Your cat had a good life and loved you and then died. There doesn’t have to be a point, there’s more good than suffering.

The point is to give someone vulnerable a full life, with safety and warmth.
From your perspective, time went by too fast; from their perspective, it was a long and peaceful lifetime, they were incredibly fortunate to have someone like you.

Also, there is an implicit assumption we carry around that to be immortal is some sort of blessing or state to aspire to, while it may very well be that being mortal is itself the blessing.

In my opinion, the highest tribute one can pay to a departed friend and companion is to again open one’s home to another vulnerable creature and make him/her family.

Do it in your departed friend’s memory and honor. If you could communicate again with them, you would let them know this is part of their proud and gentle legacy, to reduce suffering on the world - “Look what you did, by being who and what you were for me in life, you opened the door for someone else when their turn came.”

This is what I have done, and do not regret a minute of it.

My cat died April 16th, 2023. Had a few, never have another. Can I share my story? I swear there’s a point at the end.

Adopted her from a local redditor, who had only had her a month. She was always tiny, but at some point, cancer wasted her overnight. By the time I noticed her collar falling off her 1.5" neck it was too late. We found her dead in the hallway the next night.

She sat on my lap every night, and that’s all she wanted, simple affection. I was single and living alone, excepting a friend with benefits across the street, I was terribly alone. She was my solace, my peace. She was my friend, not an animal, not a pet, my friend. And gods how I cried because I felt I had let my dear friend down. Hell, crying now.

“WHY?!”, I screamed. Why was such a blameless and harmless friend dead when I’ve done such evil in life?! I’ve tried to be one of the good guys, but I’ve done bad things. She had no concept of evil, she just was, and only asked for comfort. Call it survivor guilt, guess it is. But a life like hers clearly deserved more life than my tainted soul.

She didn’t do any of the typical cat meme stuff, just kinda hung around. Rarely left the yard, just sat in the shadow of my truck when it was hot, chilled inside when it was cold. Always low energy, but no issues the vet could point to.

Anyway, I buried her out at my personal chunk of swamp in the boonies. Fought for 30 minutes to cut through cypress roots, but I wanted her to rest in a nice shady spot by the water. Literal blood, sweat and tears getting that tiny grave open. Didn’t think anyone would give a shit, but my friends all rolled out. I’m the guy in the cowboy hat. I salute her grave every time I pass.

Mom died 2-weeks ago, on my birthday. I cried for that cat far more than for her. I get you. I feel you. LOL, I’m sure mom cried more for the death of her mountain lions than she would have for me. So it goes.

So yeah, we live and we die. Our friends and family die. Suffering? I dunno. Did my cat suffer? She certainly did for at least some of her life. But she certainly didn’t after I got her. At least she was as happy as I knew how to make her.

Suffering is only possible if you’re alive. Hell, we could be atoms embedded in a Jovian moon, but at least we’re here to feel. And that’s pretty fucking wild if you think about it. I’ve suffered like hell, but I’ve also experienced and loved more than the vast majority of humans ever will. (And if you looked at our pics, the little Asian woman is now my wife. Funny how life works out.) If I died tonight, I’d call it a win. Being alive is a fabulous gift, even though it has its downsides.

How about you tell us about your cat? Your turn OP. Step up and let us have it.

Yes. Life is a blip of mostly suffering and pain. But, within that whirlwind of time, there are incredibly warming and thought-provoking moments. For your cat, it was probably laying on your lap. Cozying up somewhere warm. Getting pet, and chasing something far too nimble to catch.

Life has genuine joy in it that makes the hard times worth it. It’s through the hard times that we can find the most sympathetic and connecting moments.

I’m sorry for your loss, I’m sure your cat loved their time here, with you.

It hurts. I had to put my cat of 18 years down last year and it hurt for a long while. But I wouldn’t trade having her as my friend; the end was sad and rough, but I made sure she had as good of a life as I could give her the entire time she was with me. We can’t do much better than that for our furry friends.

Hang in there friend, it does get better with time.

I am so, so sorry for your loss. I understand how you feel, and I’m sorry that I have no words that can help. Nothing can replace them.

We do a little ritual for ours on the Day of the Dead; I don’t know if it helps. I guess it makes me feel a little better the rest of the year, setting time aside to remember the good times.

I’m sorry.

Life is a brief glimpse of awareness between two infinite voids of non-existence. It doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t have a purpose.

I’m sorry for your loss.

I’m sorry for your loss. Thank you for giving your cat a good life, and I hope they gave you memories to cherish too.

Do we just live and suffer and die?

Largely, yes. As far as we know, there’s no grand purpose nor reason of being. We’re all just floundering about, trying to answer the fundamental questions of existence for ourselves. There may be an objective answer, however, which is why I do what I can to push humankind in the direction I believe is most likely to result in that discovery - even though my significance is only comparable to that of an ant.

