“A cat has absolute emotional honesty: human beings, for one reason or another, may hide their feelings, but a cat does not.” (Ernest Hemingway)

I’m not sure if Ernest Hemingway said those exact words, but this quote is often attributed to him. No matter the origin, the words ring true. Cats do not hide anything.

Especially Oreo.

As I write this, it’s only been two days since we said good-bye to Oreo on November 24, 2025.

Despite still having three cats (Beethoven, Charlotte and Rocky), our house is unbearably silent. I’ve posted Youtube videos of Oreo’s many meows and his famous “HELLLOOOOOO” greeting in which our neighbors always thought was a human child and not a cat. Our other cats are very vocal, but nowhere near as constantly chatty as Oreo all throughout the day.

The silence right now speaks volumes.

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GOTCHA DAY: In the spring of 2008, a black and white cat started hanging outside our old condo. We lived on the first floor and my office had a screen door that opened into the backyard of our building. While writing from home, the cat would meow constantly. That’s the cat distribution system for Yoo/you.

I started playing with the cat by waving an old violin string at him. At the time, I was basically procrastinating on a writing project. This went on for several weeks. He would stop by and I would feed him tuna, play string games with him, and then he’d leave and I would finally write. (Don’t tell my agents. 🤣🤫)

But on April 15, 2008, the cat did not show up. I burst into tears and walked two miles around our neighborhood, desperately hoping to find him. When I got home, he was waiting by my screen door, wondering what was taking me so long to feed him more tuna. I immediately called a longtime dear friend of mine who was a cat owner/expert. He brought over a cat cage and we brought him to the nearest vet – Culver City Animal Hospital. Dr. Gebroe at the time, along with vet techs Vincent and William, took care of Oreo. He was not microchipped and despite my investigation, no one had reported this cat missing. We all agreed that he had either gotten lost or had been abandoned because he had clearly been a stray for a long time (and he was full of worms!).

Thus began my Cat Lady initiation. Dear friend and acclaimed children’s book author and poet Lisa Wheeler took one look at the photo above and said “He looks like an Oreo.” And that is how Oreo got his name! (Check out Lisa Wheeler’s amazing books here: https://www.lisawheelerbooks.com)

And Oreo would prove to be a great editor for me in the #AmWritingCatcave – as you can see from these pictures below, he suffered no fools – nor any split infinitives – gladly.

And here is my first ever selfie with Oreo from June 2008 on my cheap Nokia flip phone. I will not torture you by showing the 8 billion selfies of us on my iPhone. 🤣

Eventually I upgraded to the iPhone and iPad… and even Oreo upgraded to his own then-Twitter (now X) social media page at https://x.com/oreothecatyoo! He was very proud to have over 1,000 followers!

For Oreo’s first Christmas (#MERRYCATMAS) on December 25, 2008, dear friend and award-winning New York Times bestselling children’s book author/artist DAN SANTAT surprised me with a sweet painting he did inspired by one of my Facebook photos. HA! 🤣 Thank you Dan for this memory. And please check out Dan’s latest books here: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/73850/dan-santat/ and https://us.macmillan.com/author/dansantat

In fact, Oreo inspired many artists, including a longtime close friend and wonderful children’s book author/illustrator as well as an esteemed fine arts painter artist, ERIN EITTER KONO. For more on her beautiful picture books, go here: https://www.eekono-illustration.com For information on her fine arts work in which Erin uses “the ancient technique of egg tempera to investigate how memory, land, and culture intersect,” go here: https://www.eekono.com

In 2016, Oreo developed feline asthma. So yours truly had to use a kitty inhaler with Albuterol and Flovent and in later years, dosages of Prednisolone.

So that’s my Gotcha Day story for Oreo.

But as Hemingway once said, “One cat just leads to another.”

GOTCHA DAY AGAIN: On August 1, 2010, another friend of mine who is a vet tech had been fostering two black and white kittens who were the only ones who had survived being born in a litter to a stray mother in an apartment garage. She kept sending me MULTIPLE (and I mean multiple!) adorable photos, hinting very obviously that Oreo needed siblings.

Enter Beethoven and Charlotte! Oreo immediately took to them and became their 오빠/형 Oppa/Hyung big brother.

And yes, Oreo and all my cats are Korean American of course! 🇰🇷🇺🇸🫰

As kittens, Beet and Char followed Oreo everywhere. We joked that they were his minions!

And somehow all three cats were very patient with Yoo, especially around the holidays… If you want live footage, check out my YOUTUBE page to see videos of these holiday celebrations! (Link: https://www.youtube.com/paulayoo)

But wait, there’s more… Remember: “One cat just leads to another.”

