When A Friend Dies: Planning for & Grieving Animal Companions

By Peg Elliott Mayo

Animal friends—”all creatures great and small”—share our lives and bring the sweetest affection. Shared happiness is a treasure. Animal companions see us through our troubles without judgment and communicate their understanding without words. Because humans so often outlive animals, we need to understand how to grieve—and recover from—their deaths
The relationship between animals and humans is a profound bond, mattering deeply in the lives of each of us. An obvious difference between grieving the loss of an animal and a human is the simplicity and, some would say, purity of the friendship. With human losses, relationships are often complicated by things unsaid or actions uncompleted. Animal bereavement is painful, not because of unresolved regrets or grievances, but for absence of our companion’s clear, clean, and unmeasured goodness. It is human to love and appreciate love returned. When that love is uncritical, forgiving, and joyous, it would be unimaginable not to be sad at its loss. Something in us also hungers for non-verbal understanding.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Peg Elliott Mayo
• Release date: Aug 7, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476425078

Peg Elliott Mayo

Born March 31st,1929, Easter Sunday on the cusp of April Fools Day in the year the stock market died. So much for karma! Don, is the tall Shy Guy, spouse, creative force & phenomenal companion. Three living middle-aged offspring who are neither children nor “mine,” KT, Stan and Peter. When your “baby” is eligible for AARP you search for new descriptors. Three outstanding grand “children.” Jane and Anna Rose, college students, and Aaron a graphic designer, metal artist, gardener, creative force, all around good sport and friend. Home is a modest place on the banks of Coast Range Oregon river, 28 miles from “town.” I’m part of a mixed neo/retro hippie, artistic & staggeringly diverse forest community. Identity at various times: daughter, wife, widow, mother, grieving parent, Aries, failed factory worker, potter, basket maker, sewin’ fool, adequate organically-committed cook/food preserver, clinical social worker specializing in PTSD, loss, relationships & creative expression, hospice volunteer, tree hugging ecoappreciator, party girl, recluse, foolish risktaker, writer, computer graphics-photography neophyte, established writer & storyteller.

Book preview

When A Friend Dies...

Planning for & Grieving Animal Companions

Peg Elliott Mayo, M.S.W.

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 1983/2013©

[e-mail]

Animal lovers understand one thing: teachers and friends need not be human to enrich our lives. Consequently, we feel acute loss when it is time for them to go to their rest and we must continue alone. I offer this small book in the spirit of affection and supported by personal experience.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1 HONORING LOVING RELATIONSHIPS

Recognizing that throughout history animals

have been teachers, guides and comforters.

This chapter brings reassurance that the

predictable emotional turmoil of loss is normal.

Chapter 2 THE GRIEF PROCESS

Grief is a process, not a condition. This means

there is a beginning, intermediate steps, a

hope of resolution.

Chapter 3 EUTHANASIA

The hardest decisions are how, when and

whether to arrange a friend’s death. What to

consider, ask, expect, and arrange is lucidly explored.

Chapter 4 WHAT ABOUT KIDS?

How to educate and comfort children faced with

pet loss. The dangers of over-protecting, misuse

of language (the animal is not going to sleep),

and the issue of decision-making.

Chapter 5 EULOGIES

A series of touching eulogies, written as closure

on the grief process

A GENTLE REMINDER

Keep company with the wordless ones,

let their wisdom come into your heart

and do not condescend to them for being mute.

When you feel innocence slipping away,

be still and stare into the eyes of your dog,

hold a fluttering sparrow in your palm,

and marvel at the silent audacity

of ivy ascending oaks to reach the stars.

Sing of these things

and your innocence will not desert you.

From Peg Elliott Mayo’s

Blind Raftery:

Seven Nights of a Wake

Dedicated to Gud Dawg

in memory of learning and pleasures shared.

Peg Elliott Mayo

Chapter 1. HONORING LOVING RELATIONSHIPS

Animal friends—all creatures great and small—share our lives and bring the sweetest affection. Shared happiness is a treasure. Animal companions see us through our troubles without judgment and communicate their understanding without words. Because humans so often outlive animals, we need to understand how to grieve—and recover from—their deaths.

The relationship between animals and humans is a profound bond, mattering deeply in the lives of each of us. An obvious difference between grieving the loss of an animal and a human is the simplicity and, some would say, purity of the friendship. With human losses, relationships are often complicated by things unsaid or actions uncompleted. Animal bereavement is painful, not because of unresolved regrets or grievances, but for absence of our companion’s clear, clean, and unmeasured goodness. It is human to love and appreciate love returned. When that love is uncritical, forgiving, and joyous, it would be unimaginable not to be sad at its loss. Something in us also hungers for non-verbal understanding.

The feelings of sorrow and hurt are not different from any other major life loss. When Black Beauty knickers at the sight of us, Lobo noses our hand, and Meow-Say-Tung settles confidently on our lap, we receive what words too often fail to give us: full acceptance. It is proper to grieve such a friend. There are those who do not understand, saying