When Love Means Letting Go: Making End-of-Life Decisions for Pets

Summary 

In this deeply moving episode of Tails of Truth, Dr. Angie and JoJo tackle the emotional terrain of end-of-life care for pets. From the tender story of a betta fish named Tony Roni to the complexities of navigating natural death versus euthanasia, they explore how love, grief, and responsibility intertwine. Listeners will gain practical guidance, compassionate insight, and heartfelt reassurance that they’re not alone in facing one of the hardest decisions a pet parent ever makes. 

🎧 Whether you’re caring for a senior pet or navigating a terminal diagnosis, this episode will help you feel less alone, more empowered, and deeply supported.

👉 Need guidance or a second opinion on end-of-life decisions?
 Schedule a video consultation with Dr. Angie.

Key Takeaways

• Every pet parent will face end-of-life decisions—no one is exempt.
• Euthanasia can be a compassionate and dignified choice to end suffering.
• Natural death is often idealized but rarely peaceful for pets.
• Quality of life checklists and journals can bring clarity to the decision-making process.
• It's normal to struggle with guilt, grief, and uncertainty.
• Conversations with your veterinarian (and even your pet) are essential.
• In-home euthanasia can offer a peaceful, personalized goodbye.
• The decision often "makes itself" when the time is right.
• A strong veterinary relationship makes all the difference.
• Trusted third-party input can ease relational disagreements or inner doubt.

• Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and YouTube
• Schedule your personalized one-on-one consultation with Dr. Angie
• Shop my favorite CBD.

Please subscribe and review! xoxo Dr. Angie & JoJo

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction: End-of-Life is Universal
• 1:28 Talking to Kids about Pet Loss
• 6:00 What is a "Good Death"? Understanding Euthanasia
• 9:00 The Myth of a Peaceful Natural Death
• 12:00 Personal Stories: Trauma, Timing, And Terminal Diagnoses
• 16:00 Suffering vs Non-Suffering
• 18:32 In-Home Euthanasia and Creating a Peaceful Goodbye
• 21:15 Navigating Family Disagreements and Emotional Conflict
• 21:55 Quality of Life: Knowing When It's Time
• 23:35 Final Thoughts and How We Can Support You

Transcript

Dr. Angie (00:00)
Welcome back to Tails of Truth where we tell the truth about veterinary medicine. I'm Dr. Angie and this is JoJo, my veterinary nurse. And today we are going to be talking about end of life care. And while this is a really sad topic, it's really important and we want you to feel supported. So we're going to tell you everything that we know and everything we think you should know. Yeah.

JoJo (00:20)
It's such an important topic, right? Because

every pet parent is going to experience it.

Dr. Angie (00:26)
Because we all die. And so do our pets.

JoJo (00:27)
Yeah and because

life spans theirs versus ours we're just it's I feel like everybody's going to experience this if you have a pet.

Dr. Angie (00:31)
Yeah.

Yes, it's guaranteed. It's part of what we sign up for. And yesterday morning, I found myself doing a last minute beta euthanasia before school. So a beta is a fish. Yeah, so my youngest Tula got a beta fish for her birthday about a year and a half ago. And we knew that beta fish only lived about two years and we don't, when you go to

JoJo (00:49)
What is a beta? Okay, beta fish.

Dr. Angie (01:03)
smart you don't know how old the fish is when you get the fish. So Tony Roney our betta fish he has had bladder disease so he keeps like sinking to the bottom and I've done all the treatment basically what I read is that at some point there's some other cause to their bladder disease like some other underlying cause like I I think mom probably had a tumor or something like that and so

JoJo (01:06)
Hey.

Dr. Angie (01:30)
Tula and I have been talking about Tony Rooney's quality of life and when it might be appropriate to send Tony Rooney over the Rainbow Bridge. But it's been an interesting conversation to have with a seven-year-old because I hear the gears going, and this is, we still have these conversations in our head as adults, but you hear the gears going of like, well, I don't want him to suffer, but I'm gonna be really sad if he's not here.

