The Fourth Day

Like a heartbeat, growth...and grief is not linear.

Yesterday was the hardest so far.

It was the first time I looked at my bed and expected to see her sitting there, staring at me with those adorable eyes like she owned the world.

It was the first night I felt the loss of our nightly routine...and how we had a special meow that she would always respond to. I realized she would never again crawl up on my lap while I worked at my computer, making my legs go numb.

The vet who came to the house to put her down explained that the first shot to relax her was Ketamine and Versed (+2 others) and I actually relaxed because that is exactly what I receive in my ketamine therapy.

I've felt the world swallow me whole, and it has felt like life has both ended and begun with me- like a video game End Screen when you've won and it all swirls together. In those moments in real life, I've had to be held down and I am told I "look like I am swimming", but what I feel is more akin to traveling through time....being reborn. And it is stressful, but also cathartic and cosmically revolutionary. But I've resisted, scared because I haven't wanted to leave my pets, dare I say my mom, my Love. Of course, it is Ketamine therapy and I come out of it, awakened and awed with a story to tell.

But Evie would not. And the juxtaposition of all of those thoughts is unique unto the two of us in that moment.

It has been four days since we put down my five year old Maine Coon, Evie, due to Lymphoma. I held her in my arms as she drifted out of consciousness and pain and into the sweet void of Ketamine's embrace. It is a warm feeling, Ketamine. One that spreads through your limbs like a shot of whiskey and I can only imagine the universal relief and fear Evie might have faced in that moment, for it is also heavy...

It is the purest form of personification, but I imagine my own experiences unto her and hold her close, both grounding her and telling her it is okay to let go. It is almost like Ketamine asks you a question. One you shouldn't ask unless ready for the answer. In my case, I wake, reformed and blessed with a new freedom. A room long forgotten finally dusted and clean. But Ketamine presents itself as a piece of the fabric of the universe...a key to a door that dissolves the simulation you chose to build, as it all returns to you, and you return to the universe...this is the heavy...and the part I resist most; unwilling to leave behind my comforts, my attachments. Though it was all a part of me and would be again, I fight my way back into consciousness- usually thinking I have solved time travel, telling the doctor to, "call the government."

I know in this moment that there can be no fight for her- it is time and both of us know it. I wonder deeply what it would be like to give in fully and release myself from my earthly comforts and I whisper to Evie that she will be alright, that I will be alright. All around us were the people and animals that loved both her and me, the other cats terribly aware they were losing their friend.

When the doctor confirms her heart has stopped after the last injection, the noise that I hear surprises me until I realize everyone is looking at me and I am the one who sounds like a beached walrus. I couldn't care less and held her little paw as she laid on my chest. Everybody left and I laid her gently on the floor for our other cats to see. They didn't respond much but they knew.

The following days were numb. I slept, and then I slept more, disassociated to reality around me. It was the fourth day that I took a shower and opened my drapes where I saw the stained glass window pane of her and the other animals we've lost for the first time since that day.

It was the fourth day when my mother told me it was time to, "move forward", not knowing the grenade she had just launched at my heart.

It was the fourth day that I knew she was gone.