Lupita Nyong’o covers the American and British editions of Glamour, all to promote Quiet Place: Day One. The film marks the first time she had to work with a cat on screen, and it changed her life. She always thought she was afraid of cats or that she wasn’t a cat person. She told Glamour that she actually had to do some “cat therapy” to feel comfortable around the stunt cat. Then, months later, after she was going through a devastating breakup, her friend encouraged her to adopt or foster a cat. She decided to foster a big orange tomcat… and she was a foster failure after a few days. Yoyo Nyong’o is her orange son and she looooves talking about him in interviews. Some highlights from Glamour:

Graduating from Yale Drama and winning an Oscar so quickly: “We were prepared to be extras and little guest stars on TV shows before we would have our chance at any substantial role in the thing that we love to do. But it did not at all prepare us for instant success. And that is an overwhelming experience.”

Whether she really wanted to win the Oscar ten years ago: “I was in my head, Please say Lupita, please say Lupita.’ And then he said it….I didn’t think I was not going to win. I hoped I would win. How could I? It was my first film. I had absolutely no expectation; I cannot stress that enough.”

She recently moved from Brooklyn to LA: “I wanted to move here for better weather and more space.” She loves her neighborhood, but she’s not sold on the LA experience just yet. “It’s very hard to find the vibe and the rhythm, the community. I know fewer people here, so it’s a little bit socially awkward.”

Speaking up for causes including Oscars So White, Me Too, and Black Lives Matter: “There’s been a lot of amplification of things that hadn’t really been talked about before, and I definitely have been a beneficiary of many of those movements.”

Being teased for being dark-skinned when she was younger: “I got teased a lot for being dark-skinned. I went to an all-girls school for elementary school, and then I switched to coed school when I was 12. So just when I was coming into myself and becoming aware of my sexuality, I was being teased a lot by boys for being dark. So I definitely wasn’t confident, but how I dealt with that was, I think I just developed my character to compensate.”

On her breakup from boyfriend Selema Masekela on Instagram last year: “I wanted to be honest. Honestly, the thought of having to update people one at a time was going to be harrowing. I had made the choice to share the relationship with the world, and I wanted to make the choice to share the end of it with the world. I knew that announcing it or sharing it with the world would mean there would be a reverb and I would have to deal with the onset of that.”

Adopting her beloved cat Yoyo: Nyong’o credits Yoyo for pulling her out of what she describes as a “super-low” point in her breakup. Her heart was “severely broken”—so much so that her mother rushed to her side all the way from Kenya, and one of her best friends as well. “I was really having a hard time believing in joy. I was flirting with depression. I wasn’t there yet, but I was flirting with it. And I had a voice say in my head, ‘Get a cat.’”

Fostering and then adopting her cat Yoyo: “This cat isn’t going anywhere. I guess the best anecdote for when you feel poorly taken care of is to take care of something. And I took care of Yoyo and he pried my heart open. My cat shows me how to relax. He lies there all day. Every so often he’ll get up and he’ll do that cat stretch. And it’s so elegant and it’s so yummy, he reminds me to get up and stretch.”

[From Glamour]

I’d be willing to bet that the move from Brooklyn to LA was probably about her breakup too. Whatever happened with Selema Masekela, it left her absolutely devastated, depressed and desiring a fresh start in a new city and a new furry friend. Lupita shrugged off the questions about Joshua Jackson but we haven’t heard much about them in several months. It’s just Yoyo in her life permanently.

Photos/covers courtesy of Adrienne Raquel/Glamour, sent from a promotional Glamour email.