And so trying to explain to a seven-year-old that the decisions we make for Tony Roni have to be in Tony Roni's best interest and not in ours. And that's so hard. Yes.

JoJo (02:05)
I love this conversation.

Oh, but I just want to wrap Tula up in a little like hug because that's so hard to have that conversation.

Dr. Angie (02:12)
Yes.

so hard. And it's understandable. the feelings that she's expressing and verbalizing are so human. We're like, I don't want to experience those sloths. I don't want to send my pet on because I don't want to live without them. Even though they might be suffering. And we of course want the best for them. It's it's hard to ignore the part where you're like, No, I don't want you to die. You know, you have to stay. This is not how this was supposed to play out.

Even when we get to keep them their whole lifespan, we're never really ready.

JoJo (02:43)
Well, and it's just so dynamic to me, the attachment that Tula can have to a fish. You know, it's like, aw, I mean, honey, Ronnie, yeah.

Dr. Angie (02:49)
I know.

I made the mistake of saying, did you,

do you feel, did you feel really close to Tony Roni? Cause he didn't really interact with him. And she said, yes, mom, Tony Roni was my fish and he talked to me. And I was like, yeah. And I, I realized that what I said was insensitive. And I think as a veterinarian, think growing up with a mom that's a veterinarian has disadvantages because the way I talk about death can be very matter of fact.

JoJo (03:02)
Mm.

I believe her.

Hmm.

Mm-hmm, very practical.

Dr. Angie (03:23)
and

very practical. And I have posed a lot of our animals, euthanasias, you know, very practical, even though they're emotional. And I'd like to think I have a lot of emotional intelligence and softness. I think sometimes being a veterinarian's child is probably a little harsh. I don't know.

JoJo (03:43)
I don't know, because when you're telling that story, I was Tula's age when I lost Tom and Jerry, and those were my fish. And my parents, I wish they would have at least had the conversation. was, we're going to flush them down the toilet. Right? And I think that's probably from my generation, probably a lot of what happened to fish. But I narrate fish again. After that, still to this day.

Dr. Angie (03:50)
Aww.

⁓

Awwww from Tom and

JoJo (04:07)
So

I had a deep attachment to Tom and Jerry, because they were in my space all the time. They were a presence. They were something I had to care for. So maybe you're practical in your conversations, but at least the conversations being had, and there's a lot of respect for the life of Tony Rooney.

Dr. Angie (04:11)
Yeah.

Absolutely.

Yes. Yes. I thought it was very important

for her to understand that if we can relieve Tony Rooney suffering, it's important and that we're not going to make him better. I've already tried the treatment. The treatment failed and now there's nothing else to do to make him feel better. And that, you know, not being able to swim up to the top to get his food is probably felt feeling really bad for him. So sometimes.

JoJo (04:35)
Mm-hmm.

And so how

does euthanasia of a betta fish take place? Because if you're not flushing it down the toilet like my parents did.

Dr. Angie (04:57)
Why not?

So it's 7.30 AM. And actually I had spoken to another veterinarian about euthanizing fish before, and she said use clove oil. So at 7.30 AM, I am on VIN, Veterinary Information Network, trying to figure out how I can humanely euthanize this fish because, you know, I don't think I can just like...

stick euthanasia solution inside this fish doesn't work like that. So, and I wasn't about ready to can pour controlled barbiturate into this tank of water. Like I'm pretty sure my DEA license would get revoked immediately. And so I Googled as I'm packing lunches, how I might do that. And so I just found my stash of essential oils.

back from when we were all either part of do Tara or young living. So I, I found my stash and I, I put a bunch of clove oil in his tank and he had the most peaceful death. just went to sleep. Not that I've euthanized a lot of fish. So I can't say, you know, that it, but it seemed very peaceful. He just went to sleep. And that's the idea is it just.

JoJo (05:50)
Yeah. Yep.

Dr. Angie (06:15)
like renders them unconscious. Yeah. So.

JoJo (06:19)
Okay, well

let's talk about euthanasia in the sense of when I was getting my death doula license for animal medicine, euthanasia is spoken about as a good death. But as we've seen in practice, not every person believes in euthanasia.

