My poor, poor boy...

Oh man, last night my heart was just breaking for Joey. On the way back from TKD, he was looking sad and I asked if he was ok. When I asked him, he said no and started crying about how much he missed Max. He then asked me what word I was using when I had explained why I thought Max had died. I was explaining that I said I thought he had a congenital defect in his brain that caused him to have a stroke basically a problem he was born with. Well, he managed to get his emotions under control and, when we got home, we put the lights on the tree. Then, around bedtime, Joey was having a "missing Max" moment right and ended up sobbing and sobbing.  Then he said, "Mom, two nights before he died, I was holding Max and bouncing him in my arms. When he jumped down, he hit his head hard on the shelf. I think I caused Max's death." My poor dear boy.  He has such a gentle soul and would never, ever willingly hurt someone and he's been thinking he contributed to his cat's death. That just breaks my heart.  I assured him that the type of bump a cat would have gotten from jumping out of someone's arms would never cause damage to the brain. Joey then said "But what if he did have a congenital problem...maybe that bump could have caused it to be a problem." I reassured him that to do that kind of damage to a cat;s brain that there would have probably been external damage.  I also told him that the fact that Max misjudged a jump so badly probably meant something was already going wrong and we just didn't realize it. Joey said he still felt like it was his fault. I asked him if he had regularly played with Max like that and he said yes. I also asked him if Max usually liked that play and if he had ever fallen or hit his head when Joey played with him like that before this time.  He said no. So, I told Joey that what he did caused no harm to Max and that his playing with Max probably made him feel loved and taken care of. Joey was still crying pretty badly so I asked him if hearing this all from Vic would help (because two people telling you something always makes it more legitimate). Hearing the same reassurances from Vic seemed to help and he calmed down enough to sleep.  I feel so bad for my poor sweet boy.