Same has happened here. While I am proud of the younger, more skittish one, it’s also an indication of the old matriarch diminishing. I’ll never be ready to lose her.

You may wish to reconsider this. At the moment you’re excluding everyone who adopted an adult cat of poorly documented past; we’re probably not that many, but we tend to want to be helpful and often own seniors. Vet assessment can usually narrow age range down to abt 3 years.