Dr. Angie (06:30)
Mm-hmm.

Yes.

they do not.

JoJo (06:43)
And I always find that to be a really challenging space of how to have the conversation about end of life when you can actively see that their pet is in this transition from, you know, life to death. There's a, and so how do you approach that conversation?

Dr. Angie (06:57)
Yes.

I actually grew up in a family that supposedly did not believe in euthanasia.

So I was an ashram kid more or less, and my family had, has a guru in India. My mom's not alive anymore. So I kind of feel like I always use my parents in the past tense. ⁓ they have a guru in India and everything's very much about karma, being a vegetarian. And the idea was that you don't want to eat animals, kill them for any reason. And that includes euthanasia because.

suffering has a purpose. And so that's how I was raised. Although I think if push came to shove, I think our family pets would have been euthanized, although that we did have one cat that I think had kidney failure that suffered for too long, in my opinion. And so I, of course, as a veterinarian, did not continue that belief. So I came up in that. But

Once you get to veterinary school and you take the oath that your job is to alleviate suffering and continue the human animal bond, it becomes very clear that euthanasia is such a gift. And I would rather be euthanized than left to suffer. And so while I understand

why people might have differing beliefs. It's nothing that I have continued on into my career. And for those that do want to let their animals die naturally, which you and I can talk about what that means, there are a lot of ways that we can help alleviate suffering. But if you've ever hospiced a person like I did with my own mother,

That's really uncomfortable and you can just be unconscious on narcotics, but it's still not comfortable for them. It's awful.

JoJo (08:55)
Right.

Yeah, it's pretty, I think that that is challenging that let your pet die naturally, I find myself really challenged in that space. Because a natural death is not necessarily a peaceful death. But I think that's what I hear when people say I just want them to have a natural death. I think that the idea that they are presenting is that this will be to no fault of their own.

to no fault that I think we all wish that that we wouldn't have to make that life or death decision for another being. It's incredible responsibility. Especially for something and someone or something. Yeah, that we love. Like, that we have to Yeah, it's incredible decision and incredible weight to have to make. So I think sometimes when I hear that, I think they really are saying, I don't want to make that decision for my pet.

Dr. Angie (09:40)
Yeah. Well, it feels unnatural. Yeah.

JoJo (09:55)
But a natural death in the wild, if our pets were really having a natural death, would not be so peaceful. They would likely be left behind by their group left to prey, as prey, left to predators. Or they would just suffer immensely until they just couldn't take another step forward.

And I have a memory of a client who had this cat who had not eaten in so long. It had been well past the time, which we would have thought that this cat would have passed without eating. And the cat kept going outside and going underneath the bush. And she would call me and say, well, I just keep bringing him back in. And I just felt like, think the cat is really, if we were really listening.

trying to excuse itself, you know, and find that peaceful place to, to, it knew that his time was done. But sometimes we want to hold on so tightly that we just keep bringing them back and, and it's so hard to know where that line is.

Dr. Angie (11:00)
It's really hard, especially when it's your own pet. You're so close.

JoJo (11:02)
⁓ even doing this,

no matter how many euthanasias I've been a part of, when it comes to my own pet, I am going to need guidance and need, I just won't. Well, the way I had the conversation with my last dog who was 16 is I felt it was a conversation. Every day I would check in with him until the point that he was just like, I'm just so tired. That was the words or the energy that I felt from him that he was just tired, he was done.

Dr. Angie (11:12)
Yes.

Mm-hmm.

I'm just too tired. Yes.

JoJo (11:31)
Yeah, and if

I was going to keep going with the treatments and all of that, that was really my will, not his.

Dr. Angie (11:38)
Yes. And that's, that's the hard part is understanding what part you're doing for you and what part you're doing for them. And it can be really hard. Yes.

JoJo (11:45)
Mm-hmm.

And that's where the trusted third party can be really useful.

If you have a trusted third party such as your veterinarian, you asked a really great question right before this episode is, if you could ask your veterinarian, how does this disease typically play out? I think that's a fantastic question and fantastic conversation to have.

