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Wordy & Woebegone Wednesday; Two Years Ago Today I Lost My Theodore
Please send prayers out for us today as we are mourning; the two year-anniversary of our loss of Theodore is today, February 8th. I remember typing this post six months after he passed – my grief hasn’t improved TOO TOO much…. I remember that first post – it got 85 comments.
The Sad Sunday six-month tribute has a beautiful poem called Living Love. I suggest you read it here if you’ve lost a pet… it’s touching and full of truth.
I remember that Monday morning like it was yesterday; I’m so sad just typing this that my fingers are shaking, my hands are unsteady and tears are pouring over my prized Pavilion keypad.
I miss Theodore and STILL don’t understand how I haven’t EVER grieved for anyone or anything like I do and have for him.
It just doesn’t make any sense to me.
Is it because he was the first thing I considered REALLY mine? The first thing/being that I raised, owned, bought (adopted), loved and taught? (Not like a first car or anyth
ing like that – almost like a human connection…?)
Am I NUTS or what?
Some of you might call me crazy for saying this; I think the Kitty Gods sent Mad Maxwell down to me to take Theodore’s place.
Max – especially over the last few months – has become SO MUCH like Dora that it’s downright uncanny. He sleeps in the same exact spots, he races me up the stairway at night in the same manner and launches himself from the foyer with the same precision that only a Jaguar has…
Max also eats and treasures his crunchies and special upstairs (bedroom) crunchy-drawer like Theodore did. (Maybe a rescue cat always will eat like he’s starved…) Max even has the same personality elements – the silliness, the goofball demeanor, the blinky eyes when he’s tired or wants pets, the “I’m going to pretend to ignore you when I want attention” ‘tude.
Yes, I realize many cats have these traits – but Theodore took them “to a T,” no pun intended.
So is this the way that I have raised Max?
Or is it a Higher Power working so that I won’t be so sad in missing Doree (his nickname, which he despised because he told me that’s a girl name…)?
Let me know what you think…
Have you ever lost an animal and then felt like God (or Whom or Whatever you Believe In) sent you something else or someone to replace him/her? I’m not just talking cats here – I’m talking dogs, horses, beloved friends, treasured fiancées, etc.
*** The reason I have the Live Strong graphics up is because Theodore died – like so many cats and dogs – of cancer. Theodore had some type of andeocarcinoma, a very rare type of cancer. The vet did not remove all of it when he took the tumor and gall bladder out during the first surgery – as they cannot remove a cat’s entire bile duct. ***
Theodore tried SO HARD to pull through but he just couldn’t make it. I found him that Monday morning lying on my bedroom’s bathroom floor like a TRUE TOUGH-ASS TABBY, a FIGHTER FIRST-CLASS… He was hiding behind the toilet… As many of you know, when cats are really ill or feeling really bad, they hide instead of trying to let you know. They purr to try to comfort themselves. Sometimes, as in Dora’s case, this is a small, unrewarded effort to turn it around, but at least their little motors keep them going. That’s what I tell myself.
I can’t type anymore because I am crying so hard.
I love you Theodore and you will never be forgotten; you will always be missed greatly.
(And to Gibson (Gibby) – who passed just four days later from cancer – we will talk to you Sunday.)
Love, Mom
When i lost my Shasta, a mini-schnauzer, to diabetes on March 13, 2008 i felt like my world had collapsed. She was everything to me since i had gotten her as a puppy as a gift. She was the one who brought me back to lifee after being ill for a long time. She also was like my child in so many ways. Shewas a great dog in many ways & loved children. She could be stubborn too. But she always brought a smile to my face. Losing her was tough & everyone around me was afraid what would happen to me without her. Everyone said for me to get another dog immediately but i just couldn’t. I had told her once in jest that if i had to ever get another dog it would be a schnoodle since i had had a poodle before. My mom called a few days later to ask if i had ever heard of a schnoodle because someone she worked with was looking to get rid of hers’. I cried since i knew it was meant to be. I only asked that she didn’t look like Shasta & she didn’t, then! But by the time she had her shots & got her haircut she did look like her it didn’t matter. I knew Shasta & God had sent Tara to mend my broken heart. Tara has brought a smile to my face every day. But I needed that confirmation from Shasta to be able to forward in my grief.
Thanks Denise. I love the part you said about “Losing her was tough & everyone around me was afraid what would happen to me without her.” My family feared the same.
And now they know that same that yours does with Tara….
Thanks for your comment and comfort.
JL Smith
I am hoping to be very busy on March 16, which will be the fifth anniversary of my heart cat Elliott’s passing. He had been diagnosed with chronic renal failure on Christmas Eve, 2006 (Merry Christmas—not!) and despite my best efforts and that of his vet, died from complications of CRF the day before St. Patrick’s Day. While I was expecting to lose him (he was 16 1/2 years of age), and remember calmly giving the okay to euthanize him when his lab work came back & his physical exam revealed he’d had a stroke and was now blind, that first night it hit me he was gone forever. I cried at the drop of a hat, I could not listen to the song “Dry” by Incubus because it had been on the radio twice that morning we rushed E to the vet for the last time.
By the end of May a voice inside me started telling me it was time. I looked for tuxie kittens who were born around the time E passed, and adopted Ryan on June 1. Ryan was somewhat like E when he was young, but was fiercely independent. On Christmas Eve 2007, I purposefully went to a Petco that did not have adoptions. On that day, they did, and a tiny 4 1/2 month old tuxie kitten looked at me, and I at her. The voice said “Take this cat home, she will make a difference in your life. She wants to be with you.” I could not quiet the voice. Cammi cat is now my heart cat, she’s mended the hole E left, but I still feel his loss quite acutely.
(((Hugs))) Mom misses sweet Sniffie a lot too. She thinks about her every day and “talks” to her.
The Florida Furkids
How are you guys? We’ll stop by soon
The Living Love poem is just beautiful.
((((hugs)))
Love ya lots
Mitch
Thanks for your support all…
We’re thinking about you and sending comforting purrs. Mom Paula knows how you feel because she lost Sweet Praline to cancer. She truly believes that Sweet Praline led her to both of us because we each have a little something of Praline in us.
Truffle and Brulee