Reprieve
I couldn't do it.
I thought I was prepared. I had set the alarm for eight-o-clock this morning--just enough time to get up, preheat the car, throw on some clothes and go.
I gave Newt the last of the second bag of fluids last night. She showed some interest in eating but several hours later it all came back up. I washed her face and paws and brought her up on the bed to sleep with me. She stayed, softly purring, for fifteen or twenty minutes but then she wanted to go into the back room again.
The night was long. I had turned the furnace up and kept the woodstove loaded because I fancied she may have been cold. She has grown so thin, it is hard for me to imagine otherwise, but she seems to prefer the quiet and seclusion of the back rooms, which are the coolest in the house, so I don't know...
I woke once during the night to find she had joined me again on the bed, but she stayed only a few minutes before drifting off again.
I woke about seven and lay in bed listening to the morning news. After a while, I got up and checked Newt. She was resting in the back room. I began to clean and warm the cat carrier. I put a soft plush blanket in the bottom and a bottle of hot water, slipped inside woolen socks, on either end.
When the alarm finally went off, I thought, "In an hour, this will all be over..." I went into the bedroom and shut it off.
I dressed in the houseclothes I had worn yesterday--wanting to smell familiar and comforting to Newt. I went outside and started the car to let it warm up. I put my purse and the carrier out in the car. Then there didn't seem anything more to do but gather Newt up in a soft blanket and carry her out.
Carrying her out of the house that has been her home for the last fifteen years--the house that grew around her. I let her lay swaddled in my lap rather than putting her in the carrier. She eventually relaxed and purred as we took to the highway. Her little paws pressed and relaxed against my hands, kneading my skin gently.
I drove down Baycrest with tears pouring down my face.
It just didn't feel right. Waiting in the small room for Dots, I was seized with the desire to scoop Newt up and just leave, take her back home. There was just too much life left in her. She was still soldiering along. To take her life from her now, while she was still fiercely engaged in maintaining herself, would rob her of something I couldn't replace. I would be crushing out some bright spark... I couldn't do that indignity to her resolute little soul.
Dots was most patient with my indecision, trying to be supportive of whatever I decided. So, Newt came back home, with another bag of sub-Q fluids and some anti-nausea medications.
Yes, every day is a quiet agony for me, because I can see someone I love slipping away. I can project into the future to the time when there will be no Newt, just the memories of the years we have shared. So I grieve in advance for my loss. But Newt doesn't see that--she follows her own path, her own destiny. Until I am sure it is *her* suffering I am abating, I can bear with my own.
I know she is going to die. I have no faith that she will last out the month or see Christmas--but until the fire goes out of her eyes, until she is tired of fighting, I will do what I can for her, so she can die in her own time, in her own way.
I thought I was prepared. I had set the alarm for eight-o-clock this morning--just enough time to get up, preheat the car, throw on some clothes and go.
I gave Newt the last of the second bag of fluids last night. She showed some interest in eating but several hours later it all came back up. I washed her face and paws and brought her up on the bed to sleep with me. She stayed, softly purring, for fifteen or twenty minutes but then she wanted to go into the back room again.
The night was long. I had turned the furnace up and kept the woodstove loaded because I fancied she may have been cold. She has grown so thin, it is hard for me to imagine otherwise, but she seems to prefer the quiet and seclusion of the back rooms, which are the coolest in the house, so I don't know...
I woke once during the night to find she had joined me again on the bed, but she stayed only a few minutes before drifting off again.
I woke about seven and lay in bed listening to the morning news. After a while, I got up and checked Newt. She was resting in the back room. I began to clean and warm the cat carrier. I put a soft plush blanket in the bottom and a bottle of hot water, slipped inside woolen socks, on either end.
When the alarm finally went off, I thought, "In an hour, this will all be over..." I went into the bedroom and shut it off.
I dressed in the houseclothes I had worn yesterday--wanting to smell familiar and comforting to Newt. I went outside and started the car to let it warm up. I put my purse and the carrier out in the car. Then there didn't seem anything more to do but gather Newt up in a soft blanket and carry her out.
Carrying her out of the house that has been her home for the last fifteen years--the house that grew around her. I let her lay swaddled in my lap rather than putting her in the carrier. She eventually relaxed and purred as we took to the highway. Her little paws pressed and relaxed against my hands, kneading my skin gently.
I drove down Baycrest with tears pouring down my face.
It just didn't feel right. Waiting in the small room for Dots, I was seized with the desire to scoop Newt up and just leave, take her back home. There was just too much life left in her. She was still soldiering along. To take her life from her now, while she was still fiercely engaged in maintaining herself, would rob her of something I couldn't replace. I would be crushing out some bright spark... I couldn't do that indignity to her resolute little soul.
Dots was most patient with my indecision, trying to be supportive of whatever I decided. So, Newt came back home, with another bag of sub-Q fluids and some anti-nausea medications.
Yes, every day is a quiet agony for me, because I can see someone I love slipping away. I can project into the future to the time when there will be no Newt, just the memories of the years we have shared. So I grieve in advance for my loss. But Newt doesn't see that--she follows her own path, her own destiny. Until I am sure it is *her* suffering I am abating, I can bear with my own.
I know she is going to die. I have no faith that she will last out the month or see Christmas--but until the fire goes out of her eyes, until she is tired of fighting, I will do what I can for her, so she can die in her own time, in her own way.
