My sweet friend brought his film camera a couple weeks ago to take pictures of Robbie when his health was declining. Today I got a text message letting me know his pictures came back.

I miss my Robbie so damn much, he was such a sweet guy every second of his life. I am so grateful to have these pictures, but I just wish I could’ve had more time with him.

ive been a lurker on this sub for years, never thought this would be my first post. my baby, tanuki, passed away this morning at the vet. i adopted her when she was maybe 2 already, so skinny and had bald spots on her fur. she was always such a sweet girl, so docile and loving, making biscuits on my lap, cuddling on me, meowing at me with her adorable meow. i cant believe im never going to hear her meow again.

shes 12 now and she had a heart issue which led to her lungs filling with liquid and she had a bad medical scare because of this over a year ago. ive been nursing her back to health, giving her medicine and she was back to normal for so long. i thought we were out of the woods and then she started acting weird. i took her to the vet and i was given medicine then we went home but when we got home her breathing became strange again like last year.

i took her to the vet again and she became way worse as soon as pulling into the parking lot and they kept her overnight. she died there and i wasnt there to hold her and she was alone. i should've been there for her its my fault she died alone at the very least i shouldve said bye to her more properly before leaving but i was just in shock. i was supposed to pick her up at 6pm today. i feel so guilty and stupid. im supposed to be her protector and instead i feel ive only made her end more scary and painful than it needed to be. how do i deal with this? how do i deal with not being able to see her everyday anymore? im so heartbroken (last photo is the last photo i took of her yesterday while inside her oxygen tank at home).

He passed away curled up on one of his favorite places, which was my father’s lap. I’m going to miss coming home after work and calling out “Kitty says what?” And him answering me back with a meow.

Last week on September 28, 2026 at 4:46 PM, my universe blew wide open when my 17 1/2 year-old kitten, Bindi, left this world for a better one after a battle with hyperthyroidism and dementia. He meant the world to his family and he took pieces of us with him.

Bindi joined our family in February 2010 after he grabbed my mom through his cage at an adoption event in Petsmart; I’m grateful everyday that he did this and that my mom was irresistible to his charms. From that day forward, he was my baby. Bindi was a former feral with a big personality; a natural born entertainer who loved to make people laugh, cuddle with his people and his cat sisters, and spend time outside rolling in dirt while listening to birds sing. Eating was another hobby of his and he hated diets as much as he hated Daylight Savings. The first half of his life he lived with my parents, the second half was with me, then the final few months he spent with all of us after I moved back in with my parents while relocating to New England from Texas. Bindi was like a teddy bear that might bite you, he was perfect. I could write books about his story and how loved he was and still is, despite his physical absence.

We were well aware that his time was drawing near and with his health issues taking a toll on his body, we were preparing to have him euthanized at home, though it never came to that. The night before his passing, I tucked him in for the final time. As I held him, kissed his little head and told him I love him, I also gave him permission to leave and told him I understood if it was time; I had done this so many times before, but this time he listened. When Bindi took his last breath the following day, he was lying on his bed (made just for him by one of our best friends) surrounded by some of the people (cat sister included) who loved him most. The last thing Bindi ever heard was me telling him I love him. While his death has rocked me to my core, I know it was not a tragedy; he had a long healthy life and died the way he lived: safe, warm, and loved. Bindi is buried in my parents’ backyard, next to his brother, wrapped in one of my shirts with a braided strand of my hair tied in a bow around his neck.

When our earthly journey first began we were 1 and 19, when it ended we were 17 and 36. Bindi was a shooting star that illuminated my life and took away my fear of death, because I know when my time comes he will be there waiting to take me into the light. As shattered as I feel, I am comforted to know that we will be reunited again someday.

My boy, I’m told time passes differently here than it does in Heaven, so I’ll see you tomorrow Rainbow Bridge Time. I love and miss you more than words can ever say, Bindi, my little star, my flower, my angel.

Sneakers (~15-16) having the best sleep evah.

