He was pushing 27 and I realized that I could throw every cent I had at trying to diagnose him and if I suceeded, he could succomb to something else 6 months later. Or I could let him go. In the end, he made the decision for me.

It was brutally expensive considering my situation, and left me flat broke. 18+ months later, I will be replacing him.

If you rescue elderly or special needs critters from shelters, sometimes they can help defray some medical expenses in order to make room for more.

The thing is to give it enough time after that you have a $$ buffer again. And then go for it. What else is life about? You live while you can, that is all.

to you.

Because it's not fair to them to not be able to take them to a vet when they are sick. But as somebody else suggested, maybe the shelter or a local vet would have a cost sharing program for adopting an older cat. If you can't find something like that, maybe consider fostering animals. I'm sure it's hard to let them go once they do get adopted, but it probably beats not having an animal in your life.

The last cat I adopted, I chose specifically because she was older, not overly outgoing and not particularly cute. I figured she wasn't likely to be adopted by anybody else. And while it took me a month to get her out from under my bed (she clawed her way into the box spring) she then spent every night sleeping on top of me. But the only really expensive thing for her was having to have 6 teeth yanked because they were rotten. But my parents had a husky and a malamute who when they got old did need some expensive drugs. They were fortunately able to budget them in, although there was some grumbling when the husky had to be put to sleep right after a refill on his kidney medicine.

That's the deal we make as animal lovers. At some point you have to say good-bye. You're a good soul.

I do think it's better to adopt and give them a home, good food and lots of love. As someone without a lot of money, my pets were never abused and only knew love and kindness.
When one of them became ill, I would borrow money if I had to to take them to the vet.