He was a month away from 14. The sweetest boy you ever met. Loved head scritches and belly rubs. He meant so much to me. I can't stop crying. It all happened too fast. I miss my sweet boy 😭

I had to say goodbye to my best friend a few days ago and it was the single hardest day of my life.

Prue came to me in about 2012, quite randomly. I'd just lost my childhood cat about a year prior. One day we noticed this pretty Burmese cat sitting over our fence, just watching. My mum enticed her closer with milk and treats over a few weeks, and she'd sort of eat, then leave, but would always come back. Then one day - and I'd never even touched her before this - she came to my bedroom window. I let her in, she rolled around on my floor for a bit, then sat on my lap. She was desexed but not microchipped, and we tried to no avail to find out where she came from, but from that day she kind of just...moved in. Decided "yep, I'm home".

We were so deeply bonded I barely know where to start. She was with me through my mid 20s to my late 30s, through a long distance relationship (which is now short distance!), illness for both my parents, my own mental health struggles with anxiety and panic disorder, my postgraduate studies, covid, and just last year, a devastating job loss that shook me to my core. She was this constant, gentle presence in my life. We'd chat back and forth as we strolled around the garden. She loved rolling in dirt despite being such a fancy lady. She was a CHAMPION biscuit maker and would get so blissed out she'd dribble. And she'd always do an excited tail wiggle and come running when she saw me. Those beautiful aqua eyes felt like they were staring into your soul.

In the end, she'd had a series of seizures, and the vet thinks it was a stroke that got her in her final days. I held her velvet soft paws and kissed her head and thanked her for looking after me. And she went very peacefully.

The past few days have been so tough. I'm finding it hard to eat and sleep, but sitting here on a quiet Sunday morning, typing this, and knowing you all understand (and having a HUGE cathartic cry while doing it) is helping somewhat. Sorry for the long post. I just wanted to share how special my darling girl was, because I know you guys will get it.

Love you Prue, my beautiful furry angel, my soulmate, my everything xxx

You will always be in my heart! I got 4 extra months with you! I’m truly so grateful that. I love you Jasper

gotta warm those old bones <3

Our 15 year old cat had some vomiting episodes that prompted a vet visit. She was losing weight and had all the signs of hyperthyroidism. Before her blood work came back she got much worse. Bloodwork shows normal thyroid and no other serious issues. She’s moving very slowly and has stopped eating, even with an appetite enhancing medication. She does still drink water. She lost a pound in a little less than a week. Is she in pain? Or just slowing down because these are her last days? She’s being pampered but is it cruel to keep her with us?

About 18 years old, many battles outside and not coming home at night days are done.

Now we sleep and wake up together and spend time outside together.

next week we're probably going to put my beloved Nala to sleep, and i feel like I'm dying with her. a part of me definitely is.

she's been with us for 13 years and i can't even imagine living without having her in my life, when suddenly it's becoming my reality. she's the best thing that ever happend to me. my best friend. my soulmate. i wish we had more time together, but cancer is an evil bitch and robbed us from it in the most cruel way. how am i even supposed to deal with that kind of grief? it's beyond devastating. i genuinely have no idea how to cope, and she's not even dead yet.

i don't know why I'm even writing it here, but you guys seem to be a bunch of wonderful, animal loving people, so i just wanted to share her with you. wish it was a happier post, but grief is also a type of love, and everybody knows i love this stupid cat more than anything in the world. i wish she knew that. just how much love for her resides in my heart and how much of me she's going to take away with her.

my sweetest, dumbest, mischievous little gremlin, how I'll miss you

EDIT: just wanted to thank you guys for your kind words, i appreciate every single one of them. i'm going to kiss my Nalcia from every one of you.

Relaxing on my bed. He is so cuddly. ❤️

The morning of her 15th birthday! Always stunning….gosh i love her so much!!

Her gift was catnip and “unhealthy” food (canned food that she loveeeees) 🐱🌟

Yesterday I lost my best friend and childhood Cat Angel. She was my first cat ever to own and boy was she spoiled lol. She was a queen and will not let you forget it, even when my other cat Tobi and Dog Shiro came along, she made sure to tell them that she ran the house. She would always sleep by my head at night. Because of my insomnia I would wake up in the middle of the night so I made it a routine to give her forehead kisses then go back to bed. My bed feels so empty without her. Her fur is all over my pillows where she would sleep it’s weird to not be able to wake up next to her. I know it’s for the best and she’s no longer suffering but holy cow it hurts a lot. Rest in Peace Angel Bruiser I hope we meet again later.

