Happy Angelic Birthday Abby

Happy Heavenly birthday.

She'd be 24.

 

22

I truly believe in this quote from Mitch Album.

It is all we have left.

To share our memories.

She would be 22 this year.

There was no 'official' day but when I adopted her

her birth month was listed as July in 1999.

***

Happy birthday baby girl.

Momma misses you.

 

Happy Birthday Abby

My sweet girl would be 21 years old today.

Happy Heavenly birthday baby girl.

Not a day goes by that I don't remember.

***

love you to the moon

and back...

again and again

and

again.

Happy Birthday

You would be 20 today.

I'd like to believe your celebrating

your heavenly birthday with all

of your cat family and friends.

#missingyou

***

Sometimes realizations come slowly.
Like recognizing that everyone is dealing with
some type of heartache.
As simple as that seems to recognize,
I'm not sure that it's something that is totally transparent.
Each of the heartaches is different and unique.
Not one is more or less hurtful than the other.
There is nothing to compare when it comes
to loss. It just hurts like hell.
It will never stop hurting.
The length of time will lessen it's daily
impact but when the full weight of the loss
is upon you it feels like it is the same
as the day it happened.
I know I will spend the rest of my life
searching for "MY" answer.
There are tiny tidbits that come into view.
Those "ah-ha" moments that give you
clarity, but they are hard to come by.
I suppose that why it's all such a mystery.
But, I will still go on my Journey which
started too many years ago, trying to find
whatever will make it all make sense to me.
I will also continue to put it out 'there'
that I am still seeking truth.

***

I show my scars so that others
may know they can heal.

Happy Heavenly 19th Birthday

My beautiful Angel

turns 19 in Heaven today.

She had the sweetest paws.

And the sweetest face.

(to me)

All I have left now Abby,

are a few photos and

my memories.

It will have to be enough.

...for now.

She was getting ready to jump up

into my lap,

which is why I love this photo so much.

She loved loved loved her sunpuddles.

Every day, the first year she was gone

I made a graphic with a quote or thought.

It was one way I honored her

and tried to find a way to help my heart heal.

One of my all time favorite photos.

The silhouette of a cat.

The cat.

My cat.

My Abby.

My baby girl.

Happy sweet 19 dear Angel.

Happy Birthday Angel Abby

The above photo is one of my all time favorites of Abby.

The background on it is bittersweet.

She was just home from being in the ER for 3 days.

She was in her "chair".

She seemed to be rallying and I took some of the best photos of her

that morning.

Unfortunately she crashed for a second time that afternoon and 

had to be rushed back to the ER for her second stay.

I will tell you I photoshopped the photo at the time to shield myself

really from what was happening to her.

But she was still the same beautiful girl in my eyes no matter what.

So bittersweet this memory is.

I was holding onto to anything that would give me hope.

But today is more about remembering for me

that it is her birthday.

She would have been 17.

I thought then and still to this day that losing my

ability to photograph her would be very hard.

It has been.

When I look at the first photo it makes me so wistful.

Not being able to create more memories with her with my 

camera.

She was very comfortable with the camera.

After I lost her, I lost the joy of doing that.

I stopped really.

I stopped shooting photos.

It's hard for me to think, even now, that I can't take anymore

photos of her, and I can only share the ones I have that are now

at least 3 years old. They go back to 2005.

I have thousands of them but they aren't enough.

Nothing could be enough.

But that is the way it is.

I can't change that, and just have to accept it's reality.

I suppose it's more for me now,

than it is for her.

But, there is a profoundness in not 

letting her memory fade.

It's important to me.

Even though it brings a tear I am ever so grateful

when anyone remembers her, and says her name.

I miss her.

I wish I could hug her and wish her a Happy Birthday today.

But I will remember her, again today,

and be grateful and wish her a Happy Birthday at the 

Rainbow Bridge.

Some of the greatest blessings

come at the greatest

costs.

Pawing It Forward 15th Birthday Celebration

Abby

 July 1,1999 

August 12,2013

Today marks Abby's 15th birthday.
My first without her.
Today will be a hard day no doubt. There will be tears shed and there will be joy as well. I am not far enough along in my Journey to be able to truthfully say I am without the sorrow deep in my heart, in fact the sadness still sits so heavy on me at times that it makes me wonder how long I will carry it.
Today will be one of those times that I will wonder how far I can carry it.
I am sharing many pictures of Abby throughout her years with me and also today I am sharing a special story about two extraordinary people whose story interwines and it's my Abby that ties it all together.

I want you to meet Abb. Isn't he gorgeous? Abb came to Clara Showalter around the time Abby was so very sick. Clara is a volunteer extraordinaire at Austin Pets Alive, a No Kill Rescue in Austin Texas. Clara works with many of the cats that come in with high health risks. She is special. Many of you may remember CancerCat, Sandy who Clara shared with us at Feline Foster Follies. I think this is actually how Clara and I met, you see Sandy was a manx too. Sandy was a true feline warrior and her story is one I highly recommend you read about.Sandy may no longer be with us but her spirit lives on.

