Hi,
My Maltese/shih tsu is somewhere between 11 and 14 years old and two days ago was diagnosed with aggressive lung cancer.
No noticeable symptoms (to my untrained eye) up until about 5 days ago when she started coughing.
When she had her chest X Ray, biopsy and was sedated, she went from seeming like she had a mild cold to full on rapid breathing constantly.
She’s been put on antibiotics and steroids and has been on them for the last 24 hours.
She finds it difficult to get into a comfortable lying down position, but once she does she sleeps. Her cough is gone. Other than that, she is eating all her food, still following me around, still wagging her tail, still chasing birds (but gets puffed out) and still has a lot of life in her eyes.
Two vets from the same place have given me conflicting advice. - one says that it’s terminal and the breathing is uncomfortable and the sooner she is out to sleep the better.
The other said that the meds will help with the breathing once we hit 3-5 days of being on then and will work in a palliative sense.
I have a tentative appointment to put her to sleep at 9:30am tomorrow (it’s 10:20 here in Sydney Australia). But have no idea if I’m doing the right thing by her.
The breathing thing is certainly annoying, as one half of her lungs is basically a tumour, but nobody has said that she’s in pain. She’s not whimpering - only when I try to put her in a good lying position and she leans on a particular spot, which has only happened twice.
The hardest thing is not knowing whether she wants to still be around despite the discomfort. I would hate the idea of putting her to sleep when she’s perfectly happy with dealing with the rapid breathing for the moment, even if only for a few more days or a week or so.
Part of me wants it all to be over because I am keeping an eye on her all day and night (I work from home) and it breaks my heart, but that is not a reason to put her to sleep.
If I knew she would rather still be alive until things worsen and she can’t do all the good things I mentioned above, then I would love to have her around as long as possible.
I understand that it’s my decision and that nobody can make it for me, but the vets at this place are always so busy so I always end up feeling like I haven’t asked enough questions.
They’re great, but I would love it if anyone with much more animal knowledge then I could help me negotiate this decision. Not make it for me, I wouldn’t put that on anyone - just help me see things clearly.
It’s all been so sudden and I’ve barely slept and I hope there’s someone out there who can lend me their ear and expertise.
I’m sorry if I’ve broken any forum rules, I read then but am too all over the place to know if anything I’ve said is unacceptable. If it is, I apologise. I also apologise if I haven’t given sufficient information.
Thanks in advance and sorry for the long post.
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from Pets https://www.reddit.com/r/Pets/comments/cq8sv4/need_help_in_deciding_whether_to_put_my_dog_to/
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