The days after

This is about what happened, about Charlie's death, our last day and my feelings. It actually was a letter to someone I never really met, just know by email, but hoped this person would understand. Reading it again, I felt it was exactly what I wanted to tell and write down again and again, what I wanted to be unforgotten and noticed. It's burnt in my heart, anyway..
If you're happy with your loved furry, you probably shouldn't read it - it will only spoil your mood. Go back and enjoy Charlie's site, see what a wonderful little fellow he was when he was alive.

But maybe you're someone like me, just left behind, feeling you just lost your best friend, a child, and a true love.

And maybe it helps to know someone else felt like you.

........................................................


Thursday, July 3rd, 1997

I still feel like in a nightmare, thinking all the time it have to stop and things will have to go back to normal, with Charlie back again.
It's too terrible now, I'm looking around all the time and there is nothing, all I can see are empty places, screaming at me. At the clock it says that it's 48 hours since he died. Not exactly, we came back at 13:45 on Tuesday, and he was dead.
The vet said he had a total kidney failure, with both kidneys so destroyed that there isn't any chance to get better again. Charlie had bad cramps in the night from Monday to Tuesday, and all the days before he was unable to control urin. When he went to the box he couldn't, but then it dripped out of him where ever he stood and went. I tried to have towels under him all the time, but I hadn't enough, and once used, Charlie didn't want them anymore. I was washing all the time, but all went much too slow and didn't dry fast enough, so I used pullovers and stuff like that later.
Charlie didn't like any towels, anyway, when he was on my lap, and he didn't understand why I tried to put something under him.
Tho, it wasn't so bad at first when Charlie didn't really noticed that it went wet under him, but then he did notice. He was so very unhappy, always jumping away then, then came back trying to paw it away.

And then in the night the cramps came. Sometimes he just stood there, cramping, then he lied there in cramps, unable to get up. He was vomiting again and again, altho he hadn't eaten anything all Monday, and only very little on Sunday. To be true, he hadn't had any appetite from Friday on, just eating the bits I gave him in my hand. He was thirsty, in the last night he almost drank half a liter of water. Then again he just laid there, like fainting away.
I could slap myself thinking how often I carried him to his box when he stood there, trying to pee. Later I just let him, and in the morning I just watched him standing on the carpet and it was running out of him. It wasn't even urine, it was just water, smelling like nothing anymore.

We went to the vet as early as possible and he got an injection against the cramps. Then the vet said it wouldn't have any sense anymore, his kidney value was on 6,05 and this would mean that both kidneys were destroyed and wouldn't have a chance to get better evermore.
I just can pray now that this was true - I probably should have asked a second vet before.. I mean, when Charlie was younger there were three times when a vet said exactly the same, that it would be better to put him asleep, and I never believed them. But those times Charlie's eyes still have told me 'No, Mom, they talk shit and you know this!' but this time he just sat there with his head down and no look. He was too exhausted by all his pain and cramps..
Maybe he wanted to tell me this but hadn't had the strength at the moment - I will never know for sure.. I'm thinking again and again now..

I was allowed to sit with Charlie in a seperated room, to come to a decision what to do. Charlie just nestled to me, very silent, with no purr. At least he didn't cramp anymore. We sat there at least an hour. I never wanted him to die away from home, but the vet didn't want to do it at home, and didn't want to give me the injections to do it myself. He said if I couldn't decide at once, he would give Charlie more injections to be free of pain, and I could take him home, trying to find another vet who would do it.
But he also said that Charlie's body wouldn't take the injection so well anymore, and that there wouldn't be any guarantee how long the effects would last. This means the effects could have disappear somewhen in the night and all the terrible pain would come back. And he also told me that Charlie would die anyway, in a few days, poisoning himself for his kidneys didn't work.

So I finally allowed him to give him the final injection, in that room, and he did it while Charlie was in my arms. Charlie didn't react at all, just nestled to me more and more, almost hidden under my jacket. I talked to him all the time, carressed and kissed him, thanked him and told him how much I love him, how much I hope he would understand what I did, and how much I hoped I did the right thing, and he slept away so silently. But it took long, the vet came back two times and both times he thought Charlie should be dead already, but he wasn't. I have heard him sigh a bit, then took a breathe again. Then the vet didn't believe me Charlie was still there, heard after his heart and found he actually was still alive.
He gave him a second injection then.

We sat there a long, long while, and then his heart wasn't beating anymore, and we went home, Charlie and me.

I put him in one of his favorite blankets, covered him up until just his head looked out, and sat by him all day long, carressing him all the time, telling him so much I wanted him to know, hoping that his little soul would be here and not at the vet's place.
Charlie' body was still very soft, he looked as if he was just in narcosis, supposed to wake up and crawl around so dizzy like he used to after a narcosis. Then he slowly got stiff and hard, and his body went cold and his toes white as milk. I still hope that his soul first left with the warmth of his body, and his body was still warm when we came home. I hope his soul is here.