Dr. Angie (11:54)
Yes.

Yes.

And that's what most people ask me when I, when they come to me as for a second opinion, or if I am delivering the terminal diagnosis, most people ask what happens if I don't euthanize my dog? How is this going to look? And that is really different in every disease process. And some of those deaths play out more painfully than others, like dogs with

Hemanji of sarcomas I find do one of two things. One, they don't feel well and they don't eat because they have a large space occupying mass that makes it hard for them to eat and then they bleed to death so slowly that they're so tired and nauseous and feel awful. Or the second situation is is they bleed quickly. And people always feel such tremendous guilt for that moment. But I tell people that's the most peaceful death.

Like bleeding out quickly, you just go to sleep. Relatively painless, like that is the way to go. But it's hard to, it's hard to come home and find your dog that has already passed away or when they just drop in the backyard. ⁓ and that has happened to me. My dog died of hemangiosarcoma, but he, he fell down, had a seizure and just didn't keep breathing. And so for him, that was a really peaceful death. But for-

JoJo (13:22)
but traumatic for

you and the girls, I imagine. Yeah.

Dr. Angie (13:23)
god it was so traumatic for me he was fine the whole time but I

yeah I was traumatized I mean seizures are so violent and then he just wasn't gonna start breathing and I was like I'm like rushing him getting him into the car because I'm like I'm gonna go take him to Dr. Zapori and then I'm just thinking no I'm not what you know like you it's hard to think about what's gonna happen next because I didn't actually know he had cancer at the time but I think when you're

JoJo (13:32)
They're so hard to see. They're so hard to witness.

Yeah.

Dr. Angie (13:52)
dog or cat gets that terminal diagnosis, it's really important to look at what might happen and talk to your veterinarian about the progression.

JoJo (14:02)
Well, and I think that's an important piece of this too, because at some point, your animal is going to pass from from their disease state. And sometimes that's rushing them to the emergency room. And is that like playing out? Like, what do you want that transition to look like? Do you want it to be frenetic and running to an emergency room where they're euthanizing? Or do you want it to be in their bed at home with all their favorite people?

Dr. Angie (14:15)
Yes.

Yes.

JoJo (14:29)
Like there's

some beautifulness in that choice as well.

Dr. Angie (14:33)
You know, with my last horse, Dunny, I made that choice. He was really arthritic and having trouble getting around. He was doing it. He was okay. But I decided on a Sunday afternoon, I think it was last May, he was okay. And I decided to let him go. And my veterinarian, because I don't do horse medicine anymore, but my veterinarian was like, you know, most of these guys,

I have to euthanize in a really traumatic way because they've fallen down into a ditch and they're scared and they're, you know, really in a lot of distress and pain. And he got to take his last breath on a day with his friends, eating grass when it was warm outside. And so he didn't have to be uncomfortable. And I think that is important to consider if you can.

JoJo (15:25)
It really, I think it really is that it's such a valuable piece. And I think it's so tricky, because that question too, has come up for myself with my own decisions about when is the right moment? when is the and that's where a quality of life checklist can come in. You know, how many calendar days is your pet not been feeling themselves like because we can start to lie to ourselves.

We can start to lie to ourselves and our pets can do these rallies that all of sudden we think that they are like, wow, they're well. I mean, we see it all the time and then they tank.

Dr. Angie (15:50)
absolutely.

I know.

and then they tank,

yeah.

JoJo (16:02)
So I

don't know that there's a sweet spot. I like to believe there's this sweet spot before there's suffering. And that's where you and I have differed sometimes. like, I kind of want to cut it off before there's any suffering. And I think you're more on the side of like some sufferings. Okay. Yeah.

Dr. Angie (16:17)
Yeah, probably

for my upbringing, but I always tell people you can do it too early. You can do it at the perfect time or you can do it too late and you're never going to know what the perfect time is. And so everyone's always concerned. Oh, I think I did it too early or I think I did it too late. I think knowing that, that you're going to feel at one end, the other, is it like important to accept? Very rarely do you feel like, Oh, that was the perfect timing.

