First of all, if you know me, you likely know Biscuit Reynolds saw himself as my Feline Overlord and once I realized that I ceased to call him “my cat.” Or “the cat” but I wanted a title that would relate to more people.
I know four people who released their pets across the rainbow bridge during one week this month. I thought about things that have been therapeutic for me over the past year. (Cannot believe it has been a year already and yet it feels like it’s been forever. It feels like it was 2019, my entire world got uncertain, 2020-2023 blur together and were just one year and then the year Biscuit Reynolds passed and now today.)
If anything the grief compounds.
One thing I realized is that every time I lose one pet it’s like the grief for all the others becomes sharper. Macy, my dog for 13.5 years, went to be with the Goddess when the camelias were blooming in 2018. (Sometime in March, I don’t like to mark dates I like the ritual of nature’s rhythm.) Gathering camelia blossoms spent from bushes and putting them on the altar for her every year is special.
I don’t think we ever “get over” a loss that hurts deep. I think we get used to living life along with it and our joy practice gets bigger. Which means, since grief is like a spiral, we return to it at different places. My house felt so empty with no pets and that was a stark, lonely experience I had to be with.
If there’s a tool in this it’s radical self acceptance and just being with the feelings that come up without judgment.
In lieu of flowers, please send cookies.
I asked this when my dad passed and I did it again with Biscuit Reynolds. Grieving takes up a lot of calories. Our brains are a tiny part of our body mass but they use 70% of our calories! Grief is like having an open tab in our brain, especially acute grieving in the early part of the pain.
There’s a reason our ancestors brought food to one another during times of grief. Cookies are calorie dense, delicious and I love them. Giving people a clear task to do/way to help is wonderful. Your loved ones want to help! I’m so grateful for all the cookies sent my way during seasons of grief.
Lowered expectations around cleaning and “stuff removal.”
Some people grieve by immediately removing all the pet stuff from the house. I chose to be very gentle with myself and let things linger. I walked the cat box out to the dumpster three days after he passed like a pall bearer with a coffin. I let the scratching post stay in my front doorway for over a month. (Biscuit Reynolds knew he wasn’t supposed to scratch the screen door and did it anyway, so I was providing an easy alternative.)
I still have his clothes in my bathroom cupboard. I’m not stressed I know it’ll happen in time. I still have Macy’s pet bed in a house she never lived in (a STATE she never lived in!) because it makes a good laundry hamper, it’s a jolly color and I love and miss her.
Before I released Biscuit Reynolds I was already designing a standing grief stretch series for my aerobics membership because I know I can’t be bothered to clean my floor during times of grief. Thus, standing stretch is more accessible than doing stretches on the floor.
Once again this tool is just radical self acceptance and doing what you can, when you can.
Saying “Okay” out loud and embracing the waves.
It only takes 90 seconds to clear a strong emotion. I learned this from a Martha Beck book and it sounded like BS but, in fact, it’s totally true.
If I just surrender to the big Feels, the sob that is coming through, whatever, it takes usually far less than 90 seconds. It sometimes feels like I’m gonna die but I’m not.
We are trained to stuff our feelings away for other people’s comfort. But we have so much freedom when we can just feel the hard thing!
I found myself just saying “Okay” with a big sigh when I felt those feelings come up. It still comes through nowadays but it’s less intense and less frequent. I think I’ve just accepted his pain was too big to sustain his lil body any longer and I’m happy for his release from that and sad for my missed earth time with him.
Signs, Symbols & Synchronicities are messages from Spirit.
I got signs from Biscuit Reynolds immediately. I think the amount of work I’ve done to develop my openness to spirituality and my intuition has helped a lot. I believe love lives on and his spirit is still with me, bound by love.
I have heard him sneeze, I have felt him on my bed, I’ve heard him in the other room. Right after his passage I had several encounters with eagles (my strongest identified wild animal, though I am friend and collaborator with many wild things) that were too amazing to be a coincidence.
Believing the signs are loving messages is self care. Gaslighting my intuition is self abusive.
Tiny stuffed soft thing.
A friend of mine gave me this tiny stuffed incredibly soft elephant. My step mom Liz always comes through with elephants so that was especially comforting. I found having something small and soft to sleep with in those first few months was really lovely.
“Better a day too early than a day too late.”
There’s the moment you know your animal companion’s departure is within the next few months. Then you know it’s around the corner. And then it’s days not weeks. And then it’s now.
I hadn’t heard this saying before but the vet tech telling me that over the weekend living rurally one must be mindful–an hour to the closest emergency vet (with calm weather conditions).
In December 2013 I had to rush my cat, ALF, to the vet the morning after I knew it was days not months. In Brooklyn the vet was 20 minutes factoring in finding parking on the street near the vet and parking blocks away from your house. He was in intractable pain under the table in the kitchen and I knew he needed to go so fast because that was not manageable pain. (The ultrasound the day before had shown his body riddled with cysts.)
We (I was a we then) brought Macy with us so she would know ALF had crossed the rainbow bridge. As soon as I had understood that at home euthanasia helped facilitate grieving ease for the remaining pets because they can feel the soul departing, I knew it was the best choice back when I was blessed to be the mom of three.
I got to use at home euthanasia with ALF’s brother Bear (and a friend made everyone a pork shoulder and that was such a blessing) in May of 2013.
ALF passed so fast I felt lucky that Macy was so mobile and could be there. Macy loved to be included in fun and sad outings. She was amazing the whole time my Grandmother was passing. Slept right in bed with her for hours at a time.
Every time I hit another big departure of a soul I care for it feels like the cumulative grief folds in on itself. It feels like I was holding ALF in a towel on that long trip to the vet when he was in so much pain like just yesterday.
You don’t want it to get to that point if you know it’s coming, my advice to you. Macy’s departure was on a day she could still walk. I never knew consciously it was her time. I was too close to her and it was my partner and her Reiki healer that told me it was her time. (Months before her Reiki healer said that her ancestors were coming for her. “You mean my house is filled with ghost Shih Tzus???”)
I’ve learned that the pain of the body is necessary so that our souls release the body when we depart. I had such a hard time determining Biscuit Reynold’s departure because he was still eating and cuddling. But it happened so clearly that last weekend. He was in pain and I was so grateful my vet could take me first thing Monday morning. It was soooo sad and so beautiful and I’ll always remember he left during Aquarius season on the Pisces waxing moon, the moon looked like a cheshire cat smile just like him. I now call that phase of the moon a “Biscuit Reynolds Moon.”
I hope if you’re dealing with pet loss you know that their shorter life spans and unconditional love are here to teach us about release and phases of life. I’m sending you lots of love and tenderness. I hope your crying is cathartic.
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