GOTCHA DAY (THIRD TIME’S THE CHARM): In November 2024, we heard a nonstop cat meowing. Our three cats are permanent INDOOR cats, so where was this meow coming from? Turns out ANOTHER BLACK AND WHITE CAT was stuck under our house! We rescued him and then he came back every day for food. By March of 2025, we realized… we HAD to adopt him.

As a conscientious journalist and nonfiction book author, I believe it is my duty to inform you that in Los Angeles County, you can own up to five cats without a special permit. 🧐 More than three cats must be kept indoors at all times, spayed/neutered, and have a microchip or other I.D. (Link: https://codelibrary.amlegal.com/codes/los_angeles/latest/lamc/0-0-0-354802)

So we figured, FOUR cats is not breaking the law… yet. 🤷🏻‍♀️ We adopted Rocky (named after one of our classic Gen X influences bassist Lee Rocker of The Stray Cats, get it? LOL!) on March 29, 2025. You can read more about his adoption here in an older blog: https://paulayoo.com/yoo-are-on-the-road-the-new-normal/

Oreo, Beethoven and Charlotte welcomed Rocky immediately. And Oreo made sure Rocky knew that he would be his furrever protective 형 Hyung big brother! So say hello to our Fantastic Purr 4!

But 2025 would turn out to have one CATastrophe after another. I wrote about Beethoven’s bloody nose medical issue which was thankfully surgically solved (turned out an errant TOOTH was growing in his nose!) by the brilliant specialists at Sevilla Veterinary Hospital. You can read more about that here: https://paulayoo.com/광복절-🇰🇷✊-80th-national-liberation-day-of-korea/ And then to add to my stress, Rocky got a weird infection lump on his front right leg that had to be surgically removed and thankfully revealed to be a benign cyst… thank you Culver City Animal Hospital!

But in November of this year, Oreo broke my heart.

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TRIGGER WARNING: As a former newspaper reporter and nonfiction book author, although I will be respectful, I will also be very detailed and clear in my terms about illness, pain, hospice care, the euthanasia procedure and death in this blog in order to help provide information for other pet owners. However, there will be lots of cute pictures so for those of you who are triggered, I apologize and you can stop reading now and just scroll down to look at the pretty pictures instead!

In addition, pets are a lifelong and often expensive commitment that not everyone can – or wants to – afford. It’s a deeply personal and complicated situation with many financially difficult decisions based not only on your wallet… but your heart. Here’s a helpful article regarding rising health costs for pets, but this is just the tip of the iceberg: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/23/health/pets-veterinary-bills.html?unlocked_article_code=1.4U8.cp58.BBKKAwC-ruph&smid=url-share

As for pet grief, there has been a growing awareness of the importance of “legitimizing” and “normalizing” pet grief for its very specific nuances with many new books and articles being written about this topic. Here is a helpful article about the complexity behind pet euthanasia: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/02/opinion/pets-life-cats-dogs-guilt.html?unlocked_article_code=1.4U8.OU3a.DdoDGNJ3PUlP&smid=url-share There are also many studies being conducted on why the levels of PTSD in pet owners are very similar to the trauma felt when a human life is lost: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11776356/ In fact, during my last few days with Oreo, it also triggered memories of when my dad died in 2016. I was not prepared to revisit that trauma, to relive that loss twice.

Finally, I was very moved to learn from one of the staff at Culver City Animal Hospital that very often, veterinarian doctors, vet techs, and staff wrestle with their own specific PTSD trauma when they are unable to save an animal, wondering if there was anything else they could have done. Even though they did everything they could, their lack of closure is equally as painful and palpable. We must all shoulder this burden together in order to heal and move on.

I hope these links help those of you coping with recent pet loss bereavement or preparing to make some difficult decisions as your pets enter their twilight years.

Oreo died at 4 PM via humane euthanasia on Monday November 24, 2025 after 20+ years of life by the kind, compassionate and professional expertise of the Culver City Animal Hospital doctors and staff. (For pet owners interested in CCAH’s veterinary services, go here: https://ccahospital.com)

Despite his elderly status, Oreo still behaved like a mischievous kitten. As eldercare cat caregivers, we knew the clock was ticking, but annual checkups and senior blood panels had so far predicted he still had a few good years left.

But on November 10th during a regular check up with our amazing vets and staff at Culver City Animal Hospital, they found disturbing X-ray images of pleural effusion (liquid against his lungs), a heart murmur, and what looked suspiciously like a cancerous mass. They advised us to go immediately to our emergency vets at ACCESS Specialty Animal Hospitals – Los Angeles.

