My daughter and I are pet people.
We love our pets. We love other people’s pets.
We volunteer a few hours each week with the local humane society.
We do this partly to help, but if we’re being honest, the selfish component of getting to interact with new animals is just as much of a draw.
Our household consists of my daughter, myself, and our two male cats. We’re prepping to make room for a third as there’s an adorable, one-eyed cat at the humane society and my daughter has fallen in love.
Our pets are likely members of our family.
We foolishly talk to them as such, half-hoping one day they will speak back in some coherent form of English.
We don’t take it as far as saying the cats are my two sons, but they are family.
And family sometimes gets sick and you have to take care of them.
Such was the case this past Sunday morning.
Kristoff is a ball of energy most days and is one of those cats who is friendly when he wants attention, but when he’s done, he’s done.
So, I found it odd that he sauntered into the living room, plopped his butt in front of the door and didn’t move. He stayed there when we filled the food and water bowls. He failed to stir when we shook the treat bag. He didn’t even protest when we went over to pet him. No meows, no hissing, no licking our fingers, nothing.
Something obviously was wrong. My daughter sensed this as well.
Being a Sunday, our options were limited, but thankfully Animal Urgent Care in Wheeling would be open soon and we could call and get him in.
This probably is one of the hardest parts of having pets. Medical care.
One, are they going to be okay? Will the vet be able to determine what’s causing the problems and, once that’s ascertained, is it fixable and curable?
Thankfully Dr. Shondrick and her staff were able to diagnose the issue, and they came up with a treatment plan. Our kitty was going to be okay.
But that brings us to a second issue as a pet owner whose pets require emergency care – cost.
Can I afford the treatment?
Again, thankfully, we could. It wasn’t cheap, but thankfully I had enough of my check left to cover the examination, medicines, shots, and treatment.
But that’s not always the case.
If your family is more well off than others, you may have the expendable income, or an amount saved for just such an occasion.
You don’t have to be independently wealthy to be in this position, but it helps. But with proper planning, you can save up a decent amount for “in-case” pet care, in addition to the routine, yearly care required.
You can also pay for monthly pet health insurance, which may cover accidents, injuries, and even routine care at varying levels, depending on the type of plan and options you select.
Like with human healthcare, it’s not cheap, but the monthly manageable cost could be preferable to the unexpected large cost in the event of an emergency.
The Belmont County Humane Society recently had just such an event. One of its cats had accidentally ingested a straw left as a play toy, and he became severely constipated.
This required surgery that cost in excess of $1,000. The organization was able to raise the funds through generous donations of fellow local animal lovers.
There are options like CareCredit or ScratchPay that amount to a loan taken out to pay for the animal’s care that you pay back in installments. But not everyone gets approved.
Roughly six years ago, I had a tough decision to make.
Our cat, Klaus, became extremely ill quite suddenly. If I’m being honest, we should have gone to the vet a day or two prior, but at the time, he seemed relatively okay.
We took him to our regular veterinarian’s office and were hit were some not-so-good news.
There were surgical options. But a) those were going to cost around $1,500, and b) there was still only a 5-10 percent chance those options could save him. Mostly likely, Klaus wasn’t going to make it, no matter what we did or how much we spent.
I didn’t have the $1,500, so it was almost a relief to hear that the outcome wouldn’t change even with the expensive care. I didn’t have the $1,500, but I did have enough to ease his pain and have him put to sleep.
It wasn’t a fun decision to have to make. I can only imagine how I would have felt had the surgery offered 100 percent improvement, and I had not been able to afford it.
To me, that’s the hardest thing about owning a pet, and one that prospective pet owners need to consider before adopting an animal.
Yes, they are cute and cuddly, and they bring joy to your life, but they are also living beings. They get sick, they get injured, and they sometimes need quite expensive medical care. That needs to be factored in.
We lucked out this time. I’m not waiting for it to happen again. I’m going to start putting money back each pay until there’s a nice amount saved up. I’m also going to revisit the pet insurance plans available, especially before we bring the third cat into our house.
It is nice to know there are options like CareCredit and ScratchPay available should an emergency arise again.
I hope you never have to be in the position of not being able to save your pet’s life because of a lack of funds. It’s not fair to you, and it’s certainly not fair to the animal. They trust us to take care of them.
Make sure you can.
Related: Cats Should Count Too
