Went to the vet

I have to put my cat down :(
He's 18 years old and I've had him for almost my whole life so far.
He has to be put down because he has a tumor on the bridge of his nose. I explained a lot in the 'post your pics' thread and it grossed Waar out, so yea.

He's losing a lot of weight and can't seem to keep food down anymore. He's still very loving and affectionate despite all the fluid that comes out of the bridge of his nose and the side.
His left eye is starting to sink in too, because when fluid builds in the bridge of his nose it expands and it covers most of his left eye.

He's very much like my child. He always sleeps with me, wants on my lap or wants held. If you don't give him attention he'll demand it.
He came when he was called, but then he went deaf. So he started coming from hand signs, like motioning to come over here.

I have pictures if you guys are interested in looking, I was going through them and putting them together before I had to take him to the vet tomorrow:


Anyway guys, wish me luck! I'm not sure how I'll handle saying goodbye tomorrow. My mom had me call the vet but after I started setting up an appointment I started to cry and had to give the phone to my mom.

I love cats, and having had to go through something similiar in the past with one of my own, I can feel your pain. It's like losing a member of your family, so I offer my condolences. Hope you feel better.

You have my sympathies Ziggy. Doing something like this is never easy. I have had to say good bye to pets as well and once you've had them for a long time they are no longer mere animals they're family. Remember to stay strong and to spend as much time you can with him.

i'm a cat person so i can sympathize.
sorry for your future loss :cry:

sucks, I didn't read everything about the specifics as you know i'm not a fan but I do feel for you and your family.

This girl I know lost her cat 1+ month ago. She cries over it, misses it, and is often depressed about it being gone. Like you, she nearly had it all her life.

Because of her, I know how hard losing an animal can be. Hopefully you won't take it as hard... good luck. Be strong and, as animeholic said, stay strong.

i feel for you ziggy i had a loved pet before die so yeah its pretty hard when youre totally attached to your pet... i was like crying all night when my pet died i really had a hard time for a few days but i got over it oh and its a dog

and when my second pet was cooked i didnt eat any of her parts i just watched them devour my pet my second pet was a chicken. weird huh?

anyway youll get over it after a few days ziggy but i hope you hugged him before you said good bye and be strong

That's tough Ziggy. It's never easy to let go a family member. You have my sympathies as well.

...probably not, but anyways, i'm really sorry. loosing a member of the family is tough, even more so to a degenerative illness. it seems like he really loves you. good luck tomorrow.

when my parents died, they left behind our family dog, beetlegeuise. he recently had to be put down due to kidney failure. one of the vet techs at the animal hospital said something that had me sobbing. "They say when you die and go to heaven all the dogs and cats you've ever had in your life come running to meet you"

...makes you want to believe in that sort of thing,right?

chin up, dearie.

It's always a very bad day when you have to put down one of your own pets. I was in the same boat as penelope, except it was my grandparents dog. Had to be put down because of health issues and then a few months after that we had to put down my family dog....Man that was a sad couple of months...

Good luck...

That... sucks. I know how it feels to put a pet down (I had to put my dog Coco down a few weeks ago (She was 16 and was both deaf and partially blind due to cataracts (not to steal any form of condolence from you (fuck this is long. Something about it has to be grammatically incorrect).

But, yeah, my condolences for whatever thier worth. Losing a member of the family is always a shitty experience. But (from what I've gathered) you're a pretty strong-willed person, so I'm sure you'll be fine.

Thanks everyone, my mom decided to get him cremated. I was really half-half on it, because I don't even know whether or not I want to be cremated.

The options were for him to be cremated or for him to be burried in my grandpas yard. (I live on top of a flower shop, so there's no grass here)

I used to live with my grandpa and he's kinda a mix between a buddhist and pagan. He has a lot of land and has a specific area for meditation and other stuff. He burried his one cat back there and it just has a simple rock as a symbol for a grave being there. I always thought that area was really peaceful and wouldn't of minded my cat being there too. But the argument to that in my head was that it wasn't my cats home.

But, mom made the decision that cremating was going to be done, and that I'll take his remains with me when I move to Georgia in a month.

I know exactly how you feel. I've lost both my dog and previous cat to illness. My dog (who was pretty much my only friend during my childhood) died after he ate some poisonous thing outside. I was heartbroken for days and I didn't come out of my room for a week. When you're a kid, things like that really affect you.

Hopefully you "get over" (for lack of a better term) that event quickly.

Putting your pets down is never easy. The one thing you need to remember is that death isn't easy to approach from any perspective. When you have a pet "put down," you are doing what you can to protect it from suffering in the future, which is what a responsible pet owner does at any stage in their pets' lives. Death is inevitable and as humans, we are burdened with the sense of mourning that we feel when those who we are close to die. In cases such as this, its important to come to a conclusion as to whether it is more important that a living being, that is dying, should be mercifully killed, in a way that it can die as peacefully as possible, or die naturally, suffering to the extent that nature sees fit.

I was mostly against him being put down due to him being so affectionate still. I was told cats hide when they're in pain, and that they don't want any interaction.
He never hid, and he never avoided interaction and often came looking for it.

But when looking at him I felt like a bad owner for not doing anything about it, but at the same time I felt guilty putting him down, because I felt like I was just trying to rush along a process.

Sometimes I felt like he would have preferred to die at home where he could be comfortable and relaxed. Getting in a car and going to the vet is stressful to most cats and I felt like he would die unhappy.

So it was a conflict going through my head. I plan on giving him some milk and some (cooked) hamburger once my mom goes to bed (treat him before the morning)

*edit*
Has anyone ever gotten their pets cremated? Do they put the remains in something nice or just kinda give it to you in a box or bag and go here?

He was put down this morning. He was also purring up until his last breath.
It was a lot more peaceful then I expected. I was still, am still really upset about it. But he felt so relaxed afterwords, there was no tension in his body at all.

The vet had me put my arms around him on the table as she injected him. He was rubbing the side of his face against my thumb and then just laid his head on my hand.

My moms friend was there and kept saying he was in heaven now. It bothered me because I'm not a religious type, but sometimes I really wish they were right. He's getting cremated and I'll have him in this black ceramic cat all curled up sleeping.

It's gonna be lonely now :( My sleeping buddy is gone.

My sympathies Ziggy. :(
I have a dog who's getting up there in age, and I don't want to see him go when the time comes.

you seem to be taking it really really well. when betelegeuise/beetlejuice was put down, my then boyfriend thought he could fix it by getting me a puppy(he is clearly not a pet owner). i was irate at the time("YOU'RE TRYING TO REPLACE HIM? WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?"), but the puppy ended up keeping me so busy I barely had time to think about it.

I have other cats at home, Jazz and Hazel. So it's not like he was my only pet, just the one cat I was most connected with. Hazels probably going on 2 and Jazz isn't even a year old so they're more interested in horsing around then laying on your lap and sleeping with you.

That's cute what your then boyfriend did. Mostly because he tried to do nice but it was a bad idea lol.

I'll be better by the end of the week and then I'll have his remains and probably go back into pout mode.

You have my condolences, and yet I know how it feels.

I use to own many alley cats, it's about ten of them and they're one big family. Even though they're alley cats they respond to my call when it's time to eat.

One day I notice one was missing, and it kept on for days. Finally I noticed that he was dead when I found his body in a bush, and looks like she died after having a fight. After that I just make a grave for her.

After that the number of my cats kept on declining each year... :cry: