My condolences.

VERY sorry to hear that. He looks like a gorgeous cat.

I've lost two cats so far. My first cat died of kidney problems when he was 8. My third had heart issues and died suddenly. My second is still with me after 16 years. She has good days and bad days but still seems mostly okay.

I built a small garden to help me remember my cats. Their ashes are buried underneath the topsoil.

Take care of yourself.

It's never pleasant when a pet dies, even though you know it's going to happen.
I used to own an entire litter of cats but I barely remember them. They all died in strange ways
according to my parents.

Oddly enough I somehow developed a cat allergy so we never got another one. All of my pets have been dogs. I had two golden retrievers named Winnie and Pooh. I cared a lot about those dogs so I was really upset when we had to put Pooh down. One of her front legs was severely deteriorated from arthritis. A surgery was possible, but expensive, and she was already very old. I left the room when she got the injection and I never had to see her body, so my last memory of her would be when she was alive. All I know is that Dad buried her in the backyard.

Sadly when Winnie went it wasn't at the vet and I ended up seeing her body. I was watching a really sad movie, Requiem for a Dream with my dad when Mom walked into what we call "The Pine Room" which is essentially just a second dining room for special occasions like Thanksgiving. In the middle of the movie I heard Mom gasp loudly and even remember exactly what she said.

"Winnie! She's dead!"

I couldn't help but go over in the hopes Mom was wrong, but sure enough Winnie was already gone. The sight wasn't pretty either, I won't go into detail but I will say Mom suspected may have had cancer.
We never found out what killed her since Dad wrapped her in a tarp and buried her next to Pooh. At this point we had purchased two new puppies, Penny and Gracie. Mom didn't want them to see Winnie so we had her buried immediately. But even though they didn't see it they knew she was gone. It's like they can smell death or something.

Anyway to get away from depressing stories I will say that we recently purchased a Shih Tzu puppy that we named "Rosie". To this day Gracie, Penny, and Rosie are all still alive. Penny and Gracie are pretty old now but we think they're going to be fine for a few more years.

I'm probably rambling now. I can't help but share sometimes. The point is that the most important thing is your memories with your pet, so I make sure to appreciate every moment I spend with my three dogs.

Damn it, I'm actually tearing up while typing this. I think I'll wrap it up. My dogs have also been there for me, and you have my sympathy.

---

As for the cats I barely remember the list of ways they died went like this:

- Hit by car
- Lost in blizzard (We lived in Colorado at the time)
- Eaten by Coyote

Those are the ones I remember off the top of my head. My sister and I suspect our parents may have given the cats away and came up with these stories as an excuse. They still deny this claim.

---
EDIT

I forgot to mention Penny and Gracie's breeds. I'll just say they're both small dogs so they aren't anywhere near the size of my Retrievers.
I'm also not 100% sure what their breeds are. We thought Gracie was a Havanese but we later found out the guy that sold her to us lied about that.
We still have no idea her breed is.

Penny I think is part Norwich Terrier. The other part I think is Lhasa Apso which I had to Google to know how to spell.

My little Ginger passed several years ago.

She was some sort of weird little evolutionary throwback kitty - like she'd literally dangle from the cat tree and swing herself up like a little monkey, and back when I had a desktop with a big, big monitor, she'd perch on the monitor and rest her chin on the top. She made these weird noises. There are some good stories about her, like the time I was moving slowly while having sex and she jumped up onto the small of my back and curled up - she was mortally offended when I dumped her off my back. Or the time she literally herded a roof rat (unharmed but desperately scared) through the entire house as a "present" for us. But mostly I want to remember petting her and rubbing her ears.

You know, I had my smaller cat jump up on my back during sex like that, once. Awkward and hilarious at the same time, for sure.

Very lucky to have been around such good little kitties.

I'm sorry for your loss, but the important thing is he had a long life thanks to your love and care.
One of my wife's lived to 18, but cats usually don't last that long. In the wild they don't live half of that, we humans give them extra time.