We've all made mistakes, and bad ones at that.  Some of us have
been lucky and caught something before it went horribly wrong and
unfortunately some of us haven't.  But whatever the result, it was
the same potentially tragic mistake.  We make them.
 
And we don't just make them with our ferrets.  We make them all over the
place.  We narrowly avoid a collision with another car.  We take our eyes
off our children, just for a second.  We leave a pan on the stove.  There
are a million possibilities for mistakes and there is no question that
we're going to make one or two of them.  We can't help it.  But the same
spontaneity that allows us to make mistakes also allows us to love.
We're not robots.
 
You wanted to know how to stop beating yourself up.  I don't know that
there's an answer for that.  But what helps is taking extra special care
of your remaining ferrets.  I know, you think to yourself "I'm a bad
ferret keeper".  So, do you give them up?  No, of course not, because
you love and take care of your guys in a way that no one else could.
So you're needed.  Yes you, that "bad" ferret keeper.  They need you.
You'll clean their ears, trim their nails, clean their cages, and feed
and water them with the same care that you've always taken.  And maybe
a bit more.
 
And you'll hurt for a while.  I can't tell you how long.  But you
can't care about anything if you're not willing to accept the pain of
eventually being separated from that thing.  You can't separate love
and pain.  And when you see love and pain as two parts of the same thing
it's easier to accept them both.  When you accidentally drop and break
a coffee cup it's an inconvenience, not a tragedy.  Why?  Because you
simply didn't care that much about a coffee cup.  It's an inanimate
object which doesn't mean much in the scheme of things.  You never
"loved" your coffee cup, so it can't cause you much pain.  It's when
we love something greatly that we end up feeling the most pain at it's
loss.  It's an unbreakable equation.  It's just how life works.
 
My sympathies go out to you and your family.
 
Roary
Albuquerque, NM
[Posted in FML issue 4681]