Frankie died yesterday. I thought that I was emotionally prepared for this event. Frankie was old. He had been declining steadily for a year and a half or more. He had reached a point where he could not keep any weight on him – he was skin and bones. He moved with an awkward hip swinging gait, I thought that he probably had arthritis in his hips. But he could still manage the stairs when he wanted to. He decided litter box use was too much trouble for his old bones and I was spending a lot of time cleaning up after him. He slept a lot more. But his appetite was still good and dinner time was still his favorite time of day. His coat was dull but his eyes were still bright. Still, he was no longer the vibrant and healthy cat of his youth. He was declining more each day. And he was old, almost 19, so I knew that his days were numbered and one day, more likely sooner than later, he was going to die. I thought I was ready for that day. I thought it would be almost a relief when he finally went because it was so sad to see him deteriorating. I had hopes that when his time came, he would die peacefully in his sleep, at home.
So I believed that when he died, I would be ready. I was wrong.
Frankie had taken to sleeping next to the heating grate in the upstairs bathroom. When I realized that this was his new favored sleeping spot, I put a towel down over the grate to spare his bones. He liked that and from that point on he would sleep on the towel right over the grate, soaking up the warmth. Every night he managed to scale the stairs to come up to his spot and I would find him there sleeping every morning. He slept so soundly now (he had become a bit deaf) that usually he did not even awake when I came in to use the bathroom in the morning. But sometimes he would rouse himself and come over to me for a few pets before resuming his nap.
Saturday morning when I awoke, Frank was not in his spot. I came downstairs and found him sleeping on the couch. I wondered if perhaps the stairs were finally becoming too difficult for him, but I thought, well at least he can still jump up on the couch. I let the dog out, made coffee and when I went back upstairs he was still sound asleep on the couch. A few hours later, I’m not sure how long, I came back down to let Markie out again. Frank was no longer on the couch and I was astonished to see him laying on his puppy papers in the dining room. Because he was no longer reliable about using the litter box, I had laid puppy papers down on the spot that he seemed to be favoring for his ’extracurricular’ activity. He had no problems at all with the puppy papers and had been using them regularly, which saved me a lot of clean up. But now he was sleeping on them, right on the pee spot! I was like “Frankie, what can you be thinking? Why are you laying there, of all places?” But he was not actually sleeping because when I went to the back door to let Markie out, Frankie got up and came over to the door immediately. He wanted to go outside. Frank loves being outside, but he can only go when the weather is warm. And although it was getting warmer, it was still chilly – too chilly for Frank’s old bones.
Still, I let him out. He stepped out on the deck and sat down right outside the door. I asked him, “Sure you want to do this Frank? It’s cold!” But he stayed where he was and did not turn tail and hurry back into the house. Even a few minutes later, when Markie came to the door to be let back in, Frankie declined to return. So, I decided that I would leave him out for a bit, and come back and let him in again in 20 minutes or so, by which time I was sure he would be cold enough to hurry back in. I even went over and made sure the garage door was open enough for him to come in, as he often would ‘make the rounds’ around the house to the front, then come in to the garage for shelter and wait at the garage/house door to be let back in.
I went back upstairs and a short while later I heard Ed come home. He had worked some overtime this Saturday and he returned around 2:30. I went downstairs, exchanged a few words with Ed, and decided that Frankie had been out long enough and needed to come back in. He wasn’t on the deck any more so I opened up the door to the garage. Sure enough, he was there, but laying directly on the cold cement right in front of the door. Usually, he found something to lay on to keep him off the floor while waiting to be let back in. I said “Frank, that’s too cold for you – get back in here!’. He looked up at me but made no attempt to come into the house. I said, “You are not staying out there!” and I reached down and picked him up and brought him in and put him down on the floor of the utility room. I closed the door and walked back into the kitchen and was talking to Ed, when I realized that Frankie had not followed me into the house as usual. I went back in the utility room and he was still lying there in the same spot I had set him. He looked up at me, but did not move.
That was the moment that I knew. My heart went cold with dread. I said quietly, “Oh, Frankie is not looking good at all.” Ed came over and looked at him and replied, “Yeah, I was kind of thinking the same thing when I got home and saw him.” I could not leave him there lying on the floor though. Ed grabbed a towel and handed it to me and I wrapped Frankie up in it and brought him into the living room, laying him down on the blankets in the papasan chair. Frankie just laid his little head down on blankets and did not move. I sat with him downstairs for another hour or so and every time I looked at him, I knew. I knew that he was starting to die. Every so often I would check him and pet on him, but he did little more than blink in response. Ed came downstairs and looked at him and asked ‘Is he still breathing?’. I looked at him and I saw that his eyes were open and his pupils were dilated – but he was still breathing. I gathered him up in his towel and took him upstairs and laid him in my bed. I knew he was dying and did not think that he had very long left. I grabbed my pj’s and tucked them under his head as a pillow, so that he could breathe my scent and know that he was safe and everything was okay. My hard little grinch heart was starting to break.