I called up a friend who once said I could bury Charlie at the ground where he has two horses, and he came late at half past nine to get us. I'm still glad we had all this hours to spend together. I combed Charlie a last time, thinking how idle he was and how much he wanted to be 'fine', and that he would prefer to be 'fine' on his last way.
I cut off a little lock of his hair but gave him a little lock of mine for it, he has it between his front paws. He always loved it to zip my hair with his paws when he began to wake me.

He got a place beneath an elderberry tree, at the site of the ground within grass and bushes. When we arrived there I just saw a cat running by, and the friend said there were lots of stray cats and rabbits. It's a beautiful place, although it's too far away from here for me to go there often. One really needs a car to get there, and I don't have a car. It's painful to know he lays so far away, but it's better than having no chance to bury him at all.

While we sat waiting for the friend to dig out the grave, Charlie's body seemed to get soft again, I had the notion it got softer before. But while sitting, it was like he would nestle to me again, closer and closer. His head was still to be seen, and hadn't got really cold at all for I had carressed it all the time, I put my cheek on his head and told him what I saw and thought, and the friend was nice enough to let us more time, so we sat together watching it getting dark.
It was the sight for me with just his ears and the top of his head to the beginning of the white, just the same sight I usually had when we watched TV. He loved it like this, and I was wishing all the time I could hear him purring once again..

But then I had to put him in his grave and go away from him.

Coming home was the hardest thing, I automatically looked up the window where he used to sit and wait for me when I was out, and opened the door as careful as if he would stand behind it. My first thing was putting his bowls on the counter, and there they still stand. I don't have the heart to put them away, but I would feel pretty stupid putting them on their old place again, although I always have to stare at this place, crying for its emptiness.
I have poured out his water, last night I couldn't sleep and went up, filling in fresh water. I'm still sane enough to know it was a ridiculous thing to do, but I could sleep afterwards. His boxes are still standing, and last night I controlled them as usual. There is litter lying around them, that he pawed out. When he was still alive, I always removed it, now I can't. I think all the time that he pawed it out with his own little paws.

I still think this can't be true, I suddenly look and he's back. I sometimes think I hear something, a step in the box, a lick at the water or some such. I've got old furnitures, and the weather had changed. the wood is knacking from time to time, and I could jump up every time, thinking it's him.

Going to toilet is hard, I sit there with the door open and stare at the corner where he used to come around. He always followed me to the toilet, I wasn't 'allowed' to close the door. I see his bowls at the counter and think it's not right, that I have to put them on their usual place, but then I think it would be completely nuts to do so.

People who call up are strange. First everybody said 'oh, sorry..' then it went 'you have to come over it, it was just a cat and an ill one, anyway..'
They thought I was mad with him, before, anyway. The most friendly advice was to remove 'everything that reminds of him'. Guess they thought of the bowls and the litter boxes - but what's with the bed, the sofa, the wardrobe, the scratching tree, the window sills and everything? I would have to tear apart the whole flat, then...
He always was aside me - where ever I went, whatever I did, if awake or asleep. He was at my side! Here is nothing that's not reminding of Charlie.. There's not one situation possible that we used to have without him.

And I still think this all can't be true, it's just a bad nightmare. I'm getting nervous sometimes, thinking I have to do anything, cleaning the boxes, looking for food and water, looking after him, having the weird feel I just missed or forgot something important.

But worst of all is that I can't stop thinking that he probably would have had a chance, that the vet just didn't saw it or just thought it wasn't worth. We had it before, after all, we had enough socalled 'hopeless' situations and we managed them. If I had listened to the vets, I would have had put him asleep when he was 10 months old.

When we went to the vet that Tuesday, I hadn't slept for more than 32 hours, and maybe I wasn't even in the shape to make a logical, right decision, and I should have waited until I was fully clear in my head, stopped crying, having heard more vets than just one, getting more information and literature about the subject. But then I just sat and stared at the needle that went into him to end his life, and I was like dumb. My friend talked to the vet afterwards and then told me I was right, but I think I will never know for sure.

Charlie was a fighter all his life, he always was so brave and courageous and he never gave up. What gave me the right to allow someone to kill him, when he probably just was too weak at the moment to give me a look? He had pains before - when he was two he had a stomache inflamation due to the Leukemia, he was puking blood, couldn't eat for almost two weeks, fed by chicken I chewed for him til it was pasty and then stuffed into his mouth. Everybody told me to put him asleep then, accusing me to be cruel and mad and egoistic, and that I need to be locked away.
That was in 1991, and Charlie survived, defeated Leukemia and had happy years after it, enjoying his life.

But then.. a bleeding stomache can get cured, if you only hold on through long enough. But destroyed kidneys?

I'm afraid I will never know for sure. I just can hope that Charlie will understand, and forgive me if my decision for him wasn't the right one, that I probably have stolen him the chance of having some more happy years. He was just seven years old, he would have had his 8. birthday on August 17th...

I always had told Charlie that he is the most important cat, that 'everybody loves him and admires him', and he always enjoyed to be admired - he always puffed himself up when someone said 'Oh, what a beautiful cat...'.
And thank you for listening..

Please think of Charlie and sent him a good thought.

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