Quote:
Originally Posted by MoneyGuy
This couple spent $40,000 on their dog. I have a dog but I think this is nuts. These are not children. Many animals out there are in great need. What about adopting one of those? I wonder what these people are giving up, such as education savings for kids. What's your philosophy on this?
http://www.edmontonjournal.com/life/...megadrop_story |
$40,000 is a lot. That would be an extreme example. Most would balk at that.
Better to have this conversation at a lower level.
$7,500 to $20,000 or so isn't that unusual as pet medicine and the potential to extend lives in a meaningful way has made rapid advances in the last decade or so.
I think a lot of pet owners, if they could put $10,000 down in exchange for a decent likelihood of getting two more years of MEANINGFUL life from a longtime pet, would probably do so.
And I have done that and more.
I'm on a few pet message boards and the question of $20,000 came up recently and a sizeable number of people stuck up their hands saying they HAD shelled out $20,000 for a single fix in the recent past.
It would depend on your financial situation though. About 17 years ago, I had to come up with $1,500 to save the world's greatest cat after he swallowed a nickel . . . . couldn't afford it at the time but did it anyway. He lived another eight years.
Generally, the people who can put up $20,000 and more are empty-nesters AND have the financial wherewithall to make the expenditure without serious inconvenience. A Globe & Mail article a few years ago had some adult children complaining about the lavishness with which their parents treated pets, with more love and consideration than they had when they themselves were children, as though it was a do-over to get it right.
Even a lady with kids in our office did about $7,000 last year for a dog.
If you're looking at Pet Insurance, you're probably putting $10,000 to $15,000 into policy premiums through the likely lifetime of your pet in most instances, depending on the comprehensiveness of the coverage, so basically you are in a position to make that $10,000 to $20,000 decision in the latter years of the life of your pet.
Even an ultra sound just to see what the problem is will probably set you back about $2,000.
Mrs. Cowperson and I are fortunate enough to be able to foot just about any bill that might come up and continue to do so indefinitely . . . . so its important to keep the welfare of the animal in front of you. We had to make an immediate decision with our Golden Abby a year ago . . . and we could have engaged an operation to extend her life but the payback would have been an improbable extra six months, with constant chemo treatments and likely constant pain for the animal. Any surgery in that instance would have been for our own benefit and not benefitting the animal. We let her go that day. The second Golden, Keeper, also 12 years old, we let go a month later with the same condition and the same circumstances, although a little more warning.
As to the morality of it all . . . . . I can tell you I've had more difficult and painful decisions letting pets go than I did making the call to pull life support from my father. And I know my father would have understood that completely since I was the first person he called after he had let his beloved Terrier go and I had never seen him cry before that or after that.
Culturally, you can see this mindshift in our society in the last 20 years or so, when, first in the Ice Rain disaster out east and then during Hurricane Katrina, that people ordered by authorities to leave their pets behind refused to do so, instead risking their own lives to ensure the survival of the family pets.
Disaster planning in the last decade has started to factor this cultural shift in mind. When a second hurricane was going to roll over New Orleans a few years after Katrina, authorities had a fully developed plan for the removal and safety of pets . . . . just so authorities knew people would be leaving the area as well. And you can be assured, in most instances now in North America, that is something you'll see in disaster service plans.
The best, final gift your pet can leave you is a clear-cut decision, where there is little ambiguity and money isn't an issue determining life or death.
Ultimately, we outlive them, virtually every single time. You might be able to afford the bills to keep them alive but that isn't the real point. It has to be about the welfare of the animal.
If you have no money, I understand the rough position you're in. Look for a shelter first. And there are other agencies that might be able to provide funding to help with the bills.
Cowperson