“Willy is My Joy, My Sorrow…..He Says He’d Love to Live With Me…” - Joni Mitchell

Some days I just cannot keep it together.  A sad song on the radio, the hint of ridicule in some stranger’s voice, the mere glance of a pile of fluffy white kittens in a toilet paper commercial on TV, and I’m gone – melted into a puddle of tears.  The tears come on suddenly, over the silliest things, and once they start pouring down my face, I can’t stop.  The only way I can stop myself from crying is to avoid all things that might make me cry – which is everything!  Keep my head down, do not make eye contact, keep my heart sharp as a razor.

There have been SO MANY DAYS like that for me lately.  Actually, there have been many days like that for me for quite a long time. 

For the last few sessions, Jessica (my therapist) and I have been talking about “all or nothing” thinking, something I do without even realizing.  It is so insidious that even when it’s pointed out to me, I have a difficult time seeing it and not doing it again 5 minutes later.  Really, I have lived my entire life ruled by emotion.   Whatever I “feel” like doing, I do (for the most part).  I haven’t really ever thought critically about how I’m feeling or why, or “is what I am doing an appropriate response to what I’m feeling”, or “do I even know what I’m feeling right now” – and more importantly, what are the thoughts behind my vague feelings. 

My husband has told me that in the 6 years we’ve been dating/married, he has never seen me cry.  In my family, showing emotion was a sign of weakness.  No one cried in my family while I was growing up, except me, which sucked!   Crying in front of other people brings me back to growing up and having “serious family conversations” about my weight and what to do about it.  During these conversations, my parents would beg and plead with me to lose weight, and, as I got older, offer me a new wardrobe, a trip to somewhere fabulous, cash….any incentive they thought would work, if only I would lose the weight.  These conversations always ended with me running off crying and them being completely flabbergasted that I wouldn’t just lose weight.  I had a pretty good childhood otherwise, but that is just not a place I like to re-visit so I’ll be damned if anyone is going to make me cry or see me cry now. 

In private is a different story.  I am still that cry baby in private.  I cry at the drop of a hat.  I cry if I’m happy, I cry if I’m sad.  I cry if I’m angry.  I cry if I'm frustrated. The only way I can stop myself from crying is to eat or act out in some way.  I just do not know what to do when “I feel something”.  It means I spend a good deal of time like a character out of a Country and Western ballad….always on the verge of some crisis or another, always heartbroken over something, always weak, always mourning, always feeling down and out, until I rise triumphant and “start over”.  Makes for a great song, but it does get old.  Perfect example of “all or nothing”….if I can’t be “this”, then I’ll be “that”.  No room to be both, which is what a well-balanced person is. 

Jessica has been encouraging me to examine the thoughts behind the feeling.  What thought is causing me “to feel something”.  It makes me uncomfortable to examine my thoughts.  I find all kinds of thoughts I never expected to find.  And I find all kinds of thoughts I knew were there but I avoided.  I am forced to confront all my judgey, politically incorrect, disturbing, dark thoughts.  Which leads to more feelings. 

As everyone knows, Felix has been the focus of my thoughts and emotions of late.  He has been missing for 3 months.  He’s my baby and I miss him.  From the beginning of his absentia, there’s been a cat at Lollypop Farm that looks so much like Felix. Lollypop has named him Willy.  Willy has been at Lollypop since May.  He was one of the very first leads I got of Felix.  We arrived at the Greece Mall location, where he was first being kept, within a week of Felix’s disappearance.  They kept him in the back room where they store supplies.  He was so skittish and scared that he would not mingle among the other cats or allow people to touch him.  Sam and I went into the back room with the Lollypop worker and we talked about Felix, showed them a picture of him, tried to get Willy to warm up to us.  All the while, Willy insisted on jumping from and to the really high up spaces in the room, but when Sam started to leave the room with the Lollypop worker, he came down to greet me. 

Willy

I have since visited Willy several times in person and I love him.  He is now being kept at the main Lollypop office but still, in a group of offices, not the general population.  The first time I visited him in this space, I sat at the desk quietly while he paced back and forth and watched me from afar.  After a few minutes, he jumped up on the desk but would not let me touch him.  So I went over to his bed by the window and waited.  He jumped up and started to purr.  I spent a half hour with him.  By the time I left, he was purring around my legs and I had tears in my eyes.

In between visits, I look at the photos of Willy on Lollypop’s website and watch the little video they made of him over and over, searching for clues that he is in fact Felix.  He really does look and act a lot like Felix.  He’s around the same age.  It seems perfect – he needs a home, he looks like my cat, I want my cat, so maybe this IS my cat…except, Willy was picked up in May (we know this because he was micro chipped the next day) in Penfield and has pink pads on his feet.  Felix went missing on July 12 in Rochester and has black pads on his feet.  These little details are all that separates Willy/Felix from me.

His existence eases my guilt and grief over Felix.  As long as I can see Willy, then I can tell myself Felix is ok.  More than that, if I examine the thought behind the feeling, I know that I think Willy is in fact Felix.  I think Willy will be adopted by another family eventually and I will never see him again, and then my only link to Felix will be gone.  I know I am right about these thoughts because tears are rolling down my face as I write this.

I wanted my neighbour, Pat, to adopt Willy.  I think she and he would be good for each other but also, selfishly, I want him close to me so I can continue to visit him.  But Pat is not ready to adopt.

Willy

If I could adopt him myself, I would.  I want to.  My girl cat, Sugar, would probably not accept Willy….and it is that fear alone that stops me from doing so.  She is extremely possessive, unpredictable and territorial….we call her the Fluffy Mafia.  She is small, but fierce.  She oversees everything with a disapproving look and a fluffy tail that looks like it was made out of peacock feathers.  I’m not even sure she will accept Felix if we get him back.  She only accepted him the first time around because he was so tiny. 