JoJo (16:29)
Nose. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Angie (16:44)
And knowing which one of those you're more, you're going to have more peace with because you're going to be the one having to live with that decision. And so.

JoJo (16:55)
Mm-hmm.

⁓ it's such a challenge. But I also believe if you have a good veterinarian, they're not going to euthanize your pet too early. They're going to tell you that it's not time. So you can kind of set that down, put that weight on your veterinarian's shoulders. Most are not going to do that. And most are going to interject too if they're feeling like it's too, like it's definitely time.

Dr. Angie (17:06)
No.

That's true.

JoJo (17:23)
I don't think that we really ever judge if you're not ready to make that decision.

Dr. Angie (17:29)
No, we understand. We totally, I always say 99 % of the veterinarians I've worked with, they don't. They don't judge. No one's thinking.

JoJo (17:36)
No, but you have a responsibility

to, on behalf of that animal, to say, you know, at this point, here she is suffering. Like... yeah, for sure.

Dr. Angie (17:40)
Yes.

Most veterinarians will hurt your feelings in order to advocate for your pet.

Yeah, we're willing to do that. We're taught to because we took the oath to... Yeah.

JoJo (17:50)
Mm-hmm.

But that's also challenging. There's another

side of that because I feel sad sometimes when we have clients who have a brick and mortar that's maybe not meeting them where they're at in terms of, like they're not ready to euthanize, but they don't go get the medicine that they need or the support that they need because they feel so much pressure that they're just gonna be really pressured to euthanize and they're not ready yet. And so that's tricky too.

Dr. Angie (18:09)
Yeah.

Right.

I,

yeah, that is really tricky. That's when you have to find a veterinarian that is going to support you and that you have a good working relationship with. It's so important.

JoJo (18:31)
And if you're able, if you're in that space of having close to making that decision with your pet, and you can do an in-home euthanasia, I just think once I've had an in-home euthanasia, I don't wanna do it any other way. I mean, and I know that that's a gift and that's a privilege and not every situation, an end of life situation is gonna present that way.

Dr. Angie (18:44)
It's so much better.

JoJo (18:51)
But when you're in that hospice or quality of life space, like you can engage the end of life veterinarian so that they're ready for you or your veterinarian sometimes will do house calls for this moment. And that's kind of, think there's comfort in knowing that somebody can come when it's time. Because sometimes that moment shows up very quickly sometimes.

Dr. Angie (19:07)
Absolutely. Yes.

It does. I always tell people that are worried, is it time? Is it time? I always say, don't worry. That decision makes itself. It's almost, it has its own life and it makes its own self known. Yeah.

JoJo (19:21)
It really does.

And that comes

back to trusting yourself. And you know your pet, you know your dog, you know your cat. I know it sounds weird to say, but have a conversation with them.

Dr. Angie (19:33)
Yes.

I know.

I talked to all of my dying pets. I didn't talk to the fish. didn't talk to Tony Roni. Tula might have, yes, but I've talked to all my cats. ⁓ and well, I didn't get to have a conversation with my dog. We've talked to my, yeah, I've talked to everyone about it and I don't think that's crazy at all. And they always tell me and when I don't know it's because it's not clear and it's not time. Usually my not knowing is just an indication that it's just not time yet.

JoJo (19:45)
Yeah, I was gonna ask what a tough, but two of them I have.

Mm-hmm.

And I actually love this because we do have a client whose cat is older and it seemed that that time was coming and she was having conversations with her cat and she's like, I don't think she's quite there yet. And so there was this big advocacy for let's really support her and she's doing fantastic. And that was it, like, so we can get it wrong sometimes and you know your pet best.

Dr. Angie (20:11)
You don't know.

Yeah.

Absolutely.

Yes, you do know your pet best. yeah, ask other people. mean, when you were, and you and I were making house calls and Simba had been diagnosed with lymphoma, you were coming over and saying like, he doesn't look so good. And that was important because days had gone by in between the last time you saw him in the present time. And so was like, ⁓ isn't that right? Didn't you see him and not looking so well? Yeah. Yeah.

