Mother’s Day 2025 will be remembered as the day we made the decision to put Smidget to sleep the following day.
Smidget is 19. She’s had, I believe, the very best of lives. I certainly hope so, since when we got her, I spent at least the first year believing she was reincarnated. And I wanted this life to be even better than her previous one. I would hold her, and she would look at me deeply, and I swear that there was a human soul inside.
I brought this up with the vet at the time, Dr. Groskin, who has long since retired and shuttered his practice. He patted my head. Do men ever think about how condescending their non-verbal communication appears to women?
I digress.
Smidget has a way about her, that our other cats willingly acknowledged. They knew she was the mistress of all she purveyed.
A year and a half ago, when we moved from the only house she had ever known, she cried the entire 5-mile drive and then wailed as we entered the building. Her cries were so pitiful and piercing, to drown them out we played Idina Menzel on our phones the entire time, so as not to be accused of feline abuse. That first night she wailed the entire night—but then, when she realized she could sleep with us—something that had not been available previously, she settled down and was in our bed every night after.
Until a month or so ago. Then she stopped walking down the stairs to our bedroom. But other than that, she seemed relatively fine, and her appetite was not only healthy, but ravenous. I was feeding her every other hour- sometimes 8 times a day, until David purchased (at the suggestion of Uncle Larry) an electronic feeder for wet food.
That worked for about two weeks, and as long as she was eating, we thought her life was reasonably good and comfortable.
But we didn’t know how long she could go on.
We made plans to go to Morocco in the beginning of June, but we didn’t know how she would be, and we didn’t want her to die alone, so we canceled our plans.
In the last week, her appetite and energy flagged. We had our mobile vet come over on Thursday, and Smidget put on a bit of a show, helping us all to buy a little more time.
But now, she is sleeping, not moving very much, and not eating like she had.
The time has come.
Years ago, we had a cat named Soleil. When she got sick, she hid in the closet, peed there, laid in her pee, and we knew we had to do something.
I prayed every night that she would die cuddled against us. But she didn’t and David and I knew we had to be the adults in the room and end her pain.
But it’s so difficult to know when that time has come. If your lovely fur ball isn’t hiding, isn’t whimpering, is still eating, how do you know when is the time?
We took the Lap of Love test “How will I know it’s time” which was useful. But …how does anyone really know?
I am so grateful that we know a mobile vet so that Smidget can be at home when she goes over the Rainbow Bridge, as taking our cats to the vet is SOOOO extremely stressful. At least there won’t be that.
As many of you may know, we have begun working on our last documentary, which ties into our ongoing belief in gratitude, as evidenced by our 15-year-old website Mincha Moment: Taking Time to Be Grateful, where this, my VERY intermittent blog is posted. We’re still in the pre-production and fundraising phase, but I’ve done a lot of work on some of the key themes, one of which is: How does one remain grateful in the face of pain/loss/tragedy. Several meaningful answers have been posited including, “be grateful that you’re alive” “be grateful for all the time you had together,” “be grateful for this moment without looking in the past which can’t change, nor the future which is unknowable.” And all that, logically, is true, and the right way to view things.
But logic has never been a particular effective gauze to staunch the blood flowing out of a broken heart. I’m sure with “time” a scab will form. But I doubt it will make me feel differently about Mother’s Day. And I know it will do nothing to stop me missing Smidget every day.
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