Annie died today.
I wish I had a better way to update everyone about what’s going on with us.
Annie, our Maine Coon cat of 9 years, one of Jonny and Jonah’s favorite creatures in the entire world, had to be put down this morning.
It was sudden and unexpected. 3 days ago, she was fine.
This morning, I noticed she was hiding under our treadmill… the 2nd such day in a row. She hadn’t eaten much and had not used the litter box in 2 days. She was lethargic, not wanting to move.
My wife was off work today and I casually mentioned it to her. Could have been a bug. Worms. Anything really. But when we took her into the pet urgent care to be checked, it showed a much worse situation.
Annie’s bloodwork showed leukemia, showed she had heart and liver issues, and was in multi-organ failure. She seemed fine just 3 days ago. She had what I thought was an all-clear checkup not 3 months ago.
And what we learned was that she was now terminally ill and would continue to deteriorate more and more each day, unless we ended her suffering.
Let me tell you, breaking that news to the boys was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.
It’s hard for me to even type about it.
Jonny was barely 10 years old when he picked her out as a kitten, named her, and brought her home. Jonah was 4.
Jonny had an immediate attachment to Annie, but it was Jonah who noticed she was missing when she made her daring escape, not 2 weeks after she arrived home with us.
Jonny put up flyers around the neighborhood and went door to door asking people if they had seen our ‘4-month-old kitten’ who had somehow managed to sneak out of the house. He cried himself to sleep that night, wracked with worry.
And wouldn’t you know it, about 4am the next morning, Annie was found about 5 houses away by a neighbor getting ready for work. I was so excited, I woke Jonny up just to give him the news. Annie curled up under Jonah’s bed, exhausted from her ordeal.
Annie and Russell our tuxedo cat got along just like siblings. Russell would try and dominate her and she would bop him on the nose… But they always ended up sleeping on the same chair together each night.
As she got older, Annie just got bigger and bigger (as Maine Coons do). She ended up out-weighing Russell and topping the scale around 18 to 19 pounds and was a big pile of “purrrr.”
She ALWAYS wanted to be pet and brushed, often flopping at our feet to expose her tummy “floof” to be rubbed.
Our cats were a HUGE part of Jonah’s speech break-through. Jonah’s first sentence ever uttered as a non-verbal 3 year old was yelling at Russel, our other kitty to get out of his toys (“RUSSELL, OUT!”)
Every day when Jonah arrived home from school this year as a 6th-grader, his first question and virtually EVERY other sentence he uttered on a daily basis was about our cats.
“What is Russell saying?”
“What is Annie saying?”
“Why does Annie do the ‘booty-scoot?” (bwa-ha-ha-ha)
“Why is Annie flopping?”
“Why does Annie like being pet?”
“Why is Russell a Tuxedo Cat?”
“Why is Annie a Maine Coon?”
Oh yes and my personal favorites…
“Why is Russell a boy?”
“Why is Annie a girl?” (bwa-ha-ha!)
(Jonah IS in middle school).
RINSE AND REPEAT.
Jonah would ask questions about the cats NON-STOP. Even when he already knew the answers. Our cats are Jonah’s “SAFE” sentences. Predictable answers to standardized questions.
Needless to say, my boys have become VERY attached to these cats.
Which is why today was so hard.
When our first cat, Captain passed unexpectedly in 2012, Jonah hadn’t been born yet. Jonny was only 4. We didn’t tell him Captain had “died.” We just told him he went to “kitty heaven.”
Jonny, had assumed that “kitty heaven” must have been the vet’s office because he always wanted to go there to “visit Captain.” I don’t think we ever actually told Jonny what happened to Captain… he sort of figured it out on his own, who knows how many years later.
But I learned that ‘vague responses’ to what actually occurred to one of the most loved parts of our family do not meaningfully convey ‘what actually occurred.’
…especially to minds that interpret things literally.
The vet doesn’t take the cat to kitty heaven… and “dying” is not sleeping.
This time, we would have no such misinterpretations. Jonny will be 18 in a couple weeks. Jonah will be 13 this year.
The boys went with us.
They sat with Annie at the kitty hospital. They played with her and brushed her and listened to her purring, telling her what a good girl she was and eventually saying their goodbyes.
When the doctor came in, Jonny tearfully told me that he didn’t want to watch Annie die. The kitty that he had gone door to door to find and rescue as a little boy, who he cried himself to sleep for, for whom he prayed relentlessly to be found safe.
In my mind I thought about how we are all getting older, and all families will have to go through this with their loved ones at some point in time.
I tried to tell Jonny “Annie is family buddy. And we will be with her until the very end. We will hold her and comfort her and let her know how loved, important and special she is and has been to us as she passes on. And we will do that for ALL our family.”
All I could get out was “Jonny, Annie is family…”
I couldn’t finish the sentence. The words choked in my mouth and my eyes blurred. I don’t think I could even have said what I formulated in my head.
This is a life lesson I wish I never had to teach.
And in the end, I didn’t have to. They learned about it first hand.
Annie passed on right there in Jonny and Jonah’s arms… right in their lap. Jonny, trying to be brave, with his head down, crying. Jonah muttering to Annie “it’s okay girl.”
As Annie passed on, Jonny, ever the good big brother, reassured Jonah that Annie was indeed now playing in kitty heaven with Captain and Chloe (our previous cats) and having the time of her life. And Jonah could now finally understand it.
Jonny also promised Jonah a new kitten which of course perked Jonah right up. (yes we will get a new kitten)
Jojo loves all animals and especially cats. He often says he would like “ten hundred-thousand cats”.
So now, we are off to check Craigslist and shelters an all that.
Because maybe we won’t get “ten hundred-thousand cats”…
But to replace Annie, we will have to find one who is “ten hundred-thousand” percent special.
#kabukisyndrome #ausome