What my friends were really asking, however, was a valid question for all pet owners. How much treatment is too much? When do we stop putting our pets through painful procedures and giving them multiple medications, many with their own side effects? Just because we can now spend thousands of dollars on tests and exotic treatments for our pets, should we? Do they increase the quality of the pet's life? Those were questions as Boo Boo and I entered the marble hallway of a multi-story medical complex in north Dallas, a temple to the latest in veterinary treatment. It should have been called the Mayo Clinic for Pets and I cringed when I realized the facilities and quality of care were probably superior to the emergency room I had taken my father to a few weeks earlier.

After a liver biopsy and various intensive stomach tests, the doctor pronounced Boo Boo's diagnosis: Inflammatory Bowel Disease. He did not have cancer, and changing his diet and administering oral steroids would eventually help control the symptoms.

But Boo Boo's plight was not over. The tests themselves had exacerbated some of his earlier problems and he began a rapid decline. Too weak to eat, he shed several pounds. His breathing was shallow and rapid. He seemed to be slipping away. I had to consider whether it was time to let him go or to continue treatments that might possibly cause him pain.

During one particularly bleak visit, his doctor brought out jars of human baby food to see if she could tempt Boo Boo to eat. Lying on the examination table, he began to lick the food, then eat it. The doctor firmly said it was clear Boo Boo hadn't given up and neither should I. After hand feeding him for more than two weeks, his strength began to return.

Now his test results are practically normal. He seems happy, purring as he sits in my lap or stretches in the sunlight. Mercifully, the litter box issues are no more. Those few weeks also cost me close to $5,000. And Boo Boo's health does depend on taking six pills every day for the rest of his life. "Is the best and latest treatment always the best? I can't say that it would be across the board," says Marc Bekoff, an animal behaviorist at the University of Colorado, Boulder. "Being able to afford to do the best treatment available in and of itself is not always a compelling reason. We need to look at individual cases but I do think our animals tell us at some point their life isn't over and I don't mean that in some la, la, mystical way." Boo Boo wasn't ready to go--even if he is probably ready for me to stop calling him by such a silly name.