Goodbye

Last week we said goodbye to our sweet cat Cleo. She’d been slowly declining from renal failure for several months, and we made the agonizing decision to euthanize her. Together with my husband, I brought her to the vet, laid my hand over her head, and said a thousand I love you’s as she left us.

I haven’t been blogging much these last few weeks and this is why. It’s just that the loss (and everything that led up to it) has hit me hard. In fact, it keeps hitting me hard a dozen times a day. My house is full of her and, at the same time, so incredibly empty. I can’t stop finding her tiny cat toys everywhere, no matter how much I think I’ve found and thrown away the very last one.

My friend brought me an orchid and I decided to put it in the bathroom where Cleo’s water bowl used to be because I can’t stand to look at that spot anymore and feel the emptiness. At least now I have a pretty orchid to look at instead, and it helps.

I know life has to go on, but it’s a struggle. During the first few days that she was gone, she was on my mind every second. Now that a week has passed, it’s a little less painful. I looked a pictures of her the other day, which I never thought I’d be able to do, so I guess that’s progress.

Cleo was with me for 16 years. She was there when I brought each of my kids home from the hospital as newborns and was there through every milestone since. It’s hard to imagine my life without her, but just like that, it’s been a week and she hasn’t been here. Eventually I’ll have to adjust to this new normal no matter how much I hate it. Life goes on, even if you’re grieving.

So goodbye Cleo — you were the best cat a girl could have ever asked for. I’ll see you on the other side of the rainbow bridge.