I have lost my husband, three dogs and two valuable Koi in less than a year, plus a friend recently suffered a severe stroke.
My husband - Rob - passed away 19th November last year. Five days earlier I had to have my beloved one-eyed greyhound - Keela - put to sleep. In fact, the vet arrived for Keela while the paramedics were putting Rob into the ambulance. At the time, I found the contrast between Keela’s end of life and Rob’s quite shocking. I remember thinking that if I’d put my dog through what I had to put my husband through, I could have been prosecuted for animal cruelty. Having had two more dogs put to sleep since then, I still believe that, and I keep getting flashbacks to Rob’s last few hours: hearing his moans, seeing his heart pounding in his chest, watching his face change colour from pink to grey to yellow. It haunts me.
At first I felt all the obvious things: disbelief, anger, sadness, etc, but then there’s so much ‘stuff’ to do (closing accounts, getting the death certificate, booking the funeral director, etc. plus a lot of DIY and gardening) I was too busy to grieve. But now that I have time to think, I’m in a very dark place.
Pepper was put to sleep in April, and Rupert on 3rd October - just last month. (Keela was 13, Pepper 14 and Rupert 14/15, so they all reached good ages).
The problem started as Rupert’s health deteriorated (he had lymphoma and outlived his prognosis by six weeks).
Rupert’s decline in health coincided with anniversaries of Rob’s decline in health, so I felt like I had death coming at me from two angles.
Aside from that, I have been studying my genealogy on and off for years and I suddenly realised that three of my closest blood relatives (one parent, two grandparents) all died of heart attacks at young ages (64, 59 and 58), so I became very aware of my own mortality.
Then I started to see omens; for example, every morning while I drink my tea, I play online Scrabble to keep the old grey matter in shape. One morning soon after Rupert died, the first five letters in my Scrabble hand in this order were: K E E L A - Keela, the name of the dog that was put to sleep five days before Rob died.
I feel like death is all around me right now and I can’t face any more badness or sadness in my life.
I’m sick of people telling me how well I’ve coped and how much I’ve achieved because inside I feel like I’m dying. And I’m frighted of dying. Not frightened of death, because death is inevitable, but frightened of the physical mechanics of dying: not being able to communicate, not knowing there’s someone by my side, my organs systematically shutting down; i.e. I don’t want to go through what Rob went through.
I don’t know how to move on from this, especially when the anniversary of Rob’s death is just around the corner, soon followed by what are supposed to be happy times: my birthday, Christmas, New Year.
And now I don’t know how to close this post because I’m so wrapped up in myself.
Hello. I’m not sure if I can give you any solace, but I can empathise with you. I do know how you feel as I am desperately sad at losing my lovely wife last June. I too have lost pets, both cats and dogs. They are an integral part of the family and taking the decision that it’s time for them to go is heartbreaking. I do feel for you, and for both of us, I hope life gets better. Tony