u/notrapunzel

I've had a hard year. Just when things feel like they might be getting ok and I can let my guard down, something else goes to 💩. I keep getting overwhelmed by life even though I work from home, self-employed, 3 days part time, it's still too much for me. I'm also socially isolated af and I'm sick of it and nothing works for me - it's either a hobby where the activity itself is consuming my brain power, or it's one-to-one and there's a bunch of awkward silence and all the years of masking haven't fixed that.

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I need an understanding hug from folks who get it. I'm so worn down and tired of feeling this way.

There's a doughnut cushion Joey always snoozed on in the middle of the couch. That was Joey's seat on the couch every night for years. I want to keep it. I want it to be easily accessible so I can open and look at it and touch it, but obviously it's a bulky item that takes up too much space for a shelf/cupboard.

I'm also concerned that our surviving cat might be kept a bit stressed and confused by the presence of his late brother's scent, which I imagine probably smells quite strong from this cushion. I don't really know whether it's better or worse to reduce the remaining scent of a cat that's died? Or should I leave things alone for a bit longer?

What have you done with your beloved cat's bedding, and if you have a surviving cat, did you notice any problems with either the presence or the absence of things that carried your late kitty's scent?

It's so hard to get it right for my Timmy, he's a big baby softie and misses his cheeky brother and I want to handle this right for him as well as myself ❤️‍🩹

I don't know why, but there's always someone who a) doesn't check their emails despite me reminding them to keep an eye on it, or b) I'm just guessing some of my emails land in Spam while others don't?

This is the second time I've gone through bereavement since lockdown, and whether I ask people in person as well as by message to *please* keep an eye on their emails including junk folders, or whether there's no warning and I just have to stop everything and go, a few people will just turn up anyway. And if I'm still in the house by the time they show up and I'm ugly-crying and can't answer, it sends me sparkling into guilt over not just ignoring this huge thing that's just happened and just carrying on teaching. I have tried, and I cannot do that. My mental health and physical health take an immediate, massive hit and I need time to recover. My asthma kicks off, my anxiety and trauma responses have to be managed, my autism compounds it all, and I can't eat/sleep/keep hydrated enough because my heart pounds like hell for days.

Yes yes I should just be able to just keep going and ignore things so that I keep to my schedule. I shouldn't be taking time off just because I had to put my cat down suddenly, or because my father-in-law is dying and my family needs my presence. But my brain Does Not Allow Me To. I've tried to force my way through things. I can't. This is a big part of why I'm self-employed in the first place.

But, what the heck is going on here? When I'm just emailing people about my holiday dates they don't seem to have any trouble receiving those messages, but when it's something bad going down and I've also spoken to them in person about it, several of them will just carry on like nothing's up and then message me all confused as to why I wasn't home when they rang the bell. And after having to spill the beans *again* I don't get an answer half the time, leaving me feeling mega-💩 wondering whether they're angry/whether I've messed up.

Have you been in difficult situations (bereavement/illness/etc) and have you been able to set up an effective strategy for when awful things are happening and you need to hit pause?

My orange was very attached to my tuxie, who died yesterday. My heart is breaking a second time over trying to help him.

He walks around looking for his friend. He curls up in his favorite chair facing the doorway in case his friend walks through it. He begs me to stay in his favorite room with him and doesn't like when I leave to go to another room. He wants me to pet him in his chair. If I'm sat on the sofa, he will only come for a very brief cuddle, then go back to his chair, or maybe his carrier. He sleeps a lot. Any surprise sound makes him flinch. He calls out if I go to the bathroom and shut the door. He seems ok with me doing simple chores like tidying the kitchen, because he can hear me the whole time from his chair.

I'm really hurting for him 😥 he's had such a rough time leading up to this too. He always wanted to be around his brother until he was getting ill and started pushing him away a lot of the time to avoid overstimulation. So he already lost his playmate weeks ago, but at least he could still nap on the same bed and sometimes he still allowed him to curl up together on the sofa in his better days.

While his brother was deteriorating, he would come check on him sometimes, but not bother him too much. He would go take his afternoon naps alone. He was such a sweet, kind little brother to his ailing older brother, and even though he was walking on eggshells around him, he still wanted to try and snuggle when possible. When his brother got really weak, he didn't try to force himself on him. He would politely sit next to him for short periods, then leave him be.

The deterioration was so sudden and fast that we had to take his brother to the vet urgently and not leave it too late. We didn't opt for a home callout, partly because we were in shock and questioning ourselves about the decision and wanted a vet's opinion first, and partly because we didn't want to risk frightening/traumatizing our orange boy.

We let our tuxie go. We came home with empty arms.

Our kitties' normal routine all their years with us has been treats at bedtime, then closing them into the big living room together. They'd spend part of the night on the sofa together, especially in winter. But our orange doesn't know what to do with himself at night now. Last night, we couldn't bear to shut him in alone and confused, so we let him into the bedroom with us. He was quiet and spent most of the night at my feet. Tonight, he seems to really want to stay in the living room, so I'm in here on the sofa and he's in his carrier on the floor. He's not being his cuddly self. He's confused and upset that his brother is gone. He keeps thinking that random noises might be him. He catches his own reflection in the big glass doors and he fixates on it, probably wondering if it's his brother.

I don't know if I'm doing the right thing or just messing up his routine, but I just want to help him. It makes me hurt for him that he's grieving too. He's such a big softie, an absolute sweetheart, he has been through so much with the progression of his brother's illness and the uncharacteristic rejection he received from him. He was already getting lonely while his brother was still here. He doesn't know what to do without him now.

If anyone has been through similar, please let me know what helped your surviving kitty to cope after their beloved kitty friend passed away 💔

Update: my little sweetie died yesterday after a sudden sharp decline. I decided to email all students/parents and move my time off a week early. Thanks for everyone's responses. I need time to process everything.

I have to walk my students through the hallway to get to my music room for their lessons. On the way, they'll often encounter our cats. Sometimes, the cats come bursting into the room at the end of my teaching day as soon as I open the door, because it's dinner time after that. The students and families are really fond of them. There's no way I could have kept the cats completely away from my students due to the layout of our house, besides locking them up in one room all day.

One of them is now terminally ill. It could be days, weeks, or months.

I'm already dreading trying to control my emotions come Monday, but how do I deal with the usual "How are the cats?" questions from the kids? And when he dies, what do I do, send a message warning parents of this fact or something, in case this isn't something they've had to deal with at home yet?

I know it's a weird question for the sub, but I do wonder if anyone else has been here before me and how you handled it?