Hi, Margi, I'm so o o glad that you have a job prospect. I am so o o o glad. And I'm glad that you're doing better today, too - - and I know part of that is because of the job prospect, and rightfully so.

You're right, Margi, many things are different this time this year than what they were this time last year. I do hope that good fortune is coming your way, Margi. It's well overdue in my opinion.

I hope this day and evening is treating you kindly. I hope that gentle breezes will come to soothe and comfort your weary heart and spirit, and that you will feel the comforting presence of your precious Spiritwolf with you at all times and in all circumstances.

Peace and blessings,
moon_beam

Hi All--

Well, I'm beginning to go mad with boredom and depression. Some days I barely even think about Ladywolf anymore--all I can think about is how desperately underemployed I am. I am someone who is used to being on the go all the time, and my life has just ground to a halt. There is NO work in the tiny town where I live, my depression is keeping me from getting any new artistic projects going, and there is no volunteer work here either. There is just plain NOTHING I can think of to do--and I'm sure not used to living my life this way! If I have to spend another day tomorrow as bored as I was today, I may truly lose it. I can't seem to get involved in a book, I can't stand TV or movies right now, I hate computer games, and I am going completely stir crazy. This is a bad situation for me, truly bad.

Thanks for letting me rave a bit. I've never been this bored in my entire life! (Last year at this time I was teaching art to children in a private summer school [that closed], and I was anything BUT bored!)

What to do?

Thanks again lending me your ears (eyes?)

Margi and Spiritwolf

P.S. even the fact that a strange dog walked into my living room tonight and is hanging around all evening with no dog tags around her neck is not doing much to quell my boredom, though it IS an interesting situation. (It's 4th of July night, i.e., firecrackers, etc., and I think there are a number of loose dogs wandering the neighborhood. I'm just not sure quite what to do with MINE!)

Margi, I have an idea about that dog that walked into your home. Why don't you give it a hug? I'm sure it needs it and so do you. Sometimes the best way to get what we need is to give something away. I know it would make me feel better to hug a dog right now. But none are wandering into my house! You said there's no volunteer work in your area right now but I think the volunteer work just walked into your living room.
On a more serious note, I know you had at one time mentioned moving away for employment. Is that still an option? I hate for you to be so bored and down. Boredom is a bad place to be!
My thoughts are with you and I pray that a job will come along for you.
-Donna

Hi Donna--

Oh, the dog got plenty of hugs, believe me. She even slept on my bed for part of the evening. What else do you do when a strange dog walks into your house looking for you?

It's a Catch-22--moving would be a great option, I'd love to be able to afford to do it, but I don't have a penny. I mean that almost literally. I have pennies, but no nickels or dimes left. So...how to move? I'm not the world's most employable person at 60 and so broke that I couldn't travel for an interview...

Boredom is awful. Today looms ahead of me empty and pointless...

Margi and Spiritwolf

Hi Margi
It must be a "boring" day -- I'm kind of feeling that way myself today. Don't know what to do or what I even feel like doing. Take care
Sharon

You know, y'all--I've kind of been wondering why I'm not grieving more deeply over Ladywolf's passing than I am, and it occurred to me tonight that it is partly because she lived out a full, rich, mostly happy and comfortable life cycle, and died naturally at home, in a gentle way. We went full circle from meeting to parting, and I don't feel that I missed out on a thing! I got the best that my wolf had to offer, and she got the best that I had to give. Sure I've been sad and depressed, but I don't feel that I was cheated out of anything--I had it ALL, and it was delicious!

Some of you have not been so fortunate. You have had your pets' lives cut off prematurely, some in terrible ways. Others of you have had to make that awful ultimate decision, which I blessedly did not have to do. In our case, Ladywolf made her own decision, thank God. I think sometimes that the degree of suffering that we feel can be related to the degree of suffering that our animals went through at the end, or that we IMAGINE they went through. And there's the keyword--imagine--we can never truly know what they were feeling, but we like to think that we can...which leads to guilt, often ungrounded in reality.

Ladywolf, Poppers and I were truly blessed. We survived being homeless several times, and we survived it all together--in the woods, not on the streets--where the dog and wolf could romp to their hearts' content. They survived me being in a coma on a bathroom floor for eight days, with them having to feed and water and walk themselves. We survived BOYFRIENDS! We survived triumphs and tragedies. We survived...until it was the proper time for each of them not to go on surviving anymore. Both went gently at home, how lucky I was.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that for every being, there is a life-cycle which we cannot put the brakes on, much as we'd like to play God. Would I have been happy to have had Ladywolf around for another ten or twenty years? Of course. But I feel that her life was totally complete as it was--nothing missing. And so I don't grieve so much...