I spent all day at Access ER while they ran multiple tests on Oreo. They drained about 140 mL of liquid surrounding his lungs. This is known as pleural effusion – a definitive sign of congestive heart failure. They also noted the beginnings of kidney disease. Oreo had to remain at the ER for the next two nights to receive extra oxygen and recover. They say cats are often very silent and show no pain even though they are in great distress. Given Oreo’s seemingly “normal” behavior, I had no idea he was this close to dying of congestive heart failure. Because of this, we did not opt to test for cancer since this catastrophic (no pun intended) medical heart condition was the number one priority.

We were instructed to give three heart medications to Oreo every 12 hours for the rest of his life: Pimobendan (to help with heart failure and heart disease), Furosemide (a diuretic medication to treat fluid retention (edema) associated with congestive heart failure, liver disease, and kidney conditions), and Clopidogrel (a blood thinner to offset potential blood clots known as thromboembolism). The doctors agreed he had about six to nine months left… IF the meds did not hurt his kidneys too much and IF he could avoid any potential strokes or blood clots.

Those were a lot of IF’s.

For the next ten days, Oreo bounced back immediately. He returned to his incredibly (and sometimes annoying) chatty self and was still quite mobile although we noticed he was starting to walk much slower. He used to weigh 25 pounds in his prime and had recently gone down to about 7 pounds. He was now shockingly thin but it was still deemed “normal” for an elderly cat. I grew hopeful that he could make it through the New Year.

But on Friday November 21, I noticed Oreo had become unusually lethargic and was breathing rapidly. Luckily, we had scheduled a follow-up exam with our CCAH vet on Saturday where we then experienced a “Groundhog Day” deja vu experience. Once again, we were told to go to Access ER because Oreo had developed pleural effusion liquid around the lungs for a second time.

At Access ER, they removed 250 mL of pleural effusion liquid – a third more than previously. His kidney values had also skyrockted exponentially. Oreo’s time was up. The best we could do was to keep him comfortable and arrange to put him down the following week. From November 22 to November 24, I set up my office (AKA “the writing catcave”!) into a hospice care room for Oreo.

During those 48 hours, Oreo’s health took a shocking nose dive. The changes to his body and personality were drastic and disturbing. He weighed 7 pounds at the start of those 48 hours. By the end, he was a feather.

I stayed awake for most of those hours, trying to keep up with him, to keep him from floating away.

But I also wanted to keep him calm and stable, so I focused on joy.

I read his favorite books out loud – CHARLOTTE’S WEB and WATERSHIP DOWN. We also listened to his favorite composer, Debussy. Although Oreo has been deaf for several years, I knew he could still hear and feel everything. Beethoven, Charlotte, and Rocky also kept him company. At night, we watched his favorite movies including FLOW, RATATOUILLE, and TITANIC.

Oreo occasionally showed signs of life and rare moments of clarity. On Sunday November 23, he walked to the back door to look outside. Sitting by the back door facing our backyard was one of his favorite things to do.

And then I realized he was watching his last sunset. How did he know the time? Hemingway was right!

But these moments of brilliant clarity were soon dimmed by much harsher medical realities.

Oreo could no longer drink water on his own. He would rest his chin in a bowl of water but was unable to lap it up, so we used a syringe to quench his thirst. He stopped eating so we gave him the prescribed Gabapentin pain meds. His paws were icy. He began to breathe more slowly. He peed everywhere. And I mean everywhere. We also realized he may have suffered a few strokes because his right paw was bent at a 90-degree angle and he could no longer walk upright on it. When he lay down, he had this strangely stiff position where he was mostly curved to the right. When he could walk, he wobbled for a few feet before giving up. He could no longer climb the cat stairs to my human couch so I was awake for almost 24 hours making sure he didn’t attempt to jump up or down on my couch. Every time I tried to put him back on the cute little black and white matching couch I had bought for him, he still insisted on trying to go for a walk. Stubborn little fella! What a fighter.

Worst of all, he stopped talking. I was lucky enough on Saturday to capture one of his last vocalizations on video. With the exception of three random “meows,” Oreo never spoke again in his last 48 hours.

I know this is painful to read, but I hope these anecdotal details help those of you who are now caregiving for elderly cats so you know what is in store.

The last time Oreo ever walked was at 12:27 AM on Monday November 24. He first walked to the litter box in my room to pee, although he missed and once again peed all over the floor. But I was excited he actually remembered to use the box! He then walked – or rather wobbled and dragged himself – briefly down the hallway before returning to my writing catcave.

I myself passed out at 3 AM. When I woke up at 6:30 AM on Monday November 24, I saw Oreo lying stretched out and motionless on the floor. I immediately assumed he had died in his sleep.

I went to pick him up and that’s when he shook his head.

Not yet.

For his final day of November 24, 2025, I read more of his favorite books and we had a fun family portrait photo session. Talk about herding cats! Try getting four cats to sit still for photos! LOL! But it was worth it and we took tons of silly selfies.