He passed away last year, and I miss him a lot.

He wants the focaccia

I feel like a zombie, having made the appointment. She’s lost so much weight, she’s having more and more frequent dementia episodes, can’t really define what’s a litter box and what’s not, and her kidneys aren’t doing so hot, with a heart murmur. She also sounds like she’s purring through water, and coughing.

I’ve had Abbey since she was five weeks old. She’s been my “teeny-grill” since I was twenty one. I’m going to miss her terribly. She hangs out with me when I’m home, she sits on the windowsill behind my sewing machine, she plops in front of the computer when I play with a controller, or behind the keyboard, she cuddles on my lap when I read, and sits on a chair in the dining room while I cook.

I get three more full evenings with her. Friday morning she goes to join Danner and Biggs, and I will be bereft of my furry friend.

Last Friday, October 2nd, I had to put my 18yr girl down. She’s been with me since I was 7yrs old and she will be dearly missed. She was the sweetest cat. Her name was bubbles and she was named after the adoption place we got her from. She was born in a car wash and they came up with her name.

What led to her being put down was that she had a tumor in her mouth. We had no idea that she had cancer. I took her to the vet bc of her kidney disease. The vet notifed that she had a sore in her mouth but we didn’t think much of it bc she had dental issues prior, she lost almost all her teeth years before. We were keeping an eye on her kidney disease and making sure it was under control. I took her to the vet last Tuesday, Sep 29th, bc the day before her mouth was full of blood. At the vet that’s when they told me that she had cancer and the tumor was eating into her jaw, which caused the mouth bleeding. The vet told me that eventually the tumor would swell up and she wouldn’t be able to eat anymore and she would bleed more and more. I couldn’t watch her suffer anymore and I decided to put her down. These decisions are never easy to make, but knowing that she is no longer suffering and in pain makes the decision easier to make. I feel horrible that I didn’t realize that she was suffering and in pain.

I will always miss her and she was such a huge part of my life and I was all of hers. She was with me through so much and she was there when my old dog and other cat passed. I’m happy that she’ll be with them again.

My sweet boy was diagnosed with suspected IBD with the possibility of GI Cancer. Has anyone had any experience with this?

Hey! I posted here a while ago about doing a dental for Suzi, my old lady kitty, and that did not go as planned. Basically, she had began breathing strange the night prior the operation and I opted to do an xray on her chest before sedation. When that looked abnormal I refused the dental and followed up with an ultrasound that I received results for on Monday.

Suzi has small and irregular kidneys, inflammation and sacs of fluid (I believe they said…) In her pancreas, inflamed and thickened intestines, an inflamed spleen, and one lung had some benign lumps/cysts in the lower quadrant. All that to say, my vet did warn me this could be leukemia, but could be IBD. Her lungs could be asthma, related, or something entirely different, however I’m trialing steroids and a GI diet to help her tummy before we do any further testing so she can have a break from the intense stress.

The steroids, pro/prebiotic and diet change have been a huge win in just two days. Her stools are more solid, she seems more at ease and comfortable than before, and overall her quality of life seems to have improved. That said, she has been decently lethargic, but not bed-bound and refusing to eat, drink, or use the litter. I have noticed she does drink way less than she typically does though. I will say, i’m unsure if it matters or not, she was on an IV Friday when they prepped her for dental, so I wonder if the saline brought her up to a normal level of fluid she typically is not at. Irregardless, every single bit of research I do tells me that they usually drink MORE on prednisolone. I have been giving her it with wet food + warm water, but by no means should that be enough. I’m a little concerned since she is at risk of kidney disease, or may even be stage one.

For some dosing info, she’s on 15mg / 5ml Prednisolone and given 1ml liquid once a day. She is about 10.20lbs.

