Dealing With Guilt In Pet Loss

[Maylissa]

I just found this helpful article regarding the horrible feelings of guilt we can have after our beloved animals die, that I wanted to share with all of you here who might be struggling.

Dealing With The Guilt

[STARKISS]

Hi Maylissa,

Thank you for the post and the article you found, it was very helpful.. I am feel guilt not for a loss of a pet but for one I had to give up and I am not able to see her as often.. I had my dog Chelsea who is a yellow lab since she was five weeks old and due to the resent deaths of my dear parents I had to move and could not take her with me... She is living with my brother but I am feeling really guilty about abandoning her and the day I will get that phone call that she has died... I do not want her to think I throw her away I want to somehow make her understand that I did it out of love for her... It kills me so much when I see her and I have to say good bye... because what if it is the last time for her.... Missing Chelsea........

[Dana Durrance]

Dear Marty and friends,

I've been reading your discussions about dealing with the guilt over the death of a pet. I completely agree with what you and Teresa Wagner say in that we must always remember to love ourselves when we're grieving the death of a pet. As a pet loss counselor myself, I can't tell you how many people struggle with this. We do such a brilliant job of loving our pets, but forget to extend this same love to ourselves. I can think of no other time in life when we need this unconditional love more. I believe that one way we can learn to love ourselves is to try and see ourselves in the same way our pets do. We tend to see ourselves by focusing all our energy on the flaws and imperfections. Our pets only see the good things...that's why we love them so much! I was also happy to hear that some of you found the article I wrote at PetPeopleHelp on guilt to be helpful. Take care to all of you! Warmly,

Dana Durrance, M.A.

www.PetPeopleHelp.com

[STARKISS]

Hi Dana Durrance,

Thank you for your post, and being someone who has lost many pets in my life I want to say that you and everyone else are so very right when you say we have to love ourselves... I often blame myself when a pet dies on me.. I figure it had to be because I did not do something I should have done... Take care and thank you again for your post... Shelley

[MartyT]

Welcome, Dana! I'm sooooo glad you found your way to our site, and I hope our members will find their way to yours, too!

Fondly,

Marty

P.S. My sincere thanks to our dear Maylissa, whose post about Dana's insightful article led to my discovering Dana's outstanding Pet Loss Help Blog on Laurel Lagoni's wonderful Pet People Help Web site -- and then to having the very great pleasure of "meeting" Dana in cyberspace! It turns out that we've all been members of the MAS (Mutual Admiration Society) for many years! Don't you just love the Internet?!