Cat Williams, Local Artist and Disability Rights Advocate, Passes Away at 55

Catharine “Cat” Williams, a beloved artist, designer and disability rights advocate in Charlotte, passed away on Nov. 22 due to complications from a double-lung transplant she received in 2020. 

A lifelong cystic fibrosis patient who found her health worsening amidst a pandemic that made her even more vulnerable, the long-awaited transplant extended her life by nearly five years. She shared the story of that journey with Queen City Nerve in 2024. 

“I may not be running marathons, but when I take my dog for a walk, it’s like, ‘Oh my God, look how beautiful the world is, look at these flowers, smell the air. Look, I’m not coughing. Look how far I can walk,’” Williams told us then of her post-transplant life. “It’s a lot of little things.”

Her new lungs began to fail over the summer. By August, she reported that she was down to about 18% functionality after the lungs had functioned as high as 85% as recently as April. The doctor told her he didn’t believe she would get that function back. 

Following her usual process of advocacy through transparency, Williams continued to post about her journey in a months-long Twitter thread that lasted through Nov. 3, when she wrote that she was struggling to breathe, had no appetite, and was discussing end-of-life care with her transplant coordinator. 

“It sounds like my suffering will increase until they finally sedate me to get through the final days,” she wrote. “How close am I to that? They can’t predict.”

Her suffering ended on Nov. 22. She was 55 years old. Cat is survived by her mother, Louise Crumbley Williams, who was her primary caregiver in her final years; as well as her father, Philip Williams Jr.; brother Philip Williams III; nieces and nephews Kipp, Alex, and Isabel Williams; and aunt Jo Claire Dulin.  

Now friends of Williams are sharing what she meant to them, including Nancy Lennert, one of Williams’ closest friends since the two met in college. Lennert kept Williams’ many friends and followers updated throughout the arduous transplant process in 2020-21. 

In a heartfelt post following Williams’ death, Lennert said her friend lived “one of the hardest lives I’ve ever known,” but remained a shining light through the end. 

“She was very active online and while her health permitted, she would volunteer with local charities,” Lennert wrote. “She fought tirelessly for justice on all fronts — disability rights, women’s rights, social equity — and always looked for ways to make others happy.”

Lennert reflected on the popular use of the battle metaphor when people face harrowing health care challenges and diagnoses such as cystic fibrosis or cancer. She pushed back on the idea that Williams “lost” in the end.  

“It’s true that Cat fought every day to make many things better, but she always faced the challenges of her illness on her own terms, showing a strength of character equal to, if not surpassing, many heroes of yore,” Lennert wrote. “I learned so much from Cat, and will miss her terribly, but I know she’s left a legacy of many people who were inspired by her and will continue fighting in her name. The battles aren’t over, they will just be carried on in her honor.” 

An artistic life

Though officially diagnosed in her 20s, Williams said she had suffered through the symptoms of cystic fibrosis (CF) her entire life. The disorder is caused by a genetic mutation that clogs the lungs and digestive system with mucus. Patients have to take extreme precautions when interacting with others.

Throughout her life, she was passionate about creating art. Lennert was studying animation at NYU’s film school when she met Williams. 

Fellow classmate Jennifer Oxley recalled that Williams was always eager to volunteer her skills as an audio designer to help her and Lennert put sound to their animations. The collaborations led to a decades-long friendship between the three women that remained tight-knit despite the physical distance between them after graduation.  

“It was like one of those people that you meet and you can instantly talk to them and relate to them. I just always remember being best friends,” Oxley told Queen City Nerve from her home in Brooklyn, New York. “From the second we met, I’m sure it had to somehow build to that, but I don’t really remember a time when I wasn’t a close friend of hers.” 

Speaking from her home in Connecticut, Lennert echoed Oxley’s sentiments. 

“Cat was the type of person that as soon as you met her, you felt like you’d known her forever,” she said.  

The three stayed close throughout adulthood, with Oxley and Lennert regularly making the trip down to North Carolina to visit. 

Meanwhile, Williams continued to explore different creative outlets, becoming practiced in metal smithing, kiln-fired enamel vessels, jewelry, fabric arts, photography and 3D printing. In her 30s, she created Dizzy Cat Design, making purses, clothes and jewelry.

“Cat has this infectious creative spirit,” said Oxley. “She’s so incredibly generous and thoughtful about all of her relationships. She was my biggest champion of my work, just so generous with her offers to help out, to give creative input and advice.” 

Forging a path in advocacy and activism

Williams became more outspoken as a disability rights activist after a stranger approached her in a store and told her she likely had done something to deserve whatever condition she had that led to her carrying an oxygen tank. 

