My Cat Died from Large Cell Lymphoma at 7. I Don’t Want to Talk About It. But I Will.

Rainbow is my best friend. 

Present tense. 

But Rainbow died from advanced large B cell lymphoma in July. 

It just took me five minutes to write that. Lymphoma. 

The worst word I can think of. 

Something so horrible should have never happened to someone so special. 

Rainbow’s Adoption — Where it All Started

I adopted Rainbow in October 2019. I had just lost my senior cat, Snickers, two days before. I was looking for a pair of littermates to rescue and give a furever home in her memory. I saw a picture of a kitten online who I fell in love with—and ended up being my girl, Belle. 

I immediately found Belle at the shelter and started searching the kitten room for a littermate. Tucked, hiding away in a corner cubby was a tiny gray girl. My Rainbow. 

I didn’t know it at that moment, but Rainbow was very sick. I thought she was just shy, and I wanted to bring her home with her sister. So I did. 

Let me be clear—if I had known just how sick she was and that it would lead to us only having a short time together, I would do it over and over and over again. 

When we got home, Rainbow was skin and bones. She had constant diarrhea and vomiting (often at the same time). I took her to our vet, who examined her but wouldn’t even give her the proper vaccines yet because he was worried about how frail she was. 

With a little time and a lot of love, Rainbow got better. She grew so big and strong that we called her our panther, and I always joked that I “Clifford”-ed her. In the Clifford the Big Red Dog books, Clifford’s human loves him so much that he grows so big. 

The Best Years

Rainbow gave me the best almost 7 years of my life, even in the midst of some really hard stuff. 

Rainbow is the one who started off sick, and I got the honor of loving her to her healthiest self. Then I got sick, and she took care of me in a way no one else could. 

In 2023, after a long journey, I was diagnosed with POTS and an endless list of other health conditions. Rainbow always knew when I was in the most pain, and would be there. Any time I’d black out and lose my vision, she’d be the first person I’d see upon it returning. 

She never left my side. 

That’s not an exaggeration. If I got up from the couch and went to the bathroom, Rainbow got up from the couch and followed me. My mom always referred to her as my shadow. I couldn’t go anywhere without her. And I didn’t want to. 

Through it all we watched countless musicals, brushed her gorgeous coat every day, and ate more Churus than probably any cat in the world. I’m lucky enough to work from home and got to do so for almost her entire life from March 2020 on. We quite literally were always together. 

Our favorite days were spent laying in bed together, her under the blankets purring and me with my Kindle. She will always be my “Reading Rainbow”.

Late last year, we moved to a brand new house. Her and Belle got their very own room that has a sunny window seat overlooking a butterfly garden (along with special spots throughout our home). 

Words don’t do justice to the amount of love that filled our lives together. 

When She Got Sick

Rainbow was sick from the moment we met. That kitten virus is what laid the foundation for this cancer. But she’d never let you guess it. She was the strongest (ugh how I hate writing that in past tense) cat I’ve ever known. She had so much power in her that when she got the zoomies you simply stood out of her way and watched. 

But that all started to change early May. 

Rainbow has always gotten hairballs. She groomed herself better than any cat I’ve had in my family. So hairballs weren’t unusual every once in a while. We’d brought it up with the vet, they didn’t blink twice. 

But when those hairballs started coming every week. Then every few days. Then every single day. We knew something was wrong. 

I’ll make a different post about the nightmare vet experiences we shared another time when maybe it doesn’t make me quite so sick, but let’s just start with it was a long, unfair journey for Rainbow and our family. 

Going into Rainbow’s third ultrasound (and a new vet), we thought she just had IBD. Maybe an impacted hairball. But the aspiration results said otherwise. 

Large cell lymphoma. 

Advanced to multiple organs including her liver, colon, and more. 

My perfect, strong Rainbow. 

Given only a couple months to live, if we chose to do aggressive chemo. 

I kept repeating to them through my tears “you have the wrong cat, not Rainbow”. But somehow I knew. The day before she had started having trouble chewing on her left side. Her whiskers getting caught in her drooping lip. I hoped it was a sore tooth from all of the vomiting. 

But I cried sitting on my couch that night before the appointment, knowing it was something that would tear me apart. 

I hate that I was right. 

The night we came home from getting her diagnosis, she continued to get sicker. Her left pupil was stuck as a small slit, unmoving to match her right. A neurological sign that it was the end that even the specialists didn’t recognize. 

Choosing Kindness

We didn’t do chemo. We thought about it, but it weighed so heavy on my heart as something she wouldn’t want. 

She never wanted to leave my side when she was well, so why would she want to spend time at the end of her life in a cold, scary kennel getting powerful medicine that could hurt her? 

I would have done anything to save Rainbow. But don’t get it twisted. Chemo would not have saved her. It would have prolonged her sickness. If it didn’t kill her itself. 

So this is what we did. 

I took her home. I learned how to give her steroids. Some of her neuro symptoms subsided, and she started to groom herself again. 

I gave her the best days a cat could ever get. 

There was so much love. So many of her favorite musicals, watched right alongside her sister. More treats than you could ever imagine. 

But she was deteriorating, quickly. 

8 days was all we got from her diagnosis to the day we said goodbye. 

The night before, she ate treats from my hand, let me give her a good brush, and then like a light switching off, she told me it was time. 

Her eyes started shaking in her head, almost as if she was trying to read a book. A cruel irony to the many days my Reading Rainbow spent with me. A tumor was likely pressing on her brain stem. I held her close in my bed, and thanked her for being my best friend.

She was bright and loving to the last moment. But she was so weak. She fought to stay with me, but with only a sedative—no other drugs—she died with her head against my heart. Where she will always stay. 

She died on my half birthday. A beautiful, heartbreaking final way of her telling me she’s my mini me. 

Lymphoma is a cruel way to die. My girl was only 6 at diagnosis. We celebrated her 7th birthday shortly after on July 4th, her eating licks of frosting from a birthday cake I made her while she watched the fireworks. 

Too many cats get cancer. Too many get it so young. Too few vets know what to look for and make too many families suffer. 

I have a lot more to say about my experience and Rainbow’s life. But for now, please just spend a little more time with your cats today. You’ll never regret it. The one thing bringing me comfort is knowing I spent every possible second with her. 

If you have questions, please send them my way. I want this tragedy to help bring awareness, answers, and comfort to those who need it.