Comments on: My Best Friend is Dead

By: Michelle

Michelle — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 17:50:11 +0000

Hello: I am a friend of Liz’s and she suggested that I read your post after I told her that our sweet kittie died on March 19th. She is buried in our garden and we will transplant her beloved cat mint plant over her body once spring comes and we can find it! Gotta love an indoor cat who dutifully wears a purple collar and leash to go safely outside for a little kittie-kat-high. She was my daughter Lindsay’s cat. Lindsay is 13, Katie-the-kat was 11 – she doesn’t remember life without her. Thank you for sharing your grief – it comforts me to know that I am not the only one crying until my face hurts – I think I need plastic surgery to repair the new crinkles left from crying. Sigh. Arent’ we lucky to have had these delightful animals to love us so?

By: Addie

Addie — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 18:08:59 +0000

Hank,

Just read this. I am so so sorry. My cat Harold is the love of my life. He holds court over a sheepdog and border lollie (lab/border lollie mix). Three weeks ago Harold went missing. I was devastated. He had never been outside for more than 4 or 5 hours. Luckily he returned two days later just as I was assuming the worst. Pets truly are a blessing. I often like them better than people. I hope you’ll be able to open your heart to another creature soon.

Addie

By: Pete

Pete — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 04:09:27 +0000

My heart goes out to you. I know the pain, I still mourn my Susie after 3 years. Not much I can say to help other than my heart goes out you. They just don’t live long enough for us to give them all the love we have for them.

By: Lorrian

Lorrian — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 23:23:49 +0000

Bless your heart – I’ve tears in my eyes from reading your tribute to your dear Paka. I hope you find peace.

By: ScottGravy

ScottGravy — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 22:44:09 +0000

I’m so sorry for you. I feel your loss, as I had Sierra-the-Dog, and Kramer-the-Super-Cat pass this summer. I still miss them both so much.

May we both heal and live in harmony.

By: Fern (Holly's cousin)

Fern (Holly's cousin) — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 22:36:47 +0000

oh Hank, so sorry for your loss and your anguish. I think about our border collie Sasha oh so many times even though she has been gone almost 6 years… hard to believe that before her I never felt I was a dog person. Of course she wasn’t a dog but a hairy person as our son Todd used to say when he was younger. When I held her in my arms at the vet (she had several tumors that surrounded her heart and lungs) when they put her to sleep, I felt the life travel out of her and up my arms. I guess I was so emotional (I do remember that I was grieving loudly) that the vet sent me flowers the next day.

By: Galen Geer

Galen Geer — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 04:42:13 +0000

I read Holly’s post and then yours. She was one lucky cat. She truly blessed you and Holly with her presence.
I have always had a cat in my life and I truly, truly understand. glg

By: Helen

Helen — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 09:32:22 +0000

Hank -

I have lurked around your site for many months but last night I left in tears. Your Paka could have been the sister to my Dicca who left us just about 3 years ago. She was 19 and the end was not all it could have been, at least from where I am. Don’t be ashamed of your tears, you loved each other and we grieve for all those we love. She will leave a Paka shaped hole in your heart forever. But you will learn to look beyond those bad hours and remember all the good days, months and years that you had together.

Oh, and don’t push away the other girls in your household, human and feline, when they offer support. Even the most independent cat will know you are hurting and try to offer a paw. In their own way, they are family too. My hugely outdoor, feisty Blonde moved in to keep me company during the tearful weeks that followed.

By: Cork Graham

Cork Graham — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 04:41:43 +0000

Hank –

This reminds me so much of Easter 2000, and the powerlessness I had, when I had to put down my buddy, Matahan Seochael (Scots for Peaceful Bear), a Chesapeake Bay retriever I received as a gift from a neighbor friend in Homer, AK in 1990. Brought him home in the snow, bundled in the pocket of my parka. By the following year’s fall, he was 100 pounds of duck and goose retrieving magic–often because of how we could communicate with eachother with only a look.

…I’ve seen close friends die in combat and have found no difference in the uncontrollable, subconscious, response of emotional pain whether to the loss of a close human friend, or four-legged one…

Even now with a new pup, I miss Seochael dearly and get a little sad that I, too, will probably outlive my year and a half old Brittany: it took ten years for me to get up the nerve to start again with Ziggy.

…Death just sucks; no matter how we try, or or are told how best, to quantify or get meaning out of it–My deepest condolences to you and Holly…

Best,
Cork