“It kind of radicalized me because I wasn’t really out about CF at all in my life,” she told us in 2024. “And that’s when I became a sort of online activist, just deciding, ‘I’m not taking this bullshit.’”

She recalled multiple times when she was accosted and harassed for parking in a handicapped spot despite not using a wheelchair. While her disability was not always visible, her low lung function made it difficult to walk through large parking lots to reach a place of business or health care facility. 

“One of the things I learned personally [from Williams] was really understanding the challenges of people who are on disability,” said Lennert. “I just had no idea until Cat was going through it, the limitations and challenges and struggles they faced with the laws in different states and how people react to them.” 

When COVID clamped down on America, Williams thought it would lead to a reckoning over disabled people and other vulnerable populations. For a short time, it did.

“At the height of COVID, when everyone accepted we were in the pandemic and most people were masking and people were isolating, it kind of felt like, ‘Okay, we’re all in this together. You’re now seeing what a lot of disabled people go through, and we’re all in this together and things are changing,’” she said. “I really had hope that people were going to be more careful now.”

Read more: A Look at the Life of a Resident at Risk (2020)

Rather quickly, masking became a politicized issue and, as time went on, even those who had originally been willing to make the smallest sacrifices began to refuse. In the years after her transplant, Williams ran into health care workers who refused to mask, including a personal physical therapist who stopped working with her because Williams demanded that she mask up.

Williams’ struggles only drove her advocacy work online, raising awareness about cystic fibrosis and disability issues more broadly. She met with local lawmakers like then-NC Sen. Jeff Jackson to lobby for Medicaid expansion and pulmonary rehab funding. 

“She has this inner spark and motivation to do what’s right and to encourage others to do the same,” said Oxley. “She has this ability to jump right in with what she thinks should be done, this real powerful command on what she thinks and getting that word out. She really used that for so much good.” 

Following her transplant, Williams also became a more outspoken advocate for organ donation. 

According to the US Health Resources & Services Administration, about 90% of adults in the US support organ donation but only 60% are actually signed up as donors. Williams believed that was due to a stigma she’s heard reported in which people believe doctors won’t do as much to save your life if they know they can use your organs once you’re dead. 

“It’s not like that at all,” she said. “They’ll actually take better care of you because you have to be in such good shape. You can’t just take every person that donates their organs and use them for everything. The body has to be in a certain condition.”

Williams said she would like to see the US adopt a policy similar to France, in which people are automatically signed up for organ donation and need to opt out if they don’t want to be included.

She pointed to the story of Kristie Crowder, killed by the driver of a car who struck her while riding her bike in Plaza Midwood in January 2023. Her family later reported that her donated organs, cornea, and tissue saved or improved the lives of 58 people.

“I wish people’s fear of it would be addressed more because it’s such a gift to be at the end of your life and be like, ‘I’m dying, but I’m going to save people,’ and that’s just kind of the last ultimate thing you can do,” she said. “I mean, there’s nothing more amazing than that.”

Cat’s legacy

Lennert and Oxley visited their old friend for the last time in September, taking a walk with Williams and her beloved dog Olive in the park outside of the Atrium Hospice facility where Williams spent her last days. 

Oxley became emotional when contemplating the fact that there will be no more trips to North Carolina to hang out with her old college friends but emphasized that Williams’ memory lives on in her advocacy work, much of which took place online where it can remain for folks to find in the years to come. 

“I hope that others who are going through what she’s going through can look at her posts and articles [about her] and they can take inspiration from what she learned and from what she went through,” said Oxley. 

“She’s just so generous about sharing her struggles, and I feel like not everybody has that generosity and is able to be so vulnerable and open with their thoughts and their feelings and struggles,” she continued. “So I hope and I know that good will come with that.” 

Lennert has seen her own family struggle with health issues over the last five years, running parallel to Williams’ own ups and downs. Lennert’s mother, whom Williams knew well, passed away in 2021. Her father was diagnosed with dementia around the same time and has been slowly declining since. 

In June of this year, Lennert’s brother, a classmate of the friend group at NYU, was diagnosed with glioblastoma. He passed away in September. While Lennert was purposeful about showing up for Williams during her transplant journey, Williams returned the love as any best friend would. 

“Cat would check in on me sometimes and be thinking of me while she was having her own battles to fight,” Lennert recalled. “She could have just spent her whole life saying, ‘Why me? Why did I have to deal with this?’ Instead, she looked outside and was like, ‘How can I help people?’ 

“She really did think of everybody else and wanted to fight for them as well as for herself,” she said, “and I don’t see how you can’t be inspired by seeing somebody do that.”