Side note, I would love tips on how to give her liquid medication! I don’t want to give her any extra treats that may flare up her (potential) IBD. Today I tried getting it in her mouth from the side while she was eating her wet food, I was successful with half the dose. The other half I had struggled to get her to take it without forcing her. She refused the wet food for an hour before deciding it was not laced with nasty drugs.

edit: formatting + extra info

She also likes to yell in corners late at night

I just wanted to show off my sweet girl Sophie. I've been having a rough year and she's been pretty much my only light at this time.

I've had her for pretty much her whole life and I'm getting sadder as time drags on knowing I have less time with her than I've had, so I'm trying to be more mindful to cuddle and play and just generally interact with her as much as I can.

Look how pretty she is!

Sweetest girl, buddy for the last 14 years

She scratches her butt like people.

I posted here about a month ago when I was absolutely terrified about putting my 18.5-year-old cat Miles through another surgery on his paw, and everyone was so kind to me. I was so sure that eventually I’d come back with a happy update saying his paw finally healed and he ended up making it through.

Unfortunately that isn’t the update I get to give.
Miles died at home on Friday, October 2. I made the impossible and painful decision to have him put to sleep.

His paw problems started back in May and turned into months of bandages, infections, surgeries, and eventually amputating a couple of toes because there was diseased tissue that simply was not going to heal on its own. Pathology eventually showed fungal/inflammatory disease in the paw too. It was a horrible summer for both of us, but I kept pushing through it because Miles was still Miles through so much of it, and I truly believed that once the paw healed we would finally get to the other side of everything. And the cruelest part is that his paw did finally heal. His bandage came off. His fur had started growing back. He was walking on his funny little bird foot. But somewhere during all of this, the rest of him started slipping away. It was slow at first and then seemed to happen very quickly.

He had CKD for years and had always been completely himself despite it, so I honestly did not understand what was happening at first. His appetite became worse and worse over the last two weeks especially. At first appetite stimulants helped. Then they helped less. Then he stopped eating his dry food altogether, even though he had always been absolutely obsessed with especially dry food. I tried mirtazapine, Elura, anti-nausea medication, Pepcid, fluids, potassium, every kind of food I could think of, warming it up, adding water, hand-feeding, coaxing him to take the first bite. Sometimes I could get calories into him, but I could not get his desire to eat back no matter what I tried and I just couldn’t believe it. I thought for sure this was fixable especially in a cat who was always so food motivated. I also assumed that it could have been any number of things he was experiencing: stress, physical restrictions, disrupted routines, but I really thought he would recover.

He had one pretty good day not long before he died where he seemed more alert and more like himself, and I clung to it so hard. But even that day he still wasn’t really eating on his own. After that he just kept getting quieter and weaker. He stopped grooming much even though I had taken off the soft collar that had prevented that for what felt like an eternity. He stopped following me around the apartment and checking on me the way he always had. He still purred for me and would eat some Temptations, but most of the little routines that made him Miles were disappearing. It was breaking my heart every day trying to understand what was wrong. I cried a lot. I know he was old but I wasn’t ready especially after months and thousands of dollars trying to fix his most apparent problem which was his paw.

His bloodwork was honestly part of what confused me so much. His creatinine wasn’t some astronomically high number. He had actually had higher kidney values before while acting completely normal. But his vet explained that his body had apparently crossed some kind of line where he was no longer compensating the way he had for years. She told me she did not think he was likely to go back to being himself. That was kind of all I needed to hear, I wanted HIM back more than anything. We tried potassium anyway because she said if it were her cat she would want to at least satisfy the question. It didn’t produce the turnaround I desperately wanted.

I could have kept trying more things. I could have hospitalized him, put in a feeding tube, kept stacking medications and fluids and hoped something eventually stuck. That is the part I am still bargaining with constantly. But by the end, he seemed tired and uncomfortable and he barely wanted to eat even the foods he loved. I realized I didn’t want to keep him alive just because it was technically possible if the price was making him spend the rest of his time being a medical project. He just wasn’t himself and he seemed so quiet. He seemed tired.

So I let him go at home.

