Our cat Freddie died today.

I didn’t know whether to even start a thread but our cat Freddie died today, we took him in as stray so aren’t sure how old he was. Multiple visit’s to the vet’s and we decided today that it was time to let him go so we arranged for a vet to come to our home.

There’s been a few threads recently with member’s losing their pet’s, I always have so much sympathy as I know how much they mean being part of the family. It’s over 20 year’s since we lost a pet so the memories fade but until it happens to yourself again it’s only then when you’fully aware at how bad it feels.

I just feel absolutely dreadful, thought’s wishing I had done this and that differently don’t help. Sometimes I just wonder what life is all about, I don’t normally drink but bought some vodka at lunchtime and it’s time for another drink. The more you care the more it hurts when they go.

Max, the fox red Labrador you can see in my user id or whatever it’s called, he’s only two year’s old. He could see I was upset when I was lying on the bed and he jumped onto the bed and came right to the top which he very rarely does and lay down right across my chest and went to sleep, there’s no doubt he could feel my pain.

I’m am very sorry for your loss. It is really heartbreaking. I lost 3 of my pets last year (2 dogs & 1 cat).

bless you my sincere condolences at this diffucult time

Sorry to hear mate. My cattle dog was also a stray we found her and took her home its always hard when you lose a pet they are apart of the family…

huge bummer but know that you gave your cat a good life since you took it in. Good on you.

Oh man, I feel with you! We lost two cats last year, they are brother and sister and have been with us 19 years. Probably had the best life a cat could ever wish for, but it´s always heartbreaking to let them go…
So let this be a shrine for all the feline family members that left us…

Thanks for a wonderful time, Cindy & Bert, we miss you both!

K.

Very sorry for your family’s loss. That’s a tough decision to have to make. Hang in there.

Max sounds like a keeper. Spend some time remembering cat stuff before it fades.

My sincere condolences. As a cat lover, and not having any close family, our cat is precious and our constant companion. We have had to put down one of our cats before and it was a terrible loss. When there is no one else, a pet becomes a loved one.

So sorry to hear of your loss. We lost our cat Samson last year, I know how you feel.

Best cat I ever had was named Freddie too. He also was a stray and I named him Freddie after Red Skelton’s character “Freddie the Freeloader”, because at first that’s what he did. Then he became family.

Condolences!
Our cat Sushy is with us for 8 years now, we went to a farm where they had a litter of kittens.
He choose us, the others just ran of, he stayed.
And by a miracle he is extra special, he will not cause an allergic reaction from people normally allergic to cats.
I hope to find a female one day who shares that trade, it is very rare.

He is our buddy, when my son and me walk of grounds he follows, even acros an old bridge way outside his comfortzone. When we call him he comes. When there is something wrong, like a dog on the ground, strange noise, he makes us know to go check it out. Always finding a place near us. Still playful. It is like the good parts of a dog and the good parts of a cat.
I cant hardly think about losing him.

My most sincere condolences. My little cat passed away recently and I kept breaking into tears for a week.

Sorry to hear of your loss :frowning:

Surely he is playing happy among the stars

We lost both of our cats a couple years ago so I know the feeling. We replaced one of them last year and this year my daughter picked up a little baby kitten that was left on the steps of the vet clinic where she works. I’m not sure how long the kitten will live because she has a fascination with my shotgun barrel. :open_mouth:

Edit, Replaced was probably a poor choice of words. You never replace a loved pet. Eventually a new pet will replace the love.

My Daughters kitten is a real hoot. She recently changed the outcome of the college playoffs.

Hope that puts a smile on your face.

My condolences for your loss. I know it won’t help, but try not to second guess yourself. My wife is a vet and we lose pets too. They are here for a short time and all we can do is love them for as long as we have the benefit of living with them.

I had two Cats for 18yrs. Rescued them as stray kittens. Had to euthanize them both within a span of a year. That was 6yrs ago, and still think about them almost every day.

Im sorry for your loss. I lost my chi chi pedro last year of 15 yrs. It like a looseing a child . I hope you have a good memories of your pet .

maybe this will help… i dont know.

i had a dog my parents got me must have been 1st grade? His name was MOOSE. Now, I was a weird kid, and i spent my childhood and young adulthood mainly reading, i didnt play outside much till i got into athletics when older. But, suffice to say i wasnt at all social as a kid, i was different, and… the dog was literally my best friend. The dog was a part of the family, he literally went everywhere with us. It would be an understatement to say i was close with Moose… and the whole family was devastated when he finally passed away almost 17 years old.

i didnt have a pet of my own at my own house, till i bought this old house, when i was in my late 20s after graduating college the second time around. I lived here a while before i met the neighbors teenage kid, and met the family dog they had. CHAMP. Now, champ was a friendly intelligent dog? but… he instantly took a real shine to me. It was uncanny, even the kids parents noted it.

champ started coming to MY house on his own, knocking on the screen door, and coming in and making himself at home. He chose to stay here for sometimes a couple days at a time. SOmetimes he wanted to go home when the neighbors callled him? sometimes the dog would just LOOK at me when we both heard them calling him? and if he laid his head down and ignored it? i let hin stay, LMAO.

