Losing a beloved pet

Sam adopted me in 2006.  He was a starving kitten my husband had found and brought to me.  I fed Sam , bathed him, wrapped him in a towel and  I still remember how he fell asleep in my lap still purring.  His little pink paws were still kitten-soft and small.   He was afraid of our 100-pound chocolate lab, Bear, but that fear didn’t last long.  And so Sam became part of our family.

We named the kitten Sam because the vet estimated his birthday to be July 4,  the day the United States  (also known as “Uncle Sam”) was born.  Sam  was always a friendly cat.  He liked to snuggle me  and many mornings after my husband had left for work, Bear would lie on one side of me and Sam would lie on the other.  Those two often gave me the strength to start another day.  I was living in a community that had rejected me many, many times and even short errands  had become hard for me.  The 20-year-old who had packed her bags and moved to Washington, D.C., on her own  without knowing anyone there in 1989 had turned into a shell of the hopeful person she once was.  But Sam and Bear loved me, my husband and son loved me and God loved me too and that had to be enough.

Sam grew older and fatter.  The vet said he had interstitial cystitis, so I found the money for his special cat food and frequent urinalysis exams.  My husband was on a ladder that collapsed in 2011 and our lives took a dramatic turn as I became a full-time nurse and chauffeur for him.  Sam took it all in stride and even did some nursing of his own.  He could sense where my husband needed massaging and he’d carefully knead his paws in that area of my husband’s body.

My son grew up and got married, and I took Sam to the vet once again because my cat had started vomiting.  I could only barely listen to the vet as she told me my beloved Sam had kidney failure.  I brought my baby home and gave him subcutaneous saline injections.  I sang to him, I rocked him.  I cried until I didn’t think I could cry anymore.  One night I put him in his bed and he meowed to me very weakly.  I tucked a blanket under his chin and kissed him goodnight.  I woke up about 3 a.m. to check on Sam.  His face was covered.  I peered under the blanket and he was gone.  I presumed my husband had covered Sam’s head in the middle of the night because Sam was too weak to move, much less cover his head so completely and neatly, but no, my husband said, he hadn’t covered Sam.  So my interpretation of events is that an angel came for my baby.

We buried Sam near where we had buried Bear.  Bear had saved our lives from an electrical fire and had died ten days later.  I put some of my white lilies on the graves and gave the eulogy.

Looking back, I can see how those beloved pets were in my life for a season.  After Sam died, my husband and I moved to another state.  Moving would have been hard on Bear and Sam.  Yet the paw prints those two left on my heart I will never erase.  And now I have a new life, a new dog and a new cat.

I know many people who once had an animal but then lose it say never again,  the pain is just too much, losing a beloved pet is too painful, but for me, my sorrow eases a bit when my new animals make me smile, when they brighten someone else’s day.  When I take my dog places, people often tell me of an animal they once had who also left a paw print on their heart.  They stroke my dog’s head and sometimes I see tears fall and I know those tears are all part of the healing that comes after loss.  Had I not opened my heart again, I wouldn’t have heard that stranger’s story.  Had I not opened my heart again, I would have missed a lot of joy.