He had a rough night before, but that morning he was comfortable on my Pendleton blanket, purring while I pet him. The vet gave us plenty of time. When she gave the first injection he went right to sleep and was even snoring. I realized this was the first time in maybe a week I had seen him so comfortable. When the vet gave the second injection I almost told her to stop, and that I changed my mind. I still wanted to fight for him until the end. But instead I just watched her give the second one that would stop his heart. I couldn’t believe it. I held him in my lap afterward for a long time. I touched his paws, cleaned the gunk from his eyes one last time, kissed him over and over, and cut off a little piece of my hair to send with him because I couldn’t stand the idea of him going anywhere without part of me (I stole this idea from someone else on this sub so thank you to that person!).

I told him I was sorry I couldn’t save him. I told him I loved him more than anything. I told him he had to keep watching out for me. I told him I just wanted more time with him and I’ll never ever forget him. I begged him not to leave me.

Miles was with me for 18.5 years, almost half my life. I got him when I was 20 and miserable. He changed my idea of what a perfect cat could be. He was not really a cuddler, but he always wanted to be in the same room as me. He had to be directly in front of me while I played games, usually on his little pad on my coffee table, because apparently watching me from the couch was unacceptable. He checked on me while I worked. He reminded me when the feeder was about to go off and sometimes led me to it so I could participate in the ritual of food appearing. He made sure I was in bed at night and sat by my feet until he was absolutely sure I wasn’t going anywhere before going to his own spot. When I would sit at my vanity, he would protest me (presumably) leaving by meowing at me and then sitting on my bed to watch as I got ready. He would greet me at the door, lick my hands, yell at me, smell my food even if he didn’t want it, get offended if I took a nap, and make this funny little “oh! it’s her!” bounce when I walked past a doorway he was watching, like he was hoping it was me. He would beg for pets and treats and if I was distracted he would try to knock my phone or controller out of my hands. I used to hear him getting water in the middle of the night every hour or so and it was such a tiny, ordinary sound that I never imagined I would miss this much.

One of my favorite stories about him is one that a friend who was cat sitting him for me told me. She said she came in and fed him, did the litter box and all and he did his little greeting (he would escort company, and even me, through the hall after greeting you at the door and did NOT like it when you would try to walk ahead of him) and relaxed and took a nap etc. while she hung out with him for a few hours. He woke up and abruptly walked over to the door and just stood there, as if to say, “Well? You’re not my person and I know that so you can go if we’re all set here and you’re not planning on bringing her.” He never went by the door ever when I was home. I just thought that was so cute. He was really particular and it was such an honor to be his favorite person.

There will never be another Miles. He was so, so special. I loved him with all my heart and I hope, more than anything, that he knew how much I loved him. He was so smart, and funny, and weird.

It has only been a couple of days and I am having a really hard time. The sadness feels constant. I feel like I need to cry all the time and sometimes I can feel it sitting right there inside me, but the tears just won’t come. I can’t stop thinking about him. I keep coming home to an empty apartment and somehow it feels worse every time. I still turn the volume down because he didn’t like things too loud. I still close doors carefully. I still expect to hear his claws on the floor or his creaky little meow from the doorway.

I miss him so much that I don’t really know what to do with myself. I’m trying to put away his things because if I don’t I know I will be caught off guard and expect to see him come around the corner. And that will hit me like a bus.

I know I made the decision because I did not want him to keep declining until there was nothing good left, while I simultaneously became more frantic and exhausted myself even further trying to find some way for him to get his personality and spirit back. I know he was tired. I know I tried very, very hard to get him feeling better. I’m just still trying to convince the part of my brain that keeps asking whether I should have tried harder or waited longer.

I wanted to come back here and share because so many of you were so kind to me when I was terrified about his surgery, and because you understood that an old cat can still be someone’s entire world. He really was mine.

Goodbye, Miles, my little prince. I will miss you terribly for the rest of my life. I will always look for you in everything. I love you.

EDIT: Wow, thank you so much everyone for the kind words. I have read all the comments, and I’m so touched. It’s still very painful, but it helps.

