🐾 When “Doing Everything” Isn’t Always the Kindest Choice

Love & Toe Beans - Brisbane Gentle Home Pet Euthanasia, Pet Cremation & Pet Quality of Life - Greater Brisbane Region

Just Because We Can, Doesn’t Always Mean We Should

In today’s world of advanced veterinary medicine, there’s so much we can do. We can operate on senior dogs and geriatric cats. We can offer chemotherapy, remove cancerous organs, perform amputations, and manage chronic disease to extend a pet’s life, even as their bodies begin to fail, slowly and quietly.

But here’s the quiet truth that loving pet parents wrestle with every day:
Just because we can pursue a treatment, doesn’t always mean we should.

At Love & Toe Beans, we’ve seen the heartbreak of these decisions up close. We understand the deep hope that drives us to try one more thing, and the equally deep guilt that surfaces when we start wondering… what if doing less is actually doing more?

This post isn’t about giving up. It’s about letting go with love, and learning to tell the difference between extending life and extending suffering.

⚖️ Treatment vs. Quality of Life: Sometimes Two Different Goals

Modern veterinary care can often offer a treatment path.
But the more important question is:

Will this treatment help my pet live, or simply keep them alive?

It’s an essential question, because while modern veterinary care offers an incredible range of treatments, not all of them serve the same purpose and not all are appropriate for every stage of life.

There’s a meaningful distinction between:

• Treatments that offer true recovery or comfort, and

• Treatments that simply prolong decline, discomfort, or confusion

For example:

• Surgery might remove a tumour and be curative or give them more high quality years, or in an older or frailer animal approaching the end of their life, it may result in weeks of pain, disorientation, and rehabilitation with little benefit in return.

• Chemotherapy can be a powerful tool for certain cancers, particularly when the disease is detected early. In some pets, it may lead to remission and offer meaningful months, even years of extended, joyful life. But it’s not without trade-offs. Some pets may experience side effects that can significantly impact their comfort and emotional wellbeing. And in some cases, particularly with advanced or aggressive cancers, chemotherapy may not extend life at all.

• Feeding tubes, when used in recovery or temporary illness, can be life-saving. But when placed in a pet at the very end of life, they may only sustain a body that is already letting go, while diminishing comfort, connection, and dignity.

• Repeated Hospitalisation for intensive care (such as IV fluids for end-stage kidney disease) may add days, weeks or even months, but it’s important to ask, especially at the later stages of this disease: What are those days like for my pet? Are they able to come home, feel safe, eat voluntarily, and connect with their family? Or are they simply being kept alive in a clinical space, away from everything familiar?

In human medicine, the phrase “futile care” is used to describe aggressive interventions that offer little to no benefit in terms of wellbeing. The same principle applies in veterinary care. Just because we can do something, doesn’t always mean we should, especially if it doesn't align with the pet’s remaining quality of life.

That said, some treatments are truly life-saving and life-enhancing.

It’s important to acknowledge that many interventions, even advanced ones can and do add meaningful time and joy to a pet’s life when used appropriately. A well-timed surgery, targeted cancer therapy, or pain management plan can give pets months or years of additional good days.

The key is thoughtful, honest evaluation and these decisions should never be made alone.

When in doubt, consult a Veterinary Specialist.

If you're facing a complex or emotional medical decision, a conversation with your regular vet and a specialist (such as a veterinary oncologist, internist, surgeon or critical care specialist) can help clarify your options. They can offer insight not just into the possibilities, but into the realistic outcomes, including the impact on your pet’s comfort, independence, and emotional wellbeing.

At the heart of every decision should be this simple but powerful question:

Is this about helping my pet live well… or about holding on because I’m not ready to let go?

The answer may lead us down very different paths.

💔 When Treatment Becomes Trauma

It’s easy to think that doing something is better than doing nothing.
But sometimes the kindest care looks like stopping and shifting focus from cure to comfort.

Ask yourself:

• Will this treatment cause fear, pain, suffering, discomfort or confusion?

• Does it require frequent vet visits, hospitalisation, restraint, or invasive procedures?

• Is my pet strong enough emotionally or physically to recover from this?

Your pet doesn't know they're “fighting cancer” or “waiting for test results.”
They only know how they feel right now.

And sometimes, that means a life filled with pokes, pills, and car rides to clinics becomes more distressing than disease itself.

🧭 Shifting from Cure to Care

Choosing comfort-focused care over curative treatment is not giving up.
It’s changing direction, from fighting illness to honouring life.

This is where palliative care can help. These approaches focus on:

• Pain management

• Mobility support

• Emotional wellbeing

• Toileting help and hygiene

• Meaningful connection in daily life

Instead of asking, “What else can we try?”
We begin asking, “What makes today easier?” and “What brings them peace?”

🐾 What Would They Choose?

When you're unsure what path to take, try looking through your pet’s eyes.

Would they choose:

• More time… or more comfort?

• Hospital lights… or sun on their fur?

• Needles and tests… or one last walk in the park?

• Isolation and recovery… or quiet naps in your lap?

They can't tell us with words.
But they often tell us in other ways; in their eyes, their body, their energy, their absence of joy.

🫶 Loving Them Through the Hardest Choice

Letting go is not the opposite of love. It is love.

It’s love that listens.
Love that doesn’t turn away from hard truths.
Love that gives permission to rest, when staying becomes suffering.

If you’re standing at this crossroads, we know the ache in your chest. You’re not alone in it.

And if you’re wondering...

“Am I doing enough?”
“Am I giving up too soon?”
“How will I ever know for sure?”

The fact that you’re even asking means you’re already doing what matters most:
You’re loving them fully, not just in life, but in letting go.

🌿 In the End, Choose Peace Over Prolonging

Veterinary medicine gives us powerful tools. But love gives us wisdom.
Wisdom to know when enough is enough.
Wisdom to choose peace, over prolonging pain.

So when you’re faced with the question:

“Should we try one more treatment?”

It’s okay and deeply humane to instead ask:

“Will this bring my pet more comfort, or just more time?”
“Am I keeping them here for them… or for me?”

There’s no one-size-fits-all answer.
But at Love & Toe Beans, we’ll help you ask the right questions, sit with you in the uncertainty, and honour the life and bond you’ve shared, no matter which path you choose.

Because sometimes the kindest decision is also the hardest one.
And you don’t have to make it alone. 💛

For support reach out to us here.

For more Quality of Life Resources click here.

With Love (& Toe Beans),

The Love & Toe Beans Team 💛

Brisbane Gentle Home Pet Euthanasia - Brisbane Pet Cremation - Pet Quality of Life - Pet Grief Support

Serving Greater Brisbane Region, including Brisbane, Logan, Ipswich, Moreton Bay & Redland Bay.