In August, we had to say goodbye to Teddy. He had been diagnosed with HCM the summer before. That is a terminal diagnosis, but it is unclear how long you have with your cat.

When I went to the vet again in July this year, just before we went on vacation, she actually was surprised that he was still alive. That was a reality check for us, as we hadn’t realized how serious this is, and that the prospects were this grim.

It was a hard decision what to do in regards to our summer vacation, if we should send him to the cat hotel as usual, if there was something else to do - maybe even cancel the vacation.

In the end, we decided to just go ahead as planned with our sailing trip - we knew we were never that far away, and if something really bad happened, we could be at the hotel in a couple of hours. Out cats are used to being there, and Teddy really enjoyed being there and always made new friends. In addition, this was our first real vacation in two years, and we desperately needed a timeout.

We wrote the cat hotel a detailed description of what was wrong, gave detailed instructions and even gave them permission to put him to sleep if something bad happened and they could not reach us - and hoped for the best.

We had no communication until the last day of vacation - right along the lines of “no news is good news.” Just when we had finished up mooring up in our home berth, and were packing our things, a call came. When the lady from the cat hotel told me that they had just found Teddy lying dead on the floor - they had been in and cuddled with him half an hour before - I could not really believe it. We were just half an hour away from driving there and picking him up. And now he was gone?

We had of course to pick up the other two, and the lady from the cat hotel was heart broken, maybe even more than us. They had been very apprehensive as well over the course of our vacation, and now the worst case scenario had happened.

So picking up the cats was very bitter-sweet - the only thing which is a little bit of a consolation there is that it had happened very quickly, he was fine one minute, and they found him half an hour later already stiff - so he didn’t have to suffer. And it would have been so much worse if he had suddenly died during the car trip home, as that was always a bit stressful for him.

But still - three years was just too short with you, little Bärlibär, and you leave a gaping hole in our little family.