I sat at my computer desk in my room all evening with Frankie laying on my bed within arm’s reach.
Every few minutes I would reach over and stroke him and every time I did, he would make a soft little sound in his throat. I talked to him and tried to tell him that all was well and it was safe for him to go as soon as he was ready. After an hour or so, he stopped making his little sounds and no longer responded to my touch. Then his body started to twitch. For about ten minutes – maybe less – it seemed too long – he would twitch until finally he seemed to spasm abruptly and he suddenly let out a brief yowl. Then he relaxed completely, his body stopped twitching – and I was sure he was gone. I was stricken – but when I pulled the towel off him, I could still see, very faintly, the rise and fall of his breath. No, not yet. In retrospect, there is something in me that believes that this moment is when Frank’s big spirit left his small broken body. I think that this is when he experienced what we call ’brain death’. His body had not yet given up the fight, but his spirit had already broken free. This was about five o’clock on Saturday afternoon. But it was not over for me.
For the rest of that long, seemingly endless night, Frank lay quietly, unmoving, unresponsive, his breathing barely detectable. This was now a death watch. Rick came in to see how he was doing and I told him that I did not think Frank would last the night. Rick did not think so either. The towel that I had wrapped him in was damp with urine. But I did not want to risk causing him pain by moving him, so I just rearranged things so the dampness was away from his body. He breathed. Ever so faintly, barely detectable, but he continued to breathe. And I waited. I laid down on the bed next to him and dozed a bit during that night. I never slept long and when I awoke, I would check on him – each time, he still breathed.
Early morning I dozed off again and I had a dream. I don’t recall the details, but Lorie Agresta was in the dream. Lorie was my friend who went with me to the shelter with Eddie when we decided to get a kitten. Lorie was the one who ended up having to sign the adoption papers for Frankie. Lorie was the one who made it possible for us to adopt him when we did. I do not remember the dream, other than to know that she was in it.
Then in the dream, it segued into a moment when Rick came into my room and said, ‘Well, the story is over now’. I was like, ‘Wha…what? What does that mean?’ And then I woke, and remembering the dream, I thought, is it over? Is he gone? But I checked little Frankie and still yet – he breathed. It was about 7:30 am. I was tortured. I thought, am I going to have to take him to the vet after all, to be put down? How long can I let him linger like this? I did not want Frankie to die in a vet’s office, but although he seemed comatose and unaware, I did not want to risk that he was suffering any longer. I did not want to suffer any longer. I did not know what to do.
But Frankie had peed again, and his towel was wet. I could not let him die in a urine soaked towel. I went to the linen closet and got a clean towel, then I unwrapped him to move him to it. When I moved him, his limbs were already stiff as though all his muscles had locked up. But he let out a feeble sigh and a cough when I moved him. I kissed his little sweet head and laid him on the clean towel and covered him up with a blanket. He still breathed. I went downstairs to make coffee and let Markie outside. I came back up about ten minutes later and sat at my computer desk with my coffee and within just a few minutes, Frankie suddenly sighed again and let out one or two small, soft coughs. And when I looked at him, his sides were no longer moving with his breath. He was gone. His body had finally followed his spirit into the unknown.
I waited for ten or fifteen minutes to be sure – his breath had been so faint for so long that I did not want to risk making a mistake. But he did not breathe again. I had his shroud ready for him. The evening before I had dug through my closet and found what I had already known would be his shroud. A pillowcase of soft sky blue flannel, with white clouds and white stars scattered about. Several years before I had used the mate to this pillowcase to wrap Zack in when he died. So I knew that now that it was time to lay Frank to rest next to his pal, I would use the matching pillowcase for him. I wrapped Frank’s body up in the shroud. And then I got dressed and I went downstairs to the garage and got a box and a shovel. I went to the back of the lot, where Zack had been buried and nearby I dug Frankie’s grave. It was hard. I’m wimpy and though the ground was soft, it was hard work. It took me several hours and several breaks, but I got it done.
When Ed woke up, he finished off digging the grave. I laid Frankie in his heavenly shroud into the box and sealed it up with duct tape. Then I put the box into a plastic bag for more protection. Then Ed and I went outside and laid Frankie to rest.
I wish I could feel relieved. I wish I could feel at peace. But I don’t. Not yet. I know that it was Frankie’s time and I know that he is at peace. But I still feel stricken. I am desolate.
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