For this beautiful post. Your description of your father speaking words of comfort to a lifeless Princess brought back memories of the passing of my Zoe last year.

I will say a prayer for your friends and Whidbey.

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I lost both of my chocolate labs within 8 months of each other.  It was a hard year but the first one dying really threw me for a loop.  I wrote an article that was published in Newsweek's "My Turn" column about how to live with the death of a pet.  I learned so much from the commenters, including about Rainbow Bridge which helped me tremendously with the death of my second.  We now have etwo more labs, but I still kiss the pictures of my first two.  They're here somewhere.  I just can't see them anymore.

 thanks for a great post.

 merlotmom

www.merlotmom.com 

I lost my golden retriever Emma in June 2006. She was 14 years old and I still miss her very much. It helped to talk about her - and my older son (then 8) and I wrote a eulogy for her on my blog together.

http://notjustaboutcancer.blogspot.com/2006/06/emma-goldman-kingston-aka-golden.html

That helped too.

Thanks for a lovely post.

Laurie

www.notjustaboutcancer.blogspot.com

Anne

I think what you mentioned Mata about being afraid to be seen to grieve for a pet applies to many people. Those who have never developed a close and loving bond with an animal not only don't understand but sometimes try and trivialise the pet owner's grief, which only compounds the suffering, as we feel we have to hide it. I lost a beloved dog a number of years ago after 15 years and was virtually forced by my partner at the time (who is not surprisingly now an ex) to keep a social commitment on the day she was put to sleep, which turned out to be a ghastly ordeal for me and something I should never have agreed to.  If people understand that this grief is as real, and often deeper, than that we feel for a loved human, it would make it much easier to bear.  Hopefully with the insights of perceptive and intelligent pet owners, that will eventually become easier for them to do.

As I think you know, dog died in March and it was a devastating loss for me. I'd raised him from 5 weeks old, and with the help of my parents, he made it to 13 in a wonderful home and with better medical care than I have, I swear. ;)

I've covered pets for this website for awhile now, but I didn't think I could write about it immediately. It turned out, though, to be the best possible thing for me to do. The post I put up on Blogher about his death - that I wrote in a crazy mashup of grief and jetlag - helped me so much, especially because I was not with him when he died and was so far away in the aftermath. In many ways it was a worst case scenario. And in addition to helping me, I was so grateful that others shared their own experiences, as is happening in this thread. 

Also, the roommate I had on that trip did not acknowledge the loss at all.  I tried to be inobtrusive, found another place to cry, etc., etc, but that part was really hard. People can think "it's just a pet" all they want, but to dump that on someone who is experiencing this pain is cruel. Loss is loss and pain is relative. I learned a lot about people when my dog died - mostly the kindness that people can and do show - and that others not validating it means nothing.  

It's now been more than four months and the hole in our family is ridiculous.  I don't know when or if I'll get another dog. I'm visiting my sister in San Diego...we saw a Boston Terrier downtown at the market and out of nowhere I started to cry. Hard. Too hard to see one in the 3d just yet, I guess. 

Oh, I also sponsored a dog - a 9 year old Boston mix who's in fostor care - through the Homeless Animal Rescue Team in Northern Virginia (I'm in the DC area, close by.)  I found them through Petfinder. 20 bucks is deducted from my PayPal account monthly to go towards his care and feeding. I e-mailed with the rep from HART and felt good about the organization, plus for me, action is necessary to move through grief and loss. This made me feel good that even though I don't have a dog right now, I can contribute to the care of a difficult-to-adopt senior dog in memory of the one who was with me for so many years. 

Laurie

LaurieWrites

This is such a lovely post and I certainly feel the depth of the pain your friends and your own. I found it very hard to make the decision when I had to put my cat "William" to sleep. But he very clearly let me know that he had enough. There is "William sized hole in my heart" - so well put above!

I would highly recommend Colleen Mihelich's blog - she writes about grieving for pets and memorializig them. She is a very thoughtful lady! A beautiful blog! I am sure that this can be helpful to a lot of people. I have found it so. Check it out at www.blog.peternity.com. Her writing fits in with this discussion really well I think. Amazing animal stories too - one about a male cat who goes to sit in the garden where his mom's pet memorial is - he goes to sit with her, apparently! Animals are so perceptive!

In life also, our pets seem so "tuned in". I have no doubt that they "get us" on some level we cannot understand. Thanks for the blog referral. I will send it on to my friends when they are a bit less raw. I also liked the quotes on the site.

~~ Contributing Editor, Mata H. also blogs right along at Time's Fool

George Anderson's website also has an Eyes of God page. He is a medium, and not all people are comfortable with the idea of an afterlife - and one that is accessible; however, what he says about pets being the closest thing to heaven on earth has some truth. For anyone grieving - a pet or human - his website may be provide a chance for some healing. Here is the link.

Notions of Identity

Loosing a pet is like loosing a familymember. I still can't thing of Sabrina, our lovely hamster, named after Audrey Hepburn and the film Sabrina, bacause of her huge eyes and her tiny, little self when arriving. One week later she was twice as big, probabaly due to a lot of organic broccoli. She was a professional rodent and mischiefmaker, and we adored her.

Now we have Sofie. She is very serene and will be a grand dame, if she isn't already, but I miss all of them: Soelve, who listened to Brahms with his feet hanging through his cage, Noettelin, who was born without a leg and slept in my lap and Sabrina-sweet.

We are feeding Sofie the best food in hope of keeping her for a long time.  

I am so sorry to hear of your friends dog who recently passed away!!  I too lost my dog in June of this year to cancer after a great 18 years of life with me and my family.  It is a grief only a true dog (animal) lover can feel if they are truely one of your family.  I miss her everyday but I have her picture on my phone and still have her favorite toy I keep on my dresser for now just to help in the grieving process and I will spread her ashes in our woods when the time is right.  Plus I believe I will see my pets again in the afterlife, they will be there to greet us with our human family and welcome us home.

 Yes, they are family. Our current commander in chief - Sofie - slept on my arm yesterday for more than 20 minutes. What a hamster!

 Lovely Gunea pigs. I often wondered how they are to handle.