bye bye sweet tiger

Today we sadly had to say good bye to our sweet cat Tiger. He turned 13 in March and was our first pet together. I gave him to David when he started Law School so that he would have someone to keep him company while I was still at Millsaps. I had never really been a "cat person", but Tiger won me over - especially since (in his younger days) he liked to play fetch. Even up onto the loft of our itty bitty first apartment!
His kidneys started failing last summer and he had lost about half of his body weight. But, we were able to get him stabilized and he had been doing really well for the past year. I am so thankful that he fought for us and stuck around until now so that our kids did not have to loose both of their pets at once. But, in the past few days we had noticed a decline in him, and a withdrawal from David and me. Even foregoing his usual race to snuggle with us once the kids were in bed, and his usual tag along as we tucked the kids in.
Seeing him today, I just knew.
I took him to the vet and wasn't shocked to hear that his labs were extremely bad. Dr. Bill, who is a dear family friend, was the most compassionate and perfect I think you can be in that situation. I called David, dropped the kids off at my Mom's, and met David back up at the office to tell him bye.

It was hard. But, we both felt together that we were doing the right thing.


We picked up the kids from my Mom's (by this time it was getting really late) and picked up something to eat. We were worried about them noticing he was gone, but also worried about telling them something like this right before bed. Finally we decided to break the news.
Kids are amazing.
I told them that I had something to tell them that might be sad for us, but that was not sad for Tiger. That he had not been feeling well for a long time, and that although it might make us sad for him not to live with us anymore, he was no longer feeling bad.
They seemed fine with this. It did help that, just as we were finishing up our conversation, two huge beautiful deer walked into our backyard. Quite a breathtaking distraction.
Elise obviously had many more questions than Lila and Bennett, and seems to have a greater understanding of the finality of it. We shall see what the next few days bring, but so far I am really proud of them and how they handled it. Less worried about themselves, and more worried that he is ok.....unselfish children is definitely what we want. Elise even said that she was "sad, but wearing my happy face" because she knew in heaven he would not be sick anymore.

So, we close another little chapter in our life and say goodbye to a sweet friend that we are so thankful to have had in our family....

Tomorrow we have some very special visitors heading this way and we cannot wait!!!!!!
More to come on that....

For now, please say a little prayer for us and for sweet Tiger.
Love, Nicole