JoJo (20:57)
Yeah, I mean, sometimes I could see like his weight change. Like just think about

human to human, like you live with people, you don't always see their weight gain. But if you go away for a week and come back, you're like, like, when did that start? Just because when we're in close connection. Yeah, you'll hear it from pet sitters, like, oh, that she had more energy or she was not moving around as much or she would, you know, they seem to notice things that we maybe don't.

Dr. Angie (21:09)
Yes.

Yes.

You what's really hard is when animals are loved by a couple and they don't agree about when it's time. ⁓ that breaks my heart because then it becomes a relational problem. And you know, both of those people want what's best for that pet. then in their, right. And their time of grief, they need each other and then they're at odds. And I see that and I'm just like, ⁓ I feel so sad for them. Yeah.

JoJo (21:26)
⁓ so hard.

Yeah, and they're just managing grief differently.

That happens a lot.

that's a good, that's actually fantastic. Like there could, that's where I think those quality of life checklists come in so great because you're, you're unbiased in what you're saying. Did your cat eat? Did your cat drink water? Did your cat, like, you know, there are just these checklists and you can start to see a pattern. And that's, that's just data.

Dr. Angie (22:02)
Yes.

Yes.

I always tell people to keep a journal, rate the days, because most of the time when animals have a terminal disease, they're going to go up and down and that's to be expected. And on the good days, it doesn't mean they're going to be good forever. And the bad days doesn't mean they're necessarily going to be bad forever. But if you can get a pattern and be like, yeah, usually we have two good days and then a bad day and then another good day. But we've had five bad days in a row.

And we have that, you know, basically more like objective data to go off of like, yeah, they vomited or, you know, they didn't go on the walk or they couldn't do this or didn't want to engage. They didn't meet me at the door. Those things can be really important and you have to write them down because when you're hospicing a person or a pet, time is not real.

JoJo (22:59)
Mm-hmm.

Dr. Angie (22:59)
everything,

all the days blur together, you're stressed, you're not sleeping, so write it down. Keep a journal.

JoJo (23:05)
That's an important piece of advice because I do think too that we can grab onto those moments of hope. Just the one thing, ⁓ appetites are great because my cat ate dinner, but but your cat didn't eat for two days before this or the two days after. No.

Dr. Angie (23:21)
Right. You're like,

licking a little bit of Fancy Feast doesn't count. Yeah. That's so hard.

JoJo (23:25)
Yeah. And, ugh,

such a hard decision. Always. It's rarely easy.

Dr. Angie (23:31)
It's so hard.

Yes, and this is when you need to have a good conversation with your veterinarian and you need to have a good relationship to have that conversation.

JoJo (23:41)
And I would add to that, that it can be helpful with that big life decision if you want a second opinion. Just to make extra sure, Dr. Angie does offer video consultations, and a lot of them are these opinions, second opinion, just wanting to make sure, like, is this the best path forward? No.

Dr. Angie (23:58)
Yes. I can be your veterinarian in that moment. I can help you make that decision. So you can find us there, boulderholisticvet.com. And then what's our forward slash? Yeah. Just go to the website.

JoJo (24:11)
the video consultation. I would recommend we're working on this going to boulderholisticvet.com

and click on video consultations. All the information would be there.

Dr. Angie (24:19)
click on go. Right.

So we don't have our new redirect. So I can help you if you just need a different opinion, if you want to run it by me, I'm the care plan. Are we doing everything we can for pain management? Some veterinarians really nail pain management. And I think others just, I don't know if they get busy or they just haven't done a lot of continuing education, but there's a lot of things that we can do to help your pet.

JoJo (24:30)
A care plan?

Dr. Angie (24:48)
with their end of life time with less pain. And so that's important. can give you some ideas. Yes.

JoJo (24:53)
and help your decision making in that time. So you can

set down the guilt or the shame or the, you know, just the unknown. We can be a sounding board for that.

Dr. Angie (25:02)
We would love to hear from you. Tell us about your end of life time with your pet. How do you know? We would love to hear from you. You can leave a comment wherever you're watching this and we will see you next time. Bye.