Right now he is sitting next to me and purring as I write.
I notice subtle changes in his behavior too. Things that indicate how deep his grief really is. The way he hangs his head. The way he lays on me at night. He now has started to sleep near to my heart, laying his head on my chest the way he used to lay his head on her.
I try to help by doing things that Sylvia use to do, like I pet his head in the same way she used to lick him. I try to make goofy eye contact like she did too. All in an attempt to help ease his way as he misses his sister.
But I miss her too.
Intensely so.
I miss how she would curl up on my lap in the morning while I had my coffee. I miss how she looked up at me indicating she wanted me to follow her throughout the house. I miss our one on one at her favorite nest in the back of the bedroom closet.
While I was having my lunch before work today I realized just how dead the apartment actually feels without her. There is a distinct lack of energy, a lethargy of sorts, that hangs over the apartment night and day.
After our stick play Lars went looking for his sister again. I can tell he was looking for her while we played too. That was how it use to work. I got the stick out because he wanted to play and when we settled in, Sylvia would saunter in to watch us. I still see Lars looking off in her direction, waiting for her to come out from wherever she was hanging out in. I am haunted by this too because I expect her to come out as well, to she her in the corner of my eye. Then I turn, but she is no longer there.
I am becoming haunted now by overwhelming guilt. Guilt that I did not do enough, that I did not pay attention enough. I know that many say it is part of the grieving process and I get that, but this for me is different. I have real and valid concerns that I could have done more, should have done more. Yes, I know, hindsight is 20 20. But again this is different.
I feel so inadequate as a father. Always have. I never had any pets when I was a kid except for a very short time when my brother got a poodle; but then Mom and Dad gave her away. I never really knew the real reason they did that. I suspect it was because it was my brothers dog and that my mother and I got the responsibility for it instead. Mom trained that dog perfectly. But then that was my mom. Perfection was a necessity. Nothing less would do. Everything was perfect, from the outside looking in that is.
But perfection is not what I was striving for. Far from it. I just wanted to be a good father.
I have made many mistakes with my kids and sometimes that caused some hurt. I learned the hard way too. By trial and error. And I am proud of the fact that I am not a perfect father. Frankly I could not stand the strain nor to I suspect could have the kids. I just have this nagging feeling that I should have addressed her flu like symptoms earlier than I did. That had gone even one step further, she would still be alive.
That is a crushing thing to think about. But thinking I am. And all day long too.
I do not think I could have bared the thought if that had been confirmed after she died. That she died of a simple chest cold that was never treated. One that had progressed into pneumonia which attacked and destroyed her heart at the end.
The thing was, her behavior never really changed, even up to the day she died. In the morning after I got up she and her brother were chasing each other through the house and wrestling. Then it was breakfast time after which they settled in for their usual naps.
It wasn't like I just ignored her cold symptoms. I didn't. I researched on line, called the vet, and monitored both her brothers breathing and hers. I even bought a stethoscope. However, after al of that I thought that her sinus troubles that kept reoccurring were just that. Reoccurring sinus infections that would come and go. I remember in the beginning that I even did research on whether cats had sinus' and how they would react when cats has a cold.
Still I am haunted by the fact that I did not react sooner. That if I had taken her to the vet again just a week earlier she would still be alive.
I didn't have an autopsy done. I just could not bear the thought of anyone doing that to her. I suppose if it had been done, there then would have been some confirmation of the causes. That I would not be sitting here now in the wee hours of the morning beating myself up. But what if they had come back and confirmed that I did indeed miss the fact that it was just a chest cold.
I don't think I could have handled that. I don't think I could have handled knowing that I killed my daughter by shear neglect, however unintentional.
But I am not handling the unknown very well either.
What is the old saying; I am damned if I do and damned it I don't.
Welcome to my hell of the damned.
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