Senile calico cat spends final year of life on Xanax

Editor's note: An earlier version of this article appears on News Break.

I remember the first time I took my cat to have her put to sleep.

I told the vet she screams constantly, as though she is in pain. I can’t take it anymore, I said. It’s heartbreaking.

After a while, the vet returned from examining my cat. After performing blood tests and other labs, she said the cat appeared to be in remarkable physical health.

The screaming, she said, came from the 20-year-old cat being senile.

So, she put the cat on a tiny dose of Xanax. It did help my little girl for a while.

She lived another year. The second time I brought my cat in, the vet said it was time to put out her light.

LuLu would have been 22 on March 7, 2017. The picture of her and I sharing a kiss was taken on her 20th birthday.

I hired a professional photographer.

My mother reincarnated as a cat ?

LuLu was born on the very day my mom died of breast cancer.

I said I never would put her to sleep. Everyone used to say, “That cat is still alive?” In fact, they were saying that from the days she was about five or six years old.

How did I find LuLu?

Well, I met a guy in an AOL chat room (yes, remember those?) He was nice, and we used to have pleasant conversations. I was never one of those guys who would ask “stats” because I was interested much more in the dimensions of a man’s heart, as I am now.

I knew nothing of this man other than the fact he seemed sweet to chat with. I agreed to a “blind” date in truly the most “blind” of ways.

A little guy with a big present

He showed up at my door – all four feet of him (if he was that tall) with a Zesta cracker box. Inside was my little LuLu.

It didn’t work out with the guy (he was very shy, me very flamboyant at the time) but LuLu and I kicked it off from the beginning. She was friendly but kept her distance too for many years.

She was exceptionally beautiful. She always used the box. Essentially, she was the perfect cat and never caused any problems at all.

It didn’t work out with the “Little Person” who brought me LuLu, but the next guy I dated also had a real fondness for LuLu and we had a surprisingly good run.

He ended up a getting a cat, Bucky, around the same time I got LuLu. Bucky passed around the same time.

LuLu enjoyed having guests over to our Los Feliz apartment. She was not even afraid of unpassable drag queens.

Cat suffers through my drug and alcohol problem

For many years, I had a bad drug and alcohol problem. I would neglect to feed her until she told me about it. Her litter box … ick. It rarely got emptied. But she always used it.

When we moved from Los Angeles (she flew in her own seat, coach, from Los Angeles to Detroit in a corporate move) she immediately began to improve. That was in 2002.

We lived in a penthouse at Riverfront Towers, downtown Detroit. The man in the penthouse next to me, Mike (I had a fondness for Mike) also had a cat named Kitty Boy.

Mike used to live in my penthouse but moved to the larger one next door to construct an elaborate jungle gym for Kitty Boy.

From Detroit back to California

Mike seemed to be a wise man. I was drawn to him, but he carried a gun, which made me nervous. He told me he needed it for his protection because he had ownership in one of the casinos.

Once, his gun fell from its holster, and LuLu bolted four feet into the air.

But Mike and LuLu liked each other, and he brought her toys that she ignored. Mike always told me LuLu would live to be incredibly old, that she had special show cat qualities and was one of the most amazing jumpers he ever had seen (indeed, she could jump from the floor to the top of the refrigerator in a single bound).

When I left Detroit a year later, I had boxes piled to the top of the ceiling in the living room (which was all glass). LuLu climbed to the top box and fell asleep, literally “on top of the world” in Detroit.

We then returned to Southern California for a short time, which turned out to be a disaster. Finally, we turned around and came home. We were in a terrible car accident on the way home (the U-Haul jackknifed the Honda) but LuLu and I both survived.

LuLu had a bad skin disease most of her adult life in California. But it cleared up the moment we moved back to the Quad-Cities.

Cat develops attitude in Quad-Cities

Back in the Quad-Cities she developed quite a bit of attitude. Around that time, at age 8 or 9, she became very vocal, and very bossy. She had an unending appetite and would steal a piece of pizza (or a T-bone steak) right out of your hand.

Eventually her demanding, shrilling, spoiled screaming turned to painful groans. I had Pastor Stacie Fidlar perform last rites, and we again took her to the vet to be “assassinated,” as my dad always threatened her when she would scream.

My sweet little girl lived all these years, I think, because she was taking care of me, especially toward the end, when she knew I was trying to take care of grandpa while picking myself up by the bootstraps too.

She knew I needed her.

I think I’ll remember my girl most fondly when we lived in Belmont Shore, not far from the beach. Wild parrots would roost in the palm trees outside the French Door windows in my living room. She loved sitting on the back of the love seat and keeping watch.

For sure LuLu lived a purposeful life. She was loved by all who knew her.