Regarding your loss, specifically, I was in a very similar boat ~12 years ago. Honestly considered just riding into the sunset in search of Bob Ross, at the time. Today, I’m extremely glad to have stuck around to raise another cat who loves me beyond anything I ever thought comprehensible. In short, when life as a whole sucks, there’s respite in the moment. When the moment sucks, take respite in the whole of life’s experiences.

You shared love and joy. Soon it will be time to share more love and joy with another that’s in need.

I lost my dog on Wednesday.

I’m in the mud too feeling the same things. Yesterday morning I was ready to never get out of bed, to just dehydrate and die. I didn’t move until my whole body was numb. It felt like the universe had given me my reward in her spread out over 10 years, but kept tally of all my sins and unleashed my punishment all at once directly on my soul. It was ash in my mouth and salt in my eyes, unbearable and searing pain. Until my partner came over to check on me because I was non-responsive by phone. They bodily got me up, they made me drink water and eat, they got me out of bed and into the shower. Through all my sobbing and wailing and despair they held me and told me it’s ok, that they loved me. They loved me on purpose and took care of me when I couldn’t do that for myself.

And that’s it. That’s the purpose. The point. Love. Grief is always hovering there right next to love we experience, but would you trade a single moment with your cat to avoid this grief and pain? I certainly wouldn’t. I’ll take this a hundred times over for the love I experienced for and from Mercy. It’s why we do this to ourselves when we bring a pet into our lives knowing every minute of the journey that it will end too soon. Because they fill a hole in our hearts and make our lives brighter. Even though right now it feels like there is no light in the world, you need to realize that it only feels dark in comparison to how much light they brought. It’s like being in a bright room and suddenly the lights are cut and you’re blind. I promise, our eyes will adjust, we’ll see again, we’ll breath again, and eventually, all we’ll remember is the love and warmth.

All we have to do is survive this, right now. Let it wash over you, honor them with your grief and pain, but don’t let it control you because that’s not what they’d want. Your cat would want you to continue to find the light, to find joy, and to find love. And you have to stick around for that, and you have to do it for them. You’ll do it because you loved and were loved and will love again.

The point is love.

Still you got to love, didn’t you? Love always leads to heartbreak. But at least there is love and those small moments between the two of you that must have been incredibly precious. That’s all there is to life, I believe.

Edit: trust me, there are worse ways to live. For example, life lived chasing illusions such as money, fame or power.

When my dog died almost a year ago to the day, it was one of the worst things my wife and I have ever gone through. I know that’s proof of my privilege—but I think it’s also proof of how much animals mean to us. They’re pure good. I work a lot of weird shifts; when I come home my wife may not be awake or present, but my dog was always there. It initiated intense, physical grief in both of us.

Lean on any friends or family you have. Post here. Don’t deny how bad you’re hurting, but look for another animal to help after you grieve. I feel like our pets represent different chapters in our life, and when one leaves us a new chapter opens. That chapter may come with a different pet for a different time of your life. We chose to use the closing of our chapter as a transition point—we had a few horrible months at first but ultimately kicked some bad habits we had been building for a while. But where you are right now is horrible, and as another human being I understand to an extent how badly you’re hurting.

I hate platitudes, but I did hear the saying something like grief is love with nowhere to go. The amount of suffering you feel is proportional to the amount of love you gave your cat, so it sounds like your cat was exceptionally lucky overall.

We lost our cat a few years ago. She was quirky and weird and sick her entire short life. She had lymphoma - the vet never even tested for it because she was too young. The day we were supposed to bring her home from an overnight stay was the day we had to put her down, and it scarred us deeply. My work sent me home, I was so useless. I cried for hours when I realised our other cat had stopped eating from half of the bowl they shared.

It sucks. It always sucks. It feels like it will never get better, and it won’t, but it’ll get dimmer. You’ll be able to remember the good stuff more often without the final moments crashing in. It just takes time.

For now if you have to wallow in despair, do it. You lost a loved one. It’s your right. Remember though, you’re going through all this because your pet didn’t have to. You held up your end of the deal, and your pet got a great life because you took the pain of loss away from them.

We live for no other reason than that we can. Against all odds, in a universe that wasn’t trying to make us alive, we became more than the sum of our elements that compose us: to be the thinking and thriving things that we are - for as long as we are. Life itself is an act of defiance against the universe, but ultimately playing by it’s rules with the understanding that we can only do so for a finite amount of time.

Your cat too was one of those defiant and emergent souls that used the universe as it’s playground full of strangers, bullies, and friends alike. Never forget that which it did not know: that its time was short but miraculous in the grand scheme of a universe borne of chaos but twinkling with unexpected life.