 Clara honored Abby by naming this sweet ginger boy Abb. She fostered him through his eye surgery and got him back up on all four paws. Sadly, during this time Abby lost her battle. But, it was such an honor to have her name carried on by this sweet boy. When the time came for Clara to send Abb along his way, his adoptive Mother came all the way from Oregon to Texas to adopt this very special cat. Clara shared with Natalie (his adoptive Mother), the story behind his name and Natalie was so moved that she decided to keep his name as Abb. Abby became his well honor Angel Godmother and Abb I hope you know that you have a special guardian Angel watching over you.

Abb has his own Facebook page it's called Abb's Squirrel Tail.

That brings me to wanting to do something special since it's Abby's birthday. I thought I would do a commentathon and donate .50 per comment to Austin Pets Alive in Abby's and Abb's honor. I hope you will join me. One comment from each household please.
***
Plus Abby is going to send one special person a $25 gift card to PetsMart. If you want to be considered for the random drawing just let me know in the post.
Also please leave a way for me to contact you, an email would be great!
I will be using random.org to make the selection.

I began Day 1 after I lost Abby by posting one B/W photo a day of her on her Twitter account under the #hashtag #rememberingabby. I was doing it in any constructive way in the beginning. It became  a way of remembrance. As time went by I refined that idea and began putting quotes with each photo. So things evolved and it became a year long project. I plan to put all the photos together on her one year anniversary. These photos are many I chose to begin that project with.

I have so many photos of Abby. It was hard to go back through them and pick and choose. I found in the beginning it was just so hard. When I uncovered things I hadn't seen in a long time it brought forth so many memories. Along with so many tears.

Abby loved sitting on the kitchen table. As you can see the sun was perfect for afternoon napping. Abby's garden is now right out of these windows shown in these pictures. I chose that area because of her love of looking out of this big picture window and the close proximity to the house. I see her garden every time I cross through the kitchen and that is how I wanted it to be. I wanted to see her and think of her.

It's so easy in my mind to just see her lying there.

I also love photos of her in silhouette. The one below shows the afternoon sun acting like a halo around her and that plush double coat of fur is so full.

Another of Abby's favorite spots was the back porch. Being in Florida with our milder climate the porch is a near year round room which all the cats go back and forth onto. Abby certainly loved whiffing!

It dawns on me that so many of the photos I've chosen throughout the years are in the kitchen. Abby is again on the window sill in the kitchen.

When I look now I can see some aging in her face in this photo from 2012 (in the kitchen on top of the kitchen table, I am sitting down below her looking up). I sure do miss seeing this face.

This photo is one of my all time forever favorites of Abby. I had it made into a over sized photo canvas last January. I photoshopped it to erase out the ugliness that her illnesses had done to her,so you'll have to forgive me for editing out the harshness. I would never publish a photo of her that was unflattering. But the story behind this is it was the last hurrah she had. That morning, August 3rd, a Saturday, she jumped up on the dining room table and had bath , then got down and came and sat with me and all the other cats in the morning sun. I mistakenly thought she had turned a corner, but in retrospect it was truly the last time she felt strong enough and decent. It was all downhill after this. In fact the day this photo was taken she had a set back and had to be rushed back to the ER for the second time in less than week. I didn't know it then but it was the beginning of the end.

It's been close to 11 months since that fateful day and it's been a  long and hard Journey. I'm still trying to find answers. Now I'm guessing, but I doubt I will ever find them. It seems I am not supposed to find them, not in this life. Over the next few weeks so many milestones happen, this summer will be full of triggers. Grief is such a tangled complex thing. Tied to our memories which we all hold so precious to our hearts, the smallest thing can spin the entire process into a raging storm. I miss her. I have looked for words to describe it better but they fail me. I just miss her. Still.

Thank you Natalie for letting me borrow these great photos both you and Clara took of our Godson!

But today I am trying to let Abby give back. So I hope you'll help me do that. I will total up all the comments and make a donation in Abb & Abby's honor to Austin Pet's Alive. I will leave the comments open until July 4th and let you know next week what the grand total is. Thank you all for compassion and love you've shown Abby through all of these years. Thank you for listening to me as I've traveled on Abby's Journey. I hope my own personal outpouring of grief posts have helped shed some light to anyone who may be going down the path themselves.That has been a part of my message.Grief never stops, it bends, twists,slows and takes many curves but it never stops. Once you hold something in your heart, it never leaves, but the missing doesn't either. That is my struggle today. I am missing the future we will never share during the rest of my lifetime.
***
Happy Birthday Baby.
I love you
to the moon
and back
again...
and
again...
and
again...