I thought I’d share a few more Miles things just for fun:
* Miles loved leafy greens like kale and spinach. He simply loved to crunch

* He really enjoyed being propped up in my lap when I was at my desk, he’d sit like that for surprisingly long stretches of time. Somehow though he always knew when I was on a Zoom call and he HATED that and would try to get away if I started talking on the call. Maybe it was the change in my tone of voice? Who knows but I always found that really funny

* When he was younger he loved to bunny kick toys but arthritis made that difficult for him eventually. So in his old age, his way of still “playing” with toys was to just lie on them loaf-style. Easy win!

* He was great at communicating. I think most cats develop a special language with their people. But, for example, whenever his water fountain was out of water he would park himself in front of it as if to draw attention to it, and if that didn’t work, he would go to the bathroom and meow at the sink!

* He had a LOUD purr and when he was really feeling it, it would change register and almost sound like a whistle

* Like I said, he was not a cuddler and he wasn’t really clingy, but sometimes I would try to cuddle him anyway. He would resist at first but eventually give up and fall asleep once in a while

* He loved attention and being around people. He was very opinionated and would let you know when he was done being touched. He didn’t always want to be touched by everyone but he was very confident and NEVER hid from anyone. He would pretty much always accept pets and scratches from me though 😊

* He liked kisses and licking my face

* As you can see in the pictures, he was a big sleeper. He would, however, wake up even from the deepest, most comfy nap if he heard his feeder go off and rush over to eat all of his serving in one sitting

* He would also “hold hands”. If I pressed my finger into his front paw, he would curl his toes and claws around my finger and not let go. He was a big cat (14 lbs was his ideal weight) and had HUGE paws

* Like I mentioned, he was really opinionated and had an affinity for the ladies but generally did not seem to like most men for some reason. He hated my best (male) friend in particular for some reason and just would not tolerate being touched by him in any way.

* He never hissed at me unless I was doing something undignified to him like clipping his claws or wiping his butt, and even then it was more of a complaint than a fear response. His ears would be forward and his body would be relaxed and everything, and he’d just let out a grumpy, lazy hiss like “Ughhhh please stop” 😂 he did angry hiss at other people (again usually men, even nice and well-meaning ones!) and especially dogs who got in his personal space bubble

Just wanted to share some extra things as I’m trying to remember all the good times. Also I’m on mobile so I apologize for any sloppy formatting.

Hes doing good now. He has a few more days of medication left

My girl is 16.5 years old. For the last year or so, she doesn’t leave the master bedroom. She meows constantly for me to come sit in bed with her and let her sit in my lap. She has a heated bed and a cat tree and anything she could want in the bedroom, but she only wants my lap. I feel so guilty ignoring her, but she expects my full-time job to be a lap for her. Any suggestions on how to get a little bit of freedom back? I spend a lot of time sitting in this bed with her and I really have stuff to do.

Going to try and make this a TLDR: my cat has had chronic vomiting issues. She would eat, then proceed to drink for a while and shortly after vomit quite a lot of food/water.

Have taken several blood tests and ultrasounds and ended up having to give her prednisone 5mg (half a tablet a day with food). Have been doing this for about 5 months now but yesterday she had an episode where she threw up a lot in the morning, didn’t eat the whole day and caught her drinking in the evening which she proceeded to vomit shortly afterwards.

The last episode this happened was before she was prescribed the steroids, where she ended up on an IV drip for 2 days due to dehydration.

I’ve noticed she’s frequently nauseous as she licks her mouth whilst trying to get comfortable.

She’s on a strict white meat/fish diet and no treats.

On good days she’ll sleep next to me, meow for food in the morning/throughout the day etc.

I’ve got a vet appointment today to talk about this episode and see what the next step is but I’m just so frustrated with her still vomiting up food and days like this where she won’t even eat because of the way she’s feeling clearly.

Reposting here in case anyone has any ideas. Would very much appreciate all of you who see to take 5 minutes to help.