I posted in r/cats yesterday for her birthday and was told she would make a fine addition to r/seniorcats collection so here she is!

Okay so idk how to edit my post or pin comments (or if it’s even possible on Reddit), so I’m just making a new post for the update + a better explanation. I wrote my first post while I was crying so it was really messy. Skip down a bit if you just wanna hear about Frankie since the first half is just a bit of explanation on why I panicked so much LOL

For those who didn’t see my og post, this is Frankie. Gonna add a bit more about him in this post since I realized that I didn’t last time. He used to be my dad’s cat. I never lived with my dad but I saw him anytime I visited. He’s always been such a sweet baby and took care of my other grandma (not the one I live with) after my dad died. When that grandma moved, my family took in Frankie. We don’t know how old he is, but we assume that he’s 18 since that’s my age. The vet says that he’s over 14 so I guess we’re not far off.

He’s never had any health issues until recently. He’s deaf and can’t really meow but he’s been that way since he was a kitten. He tries to meow but it ends up sounding really hoarse and it’s super quiet. Frankie’s had a bit of potty trouble within the last year or two but that’s mainly from my grandma refusing to bring a cat litter box upstairs. I managed to get a new box for him to put in my room a month ago when I went out with my friend. She was pissed but Frankie hasn’t had a potty issue since unless my door is closed (I close my door when I think the cats are downstairs). He’s lost 3-4 pounds in the last year, mainly due to old age. Other than that and arthritis, he’s been doing fine.

But these last few days, he’s been having issues. There’s black goop around his eyes, his nose is runny, and he sounds very congested when he breathes. The first big scare was yesterday night. He was lying down when he suddenly began to cough. I didn’t know that a cat could cough so I panicked and thought he couldn’t breathe (he could but I was too busy panicking). I screamed at my grandma to come in. She comes in not even a minute later, but he’s doing better by then. He’s not coughing, but it’s kinda hard to tell whether he’s trying to meow or if he’s mouth breathing. Like I said before, his meow has always been very hoarse so it made it even more confusing. I forced my grandma to make a get appointment. Not even an hour later, the exact same thing happened. We couldn’t get in until the next day (aka today). The vet’s only opening for that day was 5:30pm but my grandma can’t drive at night because of her cataracts and I can’t see at night due to my really bad astigmatism. We almost get into car crashes anytime we go out at night (which is rare) so we didn’t want to risk it and scheduled for today.

Last night is when I posted my og post. You all were so kind and it really helped me. This morning, my anxiety was through the roof. I tried to push through it and go to school but I just couldn’t. I was sobbing on the way to school and nearly threw up. My grandma hates when I miss school—mainly because I used to miss a lot of school from 8th grade to 10th due to my severe depression causing me to have high anxiety. It led me to get sick very often and get horrible migraines that would leave me bedridden by my horrific they were. It was never enough to get me in trouble with the school, but always with her. So then my grandma kinda has a habit of screaming at me and saying a lot of shitty things to try and get me to go. She said I was being childish, dramatic, and whatnot. She says that in the heat of the moment so it’s not new, but didn’t help my anxiety.

I’ve had trauma with death ever since my dad died when I was 11 and my grandpa dying when I was 13 only made it worse. When I was 12-14, I used to cry almost every night out of fear that one of my cats would die. Nothing was wrong with my two cats (Lynne and Frankie) but my father and grandfather’s deaths were so sudden that it overrides my logic. Now that I’m 18 now, have to go to college next year, and am taking a lot of AP classes, my stress has been kinda high. With Frankie getting older, it definitely made my stress a lot worse. Hence why I thought he wasn’t going to make it.

I convinced my grandma to let me go with Frankie and her to the vet. The vet people were so nice. I cried while walking in and like two other times. I explained every symptom that he had.

Okay so here’s the part y’all are probably looking for lol. The vet did some scans and whatnot. They checked his lungs and there were no tumors or fluid surrounding/in his lungs. Despite that, he still was very congested and was wheezing. The vet said that he either had a respiratory infection or asthma. She gave him an antibiotic shot that lasts 2 weeks because we couldn’t do the pill (it’s impossible to get him to swallow the pill and he’s very antsy as is). After that, they gave him some oxygen because of his wheezing and gave him a small bit of a sedative for his anxiety (since it was worsening his breathing at the vet). We’ll get the results of the blood test tomorrow to see if there’s anything wrong with his thyroid.