Now, ai always DID notice his EYES looked exactly like MY dog as a kid… it was uncanny. I noticed he DID almost everything MY DOG did, and i mean all the little stuff too. It was WEIRD, and it even slightly un-nerved me. I just thought i still really missed MY dog from all those years ago, but, i could never shake the weird feeling that was MY dogs eyes in THAT dog… i know how that sounds, and, i am in no way mentally unbalanced in any other way like delusions or anything… it was just freaky.

one day, champ was just LOOKING in my eyes, like he was trying to tell me something. You know how dogs do that… anyways, on a whim? I talked to him and called him by MY DOGS name… he went INSANE, acted all happy, and ran around and did “all the stuff MY dog used to do” even more after that.

I started calling him “moose”, and he instantly answered to THAT name too. I started buying him all the favorite foods MY dog had liked… i mean, i couldnt find ANYthing to prove to myself? That MY DOG was somehow “inside” that dog, and i could just see it only in the personality, the actions, the emotions… and in the EYES.

I honestly questioned my own SANITY. I didnt SEEM to be going crazy in any other way. I didnt have any OTHER delusions of any kind. SO… i just “went with it”.

==

i cant EXPLAIN IT… i cant JUSTIFY it… but, for all intents and purposes? it was as if my dog, dead long years… had somehow “came back” in this dogs body? and had… “found me”. It just took him about a year or so to convince me that… “hey! its ME! Wheres my blanket?”

we didnt have a LOT of time together that second time? but we had a couple/several years.

==

so… THAT out of the way? I am no longer “absolutely sure” about things… and… well… when eventually i was close friends with a pet cat here? When he died young (4-1/2 years… kitty leukemia) i was equally devastated, that cat was my best friend like any other pet i ever had…. i eventually went “looking for mr fuzzy” who had DIED a little less than a year prior.

i searched high and low, just LOOKING for him… where would i find him? what CAT would he BE IN this time around? i just had to LOOK, at least THIS time around, i knew i was LOOKING for my cat, he was SOMEwhere…

sure enough? i eventually went to the shelter. I went thru EVERY cat there, I just couldnt “find him”… they even took me to the room upstairs where they had a zillion MORE cats they couldnt adopt out? nope… i was leaving, and on the way OUT? i realized the cage of baby kitties they had. I had seen them on the way in? all black kitties… on the way OUT though? i noticed ONE KITTY that was orange.

little buff boots like Mr fuzzy had. Ipulled out my cell phone? a picture of Mr fuzzy as a baby? it was him, it was like it was his own picture… i picked it up, and held it. After some time? it curled up in my arms just like mr fussy had done when i found him… then it out its paws on my cheeks, and gave me ONE nose lick. Just like Mr fuzzy would do.

the only thing was? Mr Fuzzy had come back as a GIRL cat this time, so… i named “him” Squeaky, since he was a girl this time around.

the cat did everything just like Mr Fuzzy did? everything… it was uncanny. I was very happy… then just like Mr fuzzy? looking like a female CLONE of him? Damn it, Squeaky died young (around 5 years old) of renal failure.

=

i had another young cat here when Squeaky died, and that one just “moved up” and became the only cat here. We are CLOSE like with any other pet i ever had? but… its not like its “my cat inside” the eyes or anything, and, this cat does “everything differernt”…

=

i love Takky (this one) as much as Mr Fuzzy and Squeaky? But… when TAKKY passes one day (shes past the 5 year “hex” of the other two that died young) i will be on the lookout for “3” different cats coming back to me. I just need to be observant to find one of them…

=

I’m not real religious, in fact not much at all. I am a lifelong academic, and while not exactly an atheist? I am just… not very religious.

i just… well, i cant EXPLAIN it… it just “is”. A favorite pet can come back, in another pets body sometimes… they will “do” all the same things, uncanny, and you will “see” them in the eyes. I cant explain it… call me crazy if you want to. They know their NAME, and they like all the same foods and things they used to. They run around ECSTATIC when you finally “recognize them” and start to talk to them and treat them like they remember.

I… I cant explain it.

i spent “some time” trying to reason my way OUT of thinking this bizarre crazy idea? But… just like anything thagt isnt mathematically based? I cant neither prove nor disprove it.

all i can anecdotally note? is that SQUEAKY was born (estimated by the shelter, on weight and everything) to have been born not long after Mr Fuzzy died. It was weird… and CHAMP? was born long before MY dog died… but? Champ had been hit by a CAR, and the owner said he “died” then he was going to bury him, and he started moving around. Then champ went thru a long recovery and learned to walk again…. i asked when the car wreck happened?

yeah… it was around the time my dog had died…

like i said, its weird. Its crazy… and… i cant explain it? But, it just “is”…

Thanks everyone, your replies all help.

Sedstar, amazing stories. It’s making me cry reading them.

Freddie who’s our third cat had a dodgy back leg and he used to limp when he walked, he must’ve had something happen to it before we took him in and when he sat down he always felt more comfortable stretching it out.

A strange coincidence is the fact that our first cat Merckx (named after Eddy Merckx the cyclist) who died 20 year’s earlier aslo had a rear leg that he stretched out in exactly the same way when sitting down. Some person had shot him with an air rifle so he had to have a heavy plaster on his leg.

We used to have a Labrador called Rex, he was 9 when he died in 1981. We got max last year and after we had him for a few weeks my brother said to him “Are you Rex?” His reply was a single loud bark, he wouldn’t normally bark like that and would just look at you.

My sister isn’t religious but she believes that some how our pet’s find us after reading many book’s on the subject of where we go when we die.

Maybe we need to go to the animal shelter and look for Freddie, it’s horrible when they leave us but this morning I was just thinking of how many other cat’s are sitting there in the local shelter waiting for someone to come along and to give them a good home.