis. While I was too upset to speak, my hubby was able to tell the vet what arrangements we wanted and remembered to take Hoodoo's collar off.

[BCBlondie]

Just Megan's surgery last week was about $1,400... she will probably have to be on special food that is over $30 for at least 6 months, possibly her life. Megan deserves every penny of it.

[Tollers-n-Dobes]

I would pay as much as they needed i love my dogs way too much to put a limit on a price I'd pay if they had to see the vet. Although I would not ever pay over $1000 to maybe fix Echo's knee since it will heal on it's own (which it almost is).

[cali]

as much as we can, in otherwords as much as we can afford, and how much my dad can afford because he has to help us with vet bills when we have them, but my animals needing a vet is is very very rare occasion. I dont know how much it would be but we could never afford more then $2000 in vet bills, there is no way, my mom only works part time, and I cant handle a job with school, when I can barly handle school.

[Nomilynn]

In total I probably spent about $10,000 in vet/transport/home care/etc etc for Bassett. I had a LOT of help from my friends here, but I still had to cover the majority of the costs. Bassett was young (only 4 at diagnosis) so to me it was worth it. It was her only hope to have the surgery. It only gave her a year, but it was the most special time I had with her. I told her every day that I loved her. I took time with her every day. And even on the day she died she never knew how sick she was. You can't ever put a cost on something like that, and if I had to do it all over again I would still find the money.

[GraciesMommy]

I think Glacier summed it up pretty well. I paid $900 when Mercedes ate mushrooms growing in the yard and got deathly ill..the vet didnt know what was wrong with her and treated her for several different things until we finally found out what the problem was. She stayed several nights at the vet with an IV, antibiotics, special food, etc. We had no idea at the time how high the bill would go but I was going to do whatever it took to save her..but had it been something like cancer that we knew she would not recover from...then I think I would have made the decision to help her to RB..and ultimately she has gone on now...one year this month, but from age and dementia, and a multitude of other problems that came up all of a sudden and the vet felt like she was in agony both in body and mind. Wow, what a tough decision...

People who are not "true pet parents" just don't get it and never will..They just think differently than we do

[Kfamr]

However much it took.

[Cincy'sMom]

I don't think the dollar amount is important. If there was a good chance it would help and they would have a good quality of life, I would spend it. I'm sure Cincy is in to the $1000's and I'd do it all again. (thankfully, not all at once, but well over that in her 3 years...and if it came all at once, we'd find a way)