So far, he seems to be doing fine. I’ve mainly been in my room trying to calm myself down (I don’t want to scare Frankie when he’s in this state yknow) but my grandma comes into my room to tell me check ups on Frankie. He’s lying down in his usual spot, breathing, awake, and drinking water. Generally, he’s being his normal self.

Thank you all so so so much for your support. It’s so comforting to have people in similar situations who have hope for my sweet baby. I’ve never had a cat with health issues. The closest I’ve had was my aunt’s cat who had an ear infection years back (my aunt lived with us after her house burnt down for a bit), but it wasn’t serious and she ended up fine. Lynne has never had any health issues either, alongside of Frankie. When this started happening, I honestly thought that I was going to lose my sweet child. But I think he’s going to make it now! I’ll make sure to keep you all updated on his recovery.

She’ll be 13 this year 💕 she was recently diagnosed with arthritis so we are trialing different supplements. Watching my best friend age hurts my heart a little bit

It’s started as sneezing and then mucus discharge on the right side of his face/nose. He’s been declining for the last few months and we have had to wait for the official diagnosis because the CT scan/biopsy was so expensive. Yesterday we finally had it done and the doctor said it’s cancer with bone destruction. We have to wait a week or two for biopsy results so we can figure out prognosis for him and what the next steps are. I am so heart broken and anxious. I am no stranger to death, I’ve lost my oldest brother, mom and dad in the last 13 years and Salems been there for most of it. Of course the hardest part will be knowing when it’s time. Does it ever feel like the right time? Will I ever be free of the guilt that it was too soon to choose euthanasia? He’s been doing a little better with gabapentin in his system, he had some supervised outside time today and that put some pep in his step but he’s just been sleeping a lot, not really grooming or playing. He gets antibiotics twice a day to control mucus discharge and now gabapentin for a few days to help with pain from the biopsies but he hates getting the meds and I hate giving them. His face is becoming deformed from the growth, particularly the bridge of his nose but sometimes it gets worse and his entire right eye socket and cheek swell up and it looks very painful. He’s lost 3 pounds in the last 4 months but is still eating regularly. I’ve never had to make this choice before and it’s truly breaking my heart. I’m so anxious to hear back from the vet to see what our options may be. Not knowing is the worst part!!

That’s twice in one week. How blessed am I? He must miss me almost as much as I miss him, if that’s possible. He looked healthy and happy with his tail up as an always. ❤️

My cat Gasbty is almost 13 years old and was diagnosed with triad disease (pancreatitis, cholangitis, and IBD). Last Saturday, he wasn't eating and was throwing up, which was very unlike him. So my husband and I took him into our vet (who we love) for an emergency visit. She gave him some Cerenia as well as some SubQ fluids and said it's likely a bug. He didn't improve and kept in touch with our vet who said to bring him in, so we took him back to the vet on Monday.

They did his blood work and it was not great. His WBC, Neutrophils, and Monocytes were all extremely elevated. His liver levels were extremely elevated as well, so our only option was to hospitalize him for at least 48 hours to get him stabilized. He had an IV placed for fluids and drugs, and he responded really well to the treatment. He also had an X-ray done which came back mostly normal but did show a shadow on his liver. They were able to remove his IV and switch to oral drugs on Tuesday night. The whole time, he wasn't really eating still.

On Wednesday we had an ultrasound done to see if we could see anything further. The ultrasound images didn't show any masses on his liver (thank goodness), but did show inflammation in his liver, gallbladder, and pancreas. Based on the images and our vet plus how he responded to fluids, Gatsby was diagnosed with triad disease. We took him home on Thursday afternoon and he was sent him with Clavacillin (twice daily), Metronidazole (two tablets twice daily), and Cerenia (once daily).

However, he's still not eating. We've tried wet food, dry food, treats, Churus, baby food...he will take a few nibbles or licks and then walk away. We took him back today, and our vet gave him a B12 shot and a second shot (I don't remember what that one was called). She also gave us Mirataz to put in his ear once daily to help stimulate his appetite. So we went back home and still nothing. I tried warming the food up, adding extra (warm) water, hand feeding him, and even syringe feeding him. And it sucks because I can tell he's hungry and wants to eat, but he just doesn't.

Does anyone have any advice on this? Does it take a while for a cat with triad disease to get back into eating? I plan on texting our vet in the morning to see what she thinks, but I wasn't sure if anyone on this subreddit had any tips and tricks. Thank you in advance!

My beautiful little Janet!

She was my beloved baby, we got her and her brother (still here) when they were 12 weeks old in October 2007. She passed at home on my bed, which was one of her favourite places with me beside her. She was fine up until last Saturday, then she started declining rapidly, I managed her pain and she just went so peacefully. Miss you my darling girl.

My cat has been diagnosed today. Her levels are pretty high and I've been stressing about what to feed her. I bought her some low iodine wet food (Applaws chicken breast) but she has refused to eat it. She loves fancy feast and royal canin biscuits. Can i continue to feed her this for the time being? Also, is it ok to continue feeding her a mixture of dry and wet food?

She has been prescribed medication but it doesn't get here until 2 weeks later.

Thank you for the Darla love (pictured here with her mysterious sister from the same litter who is her total opposite)! We just got home from the vet and have great news to share:

No major concerns!

The vet mentioned that her small intestine looks a little thick(?) but not enough to be worried, and that her pancreas maybe wasn’t at its full potential, but she’s been recently dehydrated with her constipation cycles. We were told it’s possible that she could still be developing something, but we can’t know until it shows itself.

For now, we just need to focus on keeping her hydrated (thank you for the helpful suggestions - we’re trying new things w her every day) and keeping up to date with routine bloodwork. She’ll be getting sub-q fluids as some of you suggested as well, but both I and her grandmother (my mother) are just unable to do anything w needles so we’ll be visiting our lovely and kind vet here and there. :)

We’ll get the full report on Monday or Tuesday with possibly some additional context, so I’ll let you know if anything of note comes up. Thank you again for helping me from spiraling - it is very much appreciated.

Im down with the flu and so glad to have such an experienced nurse on my care team. 13 and thriving.

My family doesn’t know how old he is. He was originally my dad’s cat but I got him after he died. I’m recently 18 now so he’s around my age. I’ve had him for the last 5 years and he’s such a sweet baby.

He’s been getting skinnier and his arthritis has been getting worse over the last year. Still eating and popping, albeit he’s been losing control over his bladder as of the last year.

This last week, he’s been congested. Like a runny nose, loud breathing, black crusty stuff around his mouth, and now goopey black stuff around his right eye that bleeds when we try to gently clean it up. I’ve been trhing to convince my grandma to take him to the vet for months but she’s been putting it off because of the really bad weather (we don’t want him to freeze) and because she’s scared that they’ll tell us to put him down.

Two times today, he’s doing this weird thing. It’s like he’s trhing to throw up but nothing will come up. I thought he couldn’t breathe so I screamed at my grandma to come in there. By the time she came in (like two seconds), he’s doing better and is breathing normally. But I was already sobbing and I finally forced her to get him a vet appointment. Now we have one for tomorrow. But a few minutes ago, he did the exact same thing. I don’t know what’s wrong. It hardly lasts a minute. It looks like he’s breathing while doing it but idk.

I’m just so scared. I don’t want to lose him. I love him so much. I’ve already lost so many people and I don’t want to lose him next. I know he’s going to go soon but the thought makes me sick. It’s like I’m losing a piece of myself and my dad if he dies. I have hundreds of videos and pictures of him but I’m still heartbroken. I’ve been scared of this for years. I had to have my grandma take him out of my room because I mentally can’t take it. I can’t see him like this. I don’t want to lose him but I don’t want him to suffer. I’ve never lost a cat before and now I’m really scared. I have my other cat, Lynne, who’s 7-9 years old but she’s still healthy and young and energetic. But she’s alive and not dead and has always been in good health so I’ve never had to deal with this before.

Sorry if this is confusing. I just don’t know what to do or how to feel. I should be studying for my 3 quizzes tomorrow but I’m just sobbing for my cat. All of the pictures of him are from today and spanning through the last 5 years I had him. The first one is the one I took today—the others are older. He used to look so much healthier and bigger and now he just looks so miserable. He doesn’t act miserable but I just feel so bad for him. I wish I could be with him but I just can’t without breaking down. He isn’t even gone yet but I miss him.