I also did a lot of anticipatory grieving, after I found out that she had inoperable cancer, and that helped a lot too.

"To every thing, there is a season, and a time for every purpose, under heaven..."

I am someone who loved my mate--Ladywolf--more than life itself, but I am not in very much pain. It all moved with a kind of grace that I couldn't have expected--both her life and her death--and I am so grateful for that.

Hugs from Margi, Spiritwolf, and Leopold the Terrible

Hi Margi,

Yes, I do agree, that how our pets leave us can affect the grief cycle. Guilt or trauma certainly can prevent us from moving on, and it can make the process even more painful.

However, I personally don't FULLY relate to that.

Daisy didn't live out her full life cycle. She got uterine cancer, but it was caught in the very early stages. The vet told us that it had not metastasized and that a full hysterectomy should cure it completely. He said he'd performed many of these operations and seemed convinced that she would be fine. He was laughing and joking about and really had me believing that everything would be okay. The operation was costly, but we didn't even think about that, my boyfriend simply got out his credit card and said "do it" then he said to me "we'll think about how we're going to pay it off later." When I kissed her head and said goodbye to her at the vets, I honestly had no idea it would be the last time I'd ever do that.

We went home, waiting for a phone call to say how the operation went, and to hear when we could pick her up. I made her a cosy bed, full of blankets. I started preparing a leafy salad of all her favourites. We hadn't been home long, when the phone rang. My boyfriend answered ... and I'll never forget the look on his face. I knew right away, that she'd gone. She hadn't even survived the anaesthetic. I literally collapsed to the floor, sobbing. My boyfriend held me, sobbing too, and he kept repeating, "Baby, I'm so sorry. I'm sorry. I told you she'd be okay. I promised you we'd bring her home. And I couldn't keep that promise. I'm so sorry..." over and over. I tried to tell him not to say that, that it wasn't his fault, but I couldn't. I pushed him away - I couldn't even bare to be touched. I put my head against her bed and sobbed until there was nothing left in me. I just couldn't believe she wouldn't be coming home to sleep in it. Later that day, we DID bring her home. But it was her lifeless body, still slightly warm. I just couldn't believe it was happening. That morning before we took her in, she seemed so happy and full of life. Now, only a couple of hours later, she was dead. I'd got ready a nice cosy bed for her, but instead we had to dig and lay her in a grave.

So, that was fairly traumatic, although not as sudden as, say, an accident, for example, as I did know there was some risk involved. And for the first day or so, I did think, "If only I didn't agree to the operation, she would still be here." But I got over that pretty quickly by thinking, "But she wouldn't have had long left. The cancer would have killed her, and it would mostly likely have been a painful death. No, this was the right way. At least I tried." And I did have a few issues with not being able to say goodbye properly, and thinking about how much she loved her life and what she's missing out on. But I have managed to move past that now. That's not the hardest thing about my grief.

To me, the hardest and most painful part is simply the MISSING HER. Even if Daisy would have lived to be 7 or 8 (the average lifespan for bunnies) and died peacefully in her sleep of old age, I still think I would be grieving the same way. I would still miss her physical presence. That's the part I'm still struggling with, that's the part I still cry over almost every night. I've let go of all the other issues but I just MISS HER so damn much.

So, although I do agree with what you said, for me PERSONALLY, it hasn't been that way.

Hugs -- Cheryl xx

Dear Cheryl--

I am so sorry for what happened to your beloved daisy.

Please don't misunderstand me--I was talking about MY experience, which was admittedly a lot "easier" in some ways than other peoples' experiences have been. I wasn't trying to imply that others should feel as I do--I was just musing about why I feel the way I feel--that I'm a bit taken by surprise that my grief isn't deeper.

Ladywolf too had cancer and it took a year from the time of diagnosis to her passing. So the process wasn't really "easy"--just her death was. She was impacted by the presence of large inoperable tumors on one hind leg that really slowed her down and may have hurt a lot--I had no way of knowing for sure.

I miss her like crazy too.

Again, I didn't mean to suggest that others should feel like me. Your experience WAS traumatic, and it breaks my heart to hear about it. I'm sorry that you're in so much pain, but it's understandable.

Big hugs from Margi, Spiritwolf, and Leopold

Oh, I know, Margi. I was just musing about what you said and thought I'd share my point of view. But I didn't think you were suggesting others should feel the same way you do, not for one minute. Sorry if it came across that I thought that, but I really didn't.

Hugs, Cheryl xx