Saying Goodbye to our Cat

a metaphor

by Reena Bernards

Tom and I are not cat people. And yet we spent a total of 18 years taking care of two cats, seeing one through her death at 12, and the other died in the month of May at 16.

Our daughter, Talia, at age 10, begged for a cat, and we were relieved, given the hecticness of those years, that she didn’t insist on a dog, although we both prefer dogs. We went to the home of a neighbor whose cat had given birth to a litter. Sammie, at 8 weeks old, was the only one the kids of the house could find, and she was brought to us, a small ball of grey and black fur. We figured since all the others were hiding, she was the social one. And that she was. She wormed her way onto our laps when we watched TV, laid across the kitchen floor when we cooked, and stayed with us constantly, never letting us out of her sight.

A year later, our son, Ami, asked for a kitten of his own, and this time it had to be a male. Not to turn down a teenage boy’s desire to nurture, we picked up Ra on New Year’s Eve from a foster home in DC, where the small apartment was crawling with cats, up the curtains, on the counters, on each other. Ra was the Egyptian God of the Sun, and his golden color and green eyes made it clear why he received that name. But Ami changed his name to Prince Boateng, after a Ghanaian soccer player on the Barcelona team, his favorite club.

On the same day that we picked up Prince Boateng, Talia and Tom had to take Sammie to the animal hospital for an emergency visit, to stitch her up from a wound inflicted by a stray cat out in the woods behind our house. She came home with the cone of shame. Lo and behold, she also smelled another feline in the basement and wasn’t pleased. She growled and hissed at the top of the stairs, and didn’t stop days later when we let the kitten up to meet her. Months later Botang (as I came to misspell his name) got big enough to stand up for himself. He would swipe at her with his paw for fun, sending her into the corner in fright. He never hurt her, but it looked to us that he was getting back at her for the unkind welcome he received when he first came home. They never got along, but fought like cats and dogs, or more accurately, like jealous siblings. Understandably, Sammie became a less friendly cat and an anxious one, too, peeing on precious surfaces, such as my in-laws’ circular woven rug from China.

Sammie got extremely sick during the pandemic, and ultimately, we had to end her life when she contracted a feline coronavirus. It had nothing to do with COVID-19, but the irony wasn’t lost on us.

Botang took his place as prince of the home. He was a tolerant guy, affectionate with and curious about everyone who entered the house. (A rare exception was a two week period when he bit both me and a close friend, breaking our skin. I never did figure out why.) He liked to be scratched hard on his head and ears. He perched on his tower overlooking the house, inside and out. Our only problem was his hunting. Whenever we were at the door, he would hide behind a couch and then dart out the door as fast as he could. He never went far, but stayed out long enough to kill his share of song birds, which was tough on a block with two ornithologists. Once I opened the door, and there was Botang next to a big dead rabbit, bigger than himself, an offering perhaps in return for all the cans of cat food we served him daily. I screamed and shut the door, which wasn’t the response he was looking for. During the pandemic, at a Passover seder on our back porch, we were singing the Four Questions and Botang lumbered by with a live bunny in his mouth. I screamed.

Botang lived 9 lives. Ten years ago, he was so limp and sick that he spent a few days in an animal hospital. They tried every antibiotic in their arsenal, but nothing worked. We were ready to put him down. I told everyone at my dance rehearsal I was going to say goodbye that afternoon. But lo and behold, they tried one last antibiotic overnight, and in the morning, he was prancing around, on the prowl for food. We thought he would live forever.

About a year and a half ago, he started to have stomach problems. Gary Schwartz, our vet and also a friend, said it was either irritable bowel disease or lymphoma. We knew we weren’t going to take our aging cat to a feline oncologist, so we treated him with all the meds Gary recommended: pills against nausea, against diarrhea, an appetite stimulant, anti-biotic, and a steroid.

I wondered about his aging process. Do his bones ache a bit like mine do in the morning? Is he stumbling because he feels less steady and balanced? Is he forgetting commands he once knew because he’s not feeling well, or is it his age?

The last number of months have been rough. Taking care of an old cat as we get older is both a reminder of caring for our aging parents and a rehearsal for our own future. Some days Botang ate ravenously, devouring his own food, then scrounging our kitchen for any morsel we may have dropped – a crumb of bread, or cream cheese left on the edge of a knife. Other days, we found numerous puddles of his digestive system left around the house, and then he ate nothing except for the treats we placed on his perch. On days he wouldn’t eat, we rubbed the appetite-stimulating cream into his ear.

He lost five of his ten pounds. When petting him, I felt the full skeleton of his rib cage. We learned that his 16 years were the equivalent to over 80 in human years. Since he was so dependent on us for his care, and the care became more intense, our time with him became bittersweet. He and I stared into each other’s eyes. He let me kiss him on his head, the soft part between his ears. His meowing outside our bedroom door every morning used to be an annoying wake-up. It became a relief to know he survived another night.

Two weeks ago, on the day Tom broke his elbow, Botang climbed onto a shelf on our bookcase and peed over a bag of old masks, left there from the pandemic. As the two of us cleaned up this and other messes of the day (with 3 good arms) I knew it was time. We needed to prioritize human healing. We called our adult kids and told them to come over and say goodbye.

The vet’s assistant who loved Prince Botang (she always asked, “How is His Royal Highness?”) met us with tears in her eyes. She took us into an examining room and unloaded an armful of treats on him. Churro, also known by the vets as “kiddy crack,” comes in tubes like Gogurt. He consumed the 8 tubes we fed him as the assistants shaved his leg and put in an IV. Once sedated, he laid down quietly. It was like an ice cream party followed by a deep sleep.

Within a few moments, the vet announced that he was gone. They left Tom and me alone.

We cried on each other’s shoulders. This is often how life ends. We grow weaker, and then life slowly leaves. What remains, bones, fur, and guts, isn’t worth much.

Our nervous system is still geared for care. We still ask ourselves, instinctively, if we’ve fed him, or given him his meds, or emptied the kitty litter box. Not having to care for him is a relief, braided with sadness. Our parents died, and so did our two cats. And so will we someday.

But for now, it is spring, and there is a garden to grow, and herbs to plant. I am still not a cat person. I have no sentimental illusions about the role Botang played in my life. He wasn’t my best friend, or buddy, and he didn’t know how to soothe me when I was upset, or crawl onto my lap just when I needed it, as opposed to when he needed it. I loved him, but I’m not sure what he felt towards me. He did enjoy it when I scratched his ears really hard. I was there to take care of him, and it was mostly rewarding.

He will be our last cat. We put all the scratching posts, cat food dishes, and kitty litter out on the front porch for our neighbors. It’s all gone except a small pet food bowl. We are still not cat people, but I do find myself fantasizing about filling the void Botang has left in our house. Against all my friends’ advice, I am thinking about getting a dog.

Reena Bernards is a therapist who emphasizes personal storytelling, attachment, and emotional connection. reenabernards.com