Good Grief

In college, I volunteered with an organization in Pittsburgh called Good Grief. They were a bereavement support organization and being just a few years out from losing my dad, I was drawn to their mission. It's been years since that short but powerful interaction and I still find myself finding odd comfort in remembering all of the different ways that grief exhibited itself and that grief is a unique and personal journey, but one that benefits from support from others.

If you follow me on LinkedIn, you know that one of my currently volunteer gigs is fostering through a small, local non-profit cat rescue. Our house has seen close to 40 cats and kittens in the last two years in some capacity, adopting them out, foster failing, or providing comfort care on some rare occasions as they cross the rainbow bridge.

In January, we took in a young mama and her newborns. She gave birth outside in the below freezing temperatures and somehow managed to keep all six of her babies alive until she was found by a good samaritan. Over the next two months, she raised all of the kittens to be wild and fun and they all secured forever homes. And then, out of no where, she declined. It was like she had weened her babies and done her job and could now admit she was sick. We'd find out she was riddled with cancer in her intestines and just a week later, she passed.

For the remainder of kitten season as we call it, the rescue saw critical cat and kitten after another. With the partnership of the local vet, many were able to be saved and nursed back to health, but many succumbed to whatever illness, genetic deformity or neglect had already impacted them before we could intervene.

In late summer, we took in 2 kittens found in vehicles. Both had close calls as they were barely a month old when found, but we managed to get them through it. Then, in September, there was Chet. By this time, my husband had a reputation as the guy who could get kittens out of cars. He headed to the local planet fitness and managed to wrangle a scared skinny orange tabby that was maybe 5 weeks old. He got him home, cleaned him up, and Chet was safe. The picture is from not long after he arrive, watery eyes, sniffles and just a chill little guy.

He never really perked up to normal kitten levels but he was blended with four others who came in around the same time and at least he wasn't alone. As the other kittens got healthy, Chet just kept on being Chet. He spent some time at the rescue owners home for more intensive care but when he seemed stable, he came back to us. Over the next week, he got skinny. We thought he might have something called FIP, but then we realized it was something internal. After a rush trip to the vet, he was diagnosed with Megacolon. In many cats and kittens, it isn't fatal, but he had always been a little fragile. We had hopes he would pull through after a good first night back home but then just two days later we found him in what appeared to be the aftermath of a seizure, awake but clearly not ok.

I wrapped him in a blanket while we figured out if we could rush him to the vet to at least end his pain. Within 15 minutes my husband was on his way, by the time he arrive, Chet had died.

It's never been easy to lose a pet, and some might say this is what we sign up for in rescue, but it doesn't make it easier. Part of me thinks he held on to see us one last time and say goodbye, part of me thinks we fought too hard and should have made the call earlier. All to say, the morning has been filled with tears and sadness and this grief journey will be one that some might understand more than others but I've reached the point in life where I don't need anyone to understand what it feels like, I just hope people give space and allow others to grieve in whatever way they feel is best.

As C.S. Lewis once said in A Grief Observed, "I thought I could describe a state; make a map of sorrow. Sorrow, however, turns out to be not a state but a process. It needs not a map but a history. … There is something new to be chronicled every day."