Before leaving for the hospital, we had our final “cat meetings” with the Fantastic Purr 4 – Oreo, Beethoven, Charlotte and Rocky.

We then took Oreo outside to the backyard so he could sit in the sun. He has never been outside to our backyard – he has spent the past 17 years looking longingly at the backyard through our screen door. He enjoyed the scent of our grapefruit tree and the sounds of water lapping gently against the edge of our pool.

During our car ride to the hospital, we brought his favorite books and all his toys, especially his favorite Santa toy. We listened to Debussy on the car radio and we told Oreo, “We’re off the see the Wizard!” Oreo was very excited.

The doctors and staff at our beloved Culver City Animal Hospital had prepared a quiet room for Oreo with a cute rainbow bridge soft blanket. We placed all his toys around it and his books.

We then filled out forms with Hearts & Halos for aftercare services, which included the environmentally-friendly aquamation for his ashes. We chose a beautiful carved wooden box as his urn. For more information on their services, go here: https://heartsandhalos.com

We also were advised that other cats do experience grief as well. Cats are creatures of habit – they keenly sense the absence of a longtime cat companion which disrupts their normal schedule and routines. In the days following Oreo’s passing, we would notice that our other three cats Beethoven, Charlotte and Rocky were unusually sedate and less playful. Especially Charlotte, who isolated herself and we had to encourage her to eat. Lately, she’s been sitting in Oreo’s favorite spot by the back door gazing out at our backyard. We placed a beautiful bouquet of flowers given to us by friends outside the door so she can enjoy the flowers along with Oreo, whom I know is taking a cat nap in the sun outside and keeping her company.

If you are a pet owner with multiple cats, please be advised to keep an eye on your cat’s behavior and feeding/litter box routine to make sure they can heal, too. In 2024, researchers in Michigan discovered cats do experience a sense of “mourning” when a longtime companion dies: https://www.npr.org/2024/08/08/nx-s1-5066480/cats-grief-research And here is a link to another study on this topic: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5126770/ For more information, here are some informational links: https://www.jacksongalaxy.com/blogs/news/do-cats-experience-grief and https://vcahospitals.com/know-your-pet/do-cats-mourn

Oreo’s favorite vet techs Vincent and William, who have taken care of him since 2008, were there to administer the final medications to put him to sleep. In fact, William generously offered to gift us through Hearts & Halos a plaster of Oreo’s pawprint, which moved us to tears.

Before we started the procedure, I read the last page of WATERSHIP DOWN and the last page of CHARLOTTE’S WEB.

“He reached the top of the bank in a single, powerful leap. Hazel followed, and together they slipped away, running easily down through the wood, where the first primroses were beginning to bloom.” (Richard Adams)

“Wilbur never forgot Charlotte. Although he loved her children and grandchildren dearly, none of the new spiders ever quite took her place in his heart. She was in a class by herself.” (E.B. White)

Oreo, you were one of a kind.

We all placed our hands on Oreo as the proper medications were administered via injection.

I want to thank Vincent and William, Dr. Sobel, and the staff at Culver City Animal Hospital for gently guiding us through the actual steps of what happens during a humane euthanasia procedure for cats. I also want to thank all the CCAH doctors who cared for Oreo over the past 18 years – Dr. Gebroe, Dr. Kidwell (who passed away in 2015), Dr. Hilleary, Dr. Lee, and Dr. Sheriff – and the current staff (Kristen, Gladys, Jennyfer, and Victoria), as well as the ER vets and staff at ACCESS Specialty Animal Hospitals – Los Angeles. For pet owners reading this blog, here is a helpful link to provide the basic procedural steps for human pet euthanasia: https://www.petmd.com/care/pet-euthanasia

In just a few moments, Oreo passed away. Although devastated and heartbroken, we were also relieved and full of joy. For the first time in 72 hours, his body was no longer stiff and rigid with paralysis but relaxed. His tail had grown fluffy. He felt soft. And he still felt warm.

Oreo’s eyes remained open because I learned cats do not close their eyes upon death.

I think it’s because their eyes are wide open for their next great big adventure.

Go where you want to go, Oreo.

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Cats do not regret the past. Nor do they fear the future. They embrace the present. That is their gift to us – they remind us every day to live in the moment. When they leave us, we honor their legacy by continuing to live life to the fullest just like they did.

Every moment counted for Oreo.

And now, every moment counts for Yoo.

Yoo and Oreo’s adventures are just beginning…

[NOTE: The above painting was created by my longtime dear and close bestie friend and acclaimed picture book author/illustrator and animation artist KEN MIN. You can check out his work and books here: https://kenminart.com]