On Tuesday, 28th April 2026, one of my girls, Rosalie—a lilac Birman who had just celebrated her 6th birthday on 3rd April—left us in just a few hours.
Rosalie was an exceptional cat, incredibly sensitive, who struggled a lot whenever my daughter was away; she had suffered from several urinary tract infections because of it. The last one was at the end of February, so very recently. We had X-rays, ultrasounds, and treatment, but nothing suspicious was found. We had pushed for more tests specifically because she had already had a UTI in December, but everything came back clear. So, the vet and I concluded it was down to the stress of my daughter’s week-long holiday at her gran's, which she had taken badly.
On Monday morning, Rosalie was her normal cuddly self. She loved her usual brushing session, begged for her wet food as always, and ate normally. We had a lot of appointments that day and got back in the early afternoon; she just had a bit of a runny eye. Before I headed out to the shops, I told myself I needed to keep an eye on it, as she had suffered from conjunctivitis right after her last UTI, though I didn't think it was related. I got back from the shops around 7 pm. She was lying down looking a bit down, but since we had been out for part of the day, it was common for her to sulk, so I wasn’t overly worried. Still, I was watching her—I had a bad feeling. To think that only the day before, I was saying the pheromones I had been using for a month seemed to be working and that she was in great shape. I kept monitoring her. Since she wasn’t moving, I offered her some treats, which she refused. That’s when I started to worry. I took her temperature and it was normal, so I decided to wait a bit before calling the vet. I went to look after my birds, and just in case, I tried to give her some wet food, but she turned her nose up at it. I didn’t even have time to tell my husband to call the clinic and find the number for the emergency vet—we didn't know it as we had moved house a year ago and luckily hadn't needed an out-of-hours vet yet.
Before we knew it, she was having seizures. I don’t think she ever really came back to us after that. We rushed her to the vet, and the professional arrived 20 minutes later. In the meantime, she had a heart attack. I managed to bring her back with CPR, but right from the start, the vet told me things looked bad. They did blood tests and X-rays and told me her kidneys had failed and that she was in a coma. The blood tests showed she also had very high blood sugar and high kidney markers, but the vet said the "good" side was that they were still measurable. The priority was to see if it was established diabetes or if it was due to the shock. In the meantime, they did neurological tests, gave her an injection to calm her, and checks confirmed the high blood sugar was due to shock. From there, they talked to us about kidney surgery if she managed to stabilise and survive the night. It was a very expensive procedure, and we said we would find the money—that they had to do whatever it took to save our precious girl. We left her around midnight, waiting for a call during the night to tell us she had passed away, or the next morning for an update. The call came at 9.10 am, telling me Rosie hadn't come out of the coma and there was nothing more they could do.
We went to see her, they gave us some time alone with her to say goodbye, and she passed away at 10.32 am.
We are in total despair, especially my daughter, who isn’t eating or sleeping.
We love you, Rosalie. We miss you and we will love you forever.
Sleep tight.
I’m telling you all this just to say: please pay close attention to your cats when they have these kinds of recurring issues. I keep telling myself that if we had done more in-depth tests instead of putting it all down to anxiety, maybe we could have done something sooner.
If only I had taken her in earlier... even though the vet told me it wouldn't have made a difference because it was so sudden, I’ll always have that doubt.
