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Good question. During that time we didn't know exactly what was wrong. I brought her in for the boil, we ran lots of tests, and the only thing we could determine was that she was anemic. If she ate more she was anemic less as long as the wound continued to aspirate. I cleaned it up every night, kept a patch on it, and fed her whatever would make her eat her dog food. That ended up being lots of hot dogs, burgers, and pumpkin puree but it varied by the day. Sometimes she really liked this gut flora powder. If I didn't add this stuff, she plainly just wouldn't eat. By the team she wouldn't eat food with the additives for three days is when I brought her in. At the time I didn't know it, but the cancer she had was sending her into a sort of liver failure.

When she passed away her abdomen relaxed and the vet was able to feel her liver. It was covered in tens of tumors. Without a way to clean her blood her body was expelling the blood. On the day I put her down had I not given her a blood transfusion her tiredness would have shifted towards being weak and achey, probably pretty painful, and she would've been susceptible to severe infection, stroke, or a seizure. After the blood transfusion she would've immediately needed surgery to attempt to remove the largest tumors and chemotherapy to attempt to rid her of the cancer.

The odds of surviving the surgery and chemotherapy were relatively low. I didn't listen to much the vet said as I just kind of zoned out while she explained the options that day. What I do remember is the vet noting that both of those options would result in a lot of pain that she wasn't going to understand and that the odds of survival were very low while the cost was going to be high. In my mind, humans have the privilege of letting a pet leave this world with marginal suffering - a privilege we don't even really extend to ourselves. In the end, I made the choice that I'd want for myself.