Grief and Growth

It’s so hard to realize that this year is almost gone. And more than that, this decade of my life is almost gone – I turn 30 in a few weeks. In a lot of ways, it feels like we’ve been paused since March 2020. Like the past year and a half shouldn’t even count; like we should get a “do-over.” But that’s not true. We’ve had to keep surviving, living, growing, changing even with all of the stress and uncertainty of the pandemic. Maybe even BECAUSE of that stress and uncertainty. I think there are plenty of people out there who experienced forced introspection in 2020 when they might not have done that work otherwise.

When I look back at the past year, I see so many changes. At first, I tried to talk about all of them in one post, but it very quickly got excessive. They’ll each get their own post. I make no promises about when those posts will happen. They’re all changes that are poignant – that I consider pivot points in my life. Today’s post, the first post of 2021 after almost a year of not writing, is for SunCat. It’s half reflection, half eulogy.

Her real name was Nevaeh, and she was my best friend for 17 years. If you’ve been around here for a while, you know that she was diagnosed with two types of cancer in October 2019…the same week I put an offer on my home in Ohio. Her prognosis was NOT good, and so I will forever remain grateful that I got another year and a half to spend with her. She was doing so well for so long, and then suddenly she wasn’t. And I knew it was time. I said goodbye to her in April, and I still started bawling while writing this paragraph. Grief is tricky like that.

All of my pets are important to me (and, spoiler alert, I added two more to the family this summer). But Nevaeh was special. She was the most affectionate cat I’ve ever met, and for 17 years, she slept with me almost every night we were in the same place. I adopted her when I was 12, the summer after my grandma died – she was a kitten on my grandma’s best friend’s farm. I named her Nevaeh because it’s “heaven” spelled backward, and when I heard the name for the first time earlier that year, I decided it was the prettiest name I had ever heard (I also considered myself a bit of a poet, and I was really excited to finally be allowed to have a cat. So she had to have a fitting name).

Pets (and Nevaeh especially) bring me so much joy and comfort. They’re company when you’re locked inside during a pandemic…or when you’re just depressed. They’re entertainment. They’re also external cues to take care of basic needs. There have been plenty of days where I wouldn’t have gotten out of bed to take care of myself, but I did to feed the cats and walk the dog. And that may not sound like a lot, but when I’m drowning in depression, it makes all the difference. 

I’ve written before about the costs of pet ownership, especially on the medical side. And those calculations were BEFORE a cancer diagnosis and a year and a half of treatment. Just to GET Nevaeh’s diagnosis, the biopsy alone cost $1,800, and that was after an $800 ultrasound didn’t give us any answers. Then, in the last two months of 2019, I spent $3,000 at the vet oncologist and $800 at the emergency vet. 2020 started off with $2,500 at a vet neurologist – Nevaeh started having unexplained seizures, so we did an MRI and spinal tap to figure out if the cancer had spread to her brain (which would have necessitated a different chemotherapy drug).

Critically, throughout all of this, Nevaeh was relatively happy. She still purred up a storm and wanted all the attention and affection. Back in 2014, when she had her first health scare that I was financially responsible for, I knew that I never wanted to have to make a decision about her health for financial reasons. So I bought pet insurance. It made her last year and a half so much less stressful. I could focus on her, and her wellbeing and comfort, rather than worry about paying for what she needed. I could decide to say goodbye when her quality of life had declined past a certain point, rather than when I had hit my spending limit. I could give her all the love and care she deserved, without digging myself back into credit card debt. 

I recognize that all of this is in itself a privilege – to be able to afford the insurance coverage, to have gotten it BEFORE she wasn’t insurable or had a diagnosis that would have made this treatment part of a pre-existing condition. It’s a privilege I’m so so grateful that I had, and it’s one that I will NEVER take for granted. All of those costs? 90% of her medical expenses were reimbursed. So I always knew I could give her whatever medical care was necessary, even as I was starting self-employment during a pandemic. And trust me, that was a financially rocky ride. 

Saying goodbye to her was still the hardest thing I’ve ever done (and I’ve had to recover from getting hit by a literal truck). But not because of the money.

In the middle of 2020, I re-purchased pet insurance for StarDog. I will gladly pay that monthly fee for the peace of mind it brings.

There’s a reason it took me so long to write this post. I’m not sure I have anything wise or relevant to say today, but it’s my damn blog, and Nevaeh deserved her due. Hug your furry loved ones.