Pets are like people in that losing them seems hopeless
A month ago, I lost my baby boy. Though he was old, I only had him for half of his life. I adopted him in Pittsburgh, PA in 2015, only a year before moving to NYC. Another month from now will be his adoptiversary, except there won’t be another year that moves time forward. Instead we stand still.
In the time that Rinkles has been gone, I’ve fully gone into depressive mode. Nothing motivates me anymore. Admittedly, a bunch of other factors add to my anxiety and depression. The $4000 in vet bills I have to pay for Rinkles’ last two months of care, rent, trying to find a stable job, still feeling the brunt of my parents leaving me for dead, my medical team leaving me without referrals and not being able to find anyone to replace them who will give me the medications I need and suitable care I need.
I’ve fallen into not feeling like I fit into the shell that is my body, which isn’t new but isn’t helpful at the moment. Gender dysphoria has long since been prominent in my life before I even heard the phrase. The sudden urge to get a tubal ligation before that contraception gets taken away from us some white conservatives. I don’t want my own children and haven’t for years; something I told past partners that were dealbreakers. I get it. But when you have my mental summersault genetics, you may not want to pass that on to anyone, let alone your children.
Kratom, alcohol, and cigarettes have never seemed so grand. The aching craving for blow that I haven’t touched since 2018 nudges extra hard in my loneliness. So much so that I’ve taken to a dual diagnosis center that I am waiting on to decide whether or not to admit me. Yes, I need mental health care more than substance abuse, but when you go on Craigslist and find yourself hovering over the button to call some rando who probably laced their stash with fentanyl, you know you need help with that too.
But what I have trouble with the most is telling myself it’s okay to feel this way, to feel lost without my companion, to want to care for something that cares for me too, to stumble over thin air because I thought it was him, to sometimes sit in his bed and smell his hair and cry. It’s okay to not get up and keep running without looking back.
Yeah, the debt sucks, but I did what I thought was best for my son. I’ll be eating rice and beans every day until I move out of here. But it was worth keeping him with me a little long, as the vet said he wasn’t in pain.
He passed suddenly one night. He didn’t wake up for dinner. I let him sleep a little longer. When I went to wake him up again, I felt it. I knew. I turned on the light and my baby was gone. He’d left me before I could say goodbye. He left when he was alone. I wonder if that’s what he wanted. I had to keep his body in my freezer until morning. Every few minutes that night, I went to him and cried. The chilled sheet wrapped around him touched my face. It was a sheet my grandmother had sewn together. It would be cremated with him, along with Hedgehog friend, the first toy I gave him and he loved. I cried onto the body of the one who was always there for me. My loved ones, so far away or unreachable, and my parents too ugly to even text because I know they loved that dog too.
I sit by the phone waiting for it to chime, but I am so alone in this big ass city. My brother is forbidden from seeing me. My best friend checks on me every few days from a couple states away. My partner finds out later, misses our anniversary, and can only read messages of me unraveling. I know they want to help but are limited in their capacities. I forgive all of it. I can only think about Rinkles or the deep, deep sadness in my heart, or the weight of how much just breathing actually costs.
I look hard for mental health care, I apply to every job I am capable of and attend every interview, I try to write blogs but every piece is still in Drafts. I try to do good. I write to wrongly convicted felons in prison to uplift their spirits from a stranger, I finally read a physical book since my meds have ripped away my short-term memory and concentration, I paint a series of abstraction even though I’m bad at it, I mix paint for an hour until I get Rinkles’ fur just right and I don’t think I want to put anything on it anymore. I run for the first time since high school; my stamina and speed is laughable, but I’ve been running nightly for two weeks and I let my thoughts stay home.
Guilt is a common feeling. Guilty that I couldn’t save Rinkles myself, guilty that I’m slacking off instead of trying harder, guilty that I can’t pay my way, guilty that I should have a steady job at a mid-senior rank by now, guilty that I’m taking uppers and downers and uppers and downers all day to mitigate the rollercoaster that is my brain without medication, guilty that I let my family down so much they don’t want anything to do with me, guilty that I have been abused and neglected to the point that they feel normal again.
It’s okay to feel and do all of these things. I tell this to myself every day, multiple times a day. It’s okay to miss him. It’s okay to feel alone. It’s okay to feel really fucking sad and don’t want to wake up. It’s okay this is my life right now because I can’t change it until I get my big break. It’s okay to want to leave. It’s okay to want to sleep until the sun comes up and until the moon takes its place. Rinkles would tell me, “Lie next to me, Mommy. Just a little bit longer.” And I would.
