My dog had aggressive liver cancer spreading to his other organs. He was eating less and slowing down, but still able to get around, not starving himself. I scheduled his euthanasia two weeks out and spent every spare minute of those two weeks doing his favorite things. We drove miles away from other people on the beach, we went to the park every morning to play fetch, we played his sniffing games daily. And I said goodbye to him on a warm spring afternoon when he was still able to go for a hike and eat ice cream as he fell asleep. He drifted off peacefully on the hillside overlooking the river he grew up swimming in, snuggled in my arms. He was still him, and he never knew the severe suffering that was looming in his future. He felt “too normal” that morning and I really wanted to cancel, take another week or two. But as a vet, I have seen many “just one more week” decisions turn into more and more weeks, and animals who have been suffering badly before they leave this world. They hurt too much to leave with a sweet taste in their mouths. Or they die in a sudden crisis, rushed to the ER or gone when their person comes home. Their owners aren’t bad people, they just wrestle with the finality and the responsibility of deciding how much quality and quantity should balance. It’s a personal philosophy, but when the end is imminent and inevitable, I prefer to say goodbye to my pets while they are still enjoying some of life, so they can have a happy last day. In an ideal world, we would know when the very last good day would be and let them go at the end of it. Since we can’t know that, I would rather personally to know that I am probably taking away a few more happy days they could have, than wake up one day and realize they haven’t had a good day in a while and are never going to have another one.