July 7, 2010, sometime past midnight

This is the entry I didn't want to write.

My cousin is dying.  And my cat is dying.

It hasn't been such a good year for me in that I've spent a lot of it depressed and angry at things out of my control.  Which, I know perfectly well is pointless because well, out of my control.  It was out of anyone's control that fifty one years ago my cousin was born with a bad heart; that two months ago he sat down at home to do some work and his daughter found him cold in his chair.  I'm still angry.

One month ago I came home from a wedding to find my cat panting and weak.  I rushed him to the vet and he was diagnosed with a "highly fatal" condition where his chest cavity will fill with fluid.  A leaky valve, the vet says, and they usually never find a cause.  So maybe 3 years and 6 months ago, my cat was born with a bad valve.  They drained the fluid but the vet said it stressed him out so badly they thought he could die right then.  The vet said, the fluid will come back.

With my cousin we had hope at first he'd come out of his coma.  We'll never know how much time his brain went without blood, only that it was too much.  After days and weeks passed the doctors said, no.  He's not coming back, ever.  Brain dead.  So  his wife decided to wait until his fifty-first birthday passed and then to take him off the life support.  Do not resuscitate him if his heart goes again.   They took out his feeding tube; he has water, and a morphine drip to keep him as comfortable as possible 

It's not like the movies where the little line goes flat and you hear the beep - at least not for him.  It's been three fucking weeks.  I think every day is going to be it.

After the first few days after the vet I thought my cat was going to die right there.  They drained the fluid and he felt better for a little while, but it's coming back.  I'm watching him decline slowly knowing that soon I'm going to be the one who decides for him when it is time to say goodbye and I'm having nightmares about it. 

Ok. Um. I do take comfort in the fact that  if he didn't have time to get out of his chair, hands still on keyboard and mouse, my cousin probably didn't have time for fear or to feel it coming.  The family has had two months to get themselves ready to say goodbye.  And I keep telling myself even if I only have six months with my cat, that's six months of love I was able to give him he wouldn't have had otherwise.  Maybe fate knew he was going to have a short life so that's why he was given to me, to make him happy at the end?  (I don't really believe in fate or higher powers generally, but at the moment I'm believing in bad universe mojo.)  \

Waiting for something bad to happen is much worse than having it happen.