Looking for Felix these past 3 months has really beaten me up.  I never realized how many tuxedo cats there are, many of them with the same markings as Felix.  And each one of them kills me.

The last few months have also shown me both the kindness of neighbours, who continue to ask about Felix and look for him on walks with their children and dogs, and the cruelty of posters on CraigsList who regularly post about what happens to stray cats.  I’ve made contacts in various animal control services who contact me when they pick up a dead black and white cat.  I’ve met several other Canadians who also live in Rochester all while looking for Felix.  Sam is a regular at Verona Street, where he visits every week to check for Felix.

I met a woman who has taken it upon herself to feed the stray cats of Rochester.  She   goes out every single morning at 5am, and goes from street corner to street corner to the many little stations she has set up…..no matter the weather.  She feeds them, checks the shelters she has built them and gives them water.  She rescues the ones she can.  She finds homes for the ones she can.  She neuters and spays the ones she can.  She picks the ones up off the street who have been hit by cars.   All out of her own pocket, with her own time, with no assistance - financial or otherwise.  She knows the hookers, the street people, the thugs and the vandals who destroy her work.  And they all know her.  She exposes herself not only to financial hardship, but also to disease from cat bites and scratches, and to the dangers of the street.  She puts aside her own heartbreak and outrage and DOES something about it.  I gotta hand it to the girl…she’s got conviction.  I admire that.

When I read her blog, I am heartbroken at the dangers these cats encounter.  All my worst fears for Felix are confirmed – yes, people really are that cruel; yes, Felix could have been hit by a car by now; yeah, he could be getting attacked by a dozen other cats every single night.  He could be starving.  He is most definitely scared.  He may have no shelter and if he does tonight, he might not tomorrow. 

 

One Thursday night at 10pm while Sam was watching football, a woman and a couple of kids showed up at our house with a cat who looked nothing like Felix in their arms, as if they scooped it right up off the street, claiming that it’s him.  They even tore off one of the posters we put up and brought it with them, as if we might have forgotten about our lost cat.   We put all the posters in plastic sheet sleeves to protect them from the elements but even still, this was clearly one of the first posters we put up and it’s shriveled, ripped, worn exterior sits like a reminder on the stairs of how emotionally draining the last 3 months have been.

 

We have followed so many leads and seen and heard so many devastating stories of unwanted pets, it has really gotten to me.  There are some things you just can’t “unknow”.
 

However, my life goes on.  I keep putting one foot in front of the other, willing the days to pause so I can get Felix back before Winter sets in.  Everything seems like it is slow motion for me, which has been a good thing for me in terms of my sleeve surgery.  If it wasn’t for this “slow motion” thing, I’d be losing my mind waiting for the process to unfold.  Patience, I’m afraid, is not one of my gifts.

 

On October 2, gastric sleeve surgery stepped just a little bit closer to me.  I saw Dr. D and got my surgery date.  The next step is insurance approval.  The hospital submitted the claim to insurance and now we wait.  Apparently my insurance company has recently made it their policy that they will only pay for one bariatric surgery in a lifetime.  Although they did not pay for my lap band to be put in, they did pay for it to be removed.  (Usually, a "revision" patient is someone for whom Dr. D has put in a lap band, then a year or two later the patient decides they want sleeve surgery instead.) The insurance company's thinking is, it's not our fault you chose the wrong surgery.  I obviously don't agree with that thinking (all or nothing, anyone?) but it's not Dr. D's call - it's up to Excellus.  My surgeon has not had another case like me, so he is not sure what they will decide to do. 

 


Willy

I suppose in terms of timing it has all worked out rather perfectly.  Assuming I am approved by insurance, my surgery date is January 6, 2014.  What better time than a New Year to do something like this?  It also means another 5 day pre-op liquid diet, which makes New Year’s Eve the last night I can eat or drink anything I please for a long, long, long time.  
 

My Mother-in-Law did a lovely thing to try and cheer me up.  She gifted me with a big, thick, black lace skull shawl, handmade by one of her old students.   It did cheer me up and helped me remember that doing something is better than stewing about it. 

In the spirit of “pay it forward”, I really need to do something for Willy.  Please, if you live in Rochester and have been thinking of adopting a cat – choose Willy.  He would do best in a quiet home, living with women and no other animals.  He is 6 years old, takes awhile to warm up and when he does he is a cuddly sweetheart.  And is really beautiful.  He's neutered and micro-chipped.  Lollypop has a free adoption event on Friday…..you don’t even have to pay for him!  Here's Willy's listing:  http://www.lollypop.org/site/c.clKUI9OQIoJcH/b.7792283/k.ADD3/Cats.htm#.Ul7J4WzD_yN

And I hope if you do adopt him, you’ll consider letting me visit him occasionally, tears and all.  See his video here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdtTpHfHhIs&feature=share&list=FLXO4jaIX3jmhAN6qCXtGCAw

These Things Are True About Me:

·        I absolutely LOVE Fall - falling leaves, gorgeous colours, crisp leaves, burning wood smells in the air
·        Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday
Now that I live in the US, I get TWO Thanksgivings, which could not be more awesome!
·        I love Halloween
·        Pumpkin everything!
·        Tim Horton’s pumpkin iced cappuccino – OMG so good!
·        I love homemade Halloween costumes.  Brings me back to Halloween as a kid before my Aunt Rosie, who was an artist, moved to BC....she made paper mache masks for us, did our make up, dressed us up, made awesome Halloweeny popcorny caramely treats and decorated our house with cool Halloween art.