Opinion: How to Cope with the Death of a Pet

Losing a beloved pet is always devastating but here are some reflections to soften the blow

Photo byRaul Castanos by Pexels

I love my cat — some would argue I love her too much. Lately, she’s been sick, and I’ve spent many nights barely sleeping as she’s sneezed and wheezed in bed next to me. She’s only 5 years old, but she gets ill so often that I wonder how much time she has left.

I write to make sense of those things I otherwise have trouble processing. The fear I feel at her potential passing, and the sadness I’ll feel when the day inevitably comes, are certainly not things I’m having an easy time working through. Fortunately, as I unpacked the issue on paper, I’ve found a lot of insights that helped soothe my soul. Just in case you’re going through something of the same, I wanted to share those thoughts with you.

Ignorance

The hardest thing about being human is that our imagination can amplify our pain. We suffer in this way, but fortunately our pets don’t suffer along with us. I might stay preoccupied the rest of the day with my cats unsettling bouts of violent sneezing and strained breathing in the morning, but as soon as the episodes have stopped, she herself will be carefree, bringing me over her wand toy, so I can swing it around, and she can give it a good chase. Our intellect acts to magnify our worries, but we should remember, this concern is only within us, and the animal is free of it.

Due to this, animals descend into death in a truly enviable way. They may feel the immediate pain or discomfort, but they don’t compound it with anticipation of what’s to come — or dwell on it once it has passed. They have no thoughts of death. They don’t stay preoccupied with their symptoms when they’re not actively being bothered by them. They’re not forecasting the trajectory of their health. My cat can show all the signs of her affliction one moment and be carelessly luxuriating under a sunbeam in the next.

What’s even more beautiful about this fact, is that we’re all free from pain and painful awarenesses in death.Even when a human who I cared for passes, I don’t pity them. They’re now beyond all mortal concerns. I pity myself that I have to live with the longing I have for them and the awareness that they’re gone. The same goes for our pets.

To their great benefit, an animal’s mind doesn’t exacerbate their suffering while alive, and when they cease to be alive, their capacity for negative feeling is gone in its entirety. Our own eventual physical decline will be much worse than theirs, but we tend to liken the two experiences to one another and project extra hardship onto them. We should instead recognize that they suffer much less than we imagine they do,much of the suffering we experience throughout is only felt by us on their behalf, and the pain we feel once they have gone is ours alone.

Age

It is a normal consequence of pet ownership that we have to watch our animals get older much faster than we do, and that we may have a succession of pets pass in the course of our one lifetime. It’s one of the sad facts of this relationship: When they enter our lives, we have to expect to someday bear witness to their final days.

Yet, for any life-form, to die of old age is the ultimate success. If we cannot content ourselves to some extent by knowing that things went as good as they could, then we will find ourselves trying to wish away death altogether, and it is silly to let ourselves be unduly upset by the natural order. If they live to a ripe old age, for their species, then hopefully we can find some solace in this.

However, I would feel it to be a great injustice if my pet were to go anytime soon. She is still relatively young, only 5 years old. Let her live to the average age of death, and I will feel contented knowing that I could not reasonably wish for more time with her. But still I must internalize what an average means: roughly half before that age and roughly half after.

To be taken at an age when 25% of the other members of the species are also taken is no tragedy. An average would not be an average if everyone was guaranteed to attain it. It’s not inherently less sad just because it’s common, but I can partially quell my emotions knowing that what I’m upset about is just the designs of nature. Neither I nor her are the victims of a tragedy or some unfortunate outlier in the cosmic scheme.

It is indeed sad when any creature, man included, loses their life while young. Unfortunately, it’s something that happens, and one of those vagaries of chance that we can find no real satisfying explanation for. To those experiencing this, I’m truly sorry for you — though there are more measures of a life left for us to discuss. To everyone else, be grateful for the time you were given.

Time

Up until this point, I have spoken about time, and specifically the duration of a life, using objective measurements. However, the experience of the passage of time is subjective. Every year feels as if it goes by faster than the one before. Some days pass quickly, while an hour might pass slowly. I’ve passed hours in what felt like minutes and minutes in what felt like hours. The true length of a life can only be gauged subjectively, and it’s arguable that my cat’s five years have endured for just as long as my 32.

No person is in a position to definitively argue that the mere days of existence granted to a fly don’t feel every bit as long as the decades that we get. Similarly, we cannot say that just because less revolutions around the sun have occurred during their lifetime that our pet, on a subjective level, isn’t living a life every bit as extensive as our own. If this is the case, we needn’t fret over their relatively short lifespan.

Quality

Putting aside the duration of life entirely, what’s most important about our days is not their quantity but their quality. I question the institution of pet ownership as a whole. It’s not something I’m for as a principle, as I’m not sure this leads to the most enjoyable life for the animal. Cats and dogs, for example, seem to want more than anything to run free, to chase about different critters, and to eat — a life in nature would consist of little else.

Nonetheless, I am a pet owner, and likely always will be, due to the context we find ourselves in, where we can adopt a rescue that would otherwise be wandering about a city as a stray or put to sleep. In this case, we will have done the best we can for the animal by taking it into our home and treating it well. Given the circumstances, providing a good life for them makes all the difference, and how well we treat our pets can work to assuage the inevitable badness of losing them.

Nothing offsets death quite like a good life. Much like we can be contented in part by knowing our pet lived its life to a ripe old age, we can find some kernel of solace in knowing that, however short, our pet’s life was a good one. I try to spend each day that I’m able to enjoy my cat’s companionship making sure that things are as pleasant as possible for her.If you’ve tried to do the same, what more was there to do? Every life ends in death; a good life is all we can ask for.

Life

I used this premise in an earlier article talking about death. I came to terms with the death of people and animals I love with one simple realization, but to reach that realization we need to ask ourselves why is it that death can be such a sad and hard thing to cope with? The answer: It’s because death is the end of life, and life is just that good.

All those moments we spent cuddled up with our pet, or enjoying their random antics with a smile, or watching them sleep in adorable poses were all great. Even now, the memory of them can bring a smile to our faces. We were gifted so many hours, and days, and years of that. We were given their love and able to return it. We formed a connection that crossed the boundaries of our respective species.

Many of us were granted the opportunity to raise our pets from when they were young and watch them grow. We entertained them with their favorite toys and gorged them with their favorite treats. We brought so much joy into each other’s lives and relished the time we spent together. If the condition for that is that one day you have to give it up, so be it. That’s a trade-off any person with sense would take 1,000 times over.

Let us not be sad that we lost them or someday will; let’s be overcome with gratitude that we were ever afforded such a wonderful companion in the first place.

Conclusion

I was always a dog person up until a few years ago. By chance, my sister’s cat, who was living with my dad, happened to get passed along to me. I was fond of the animal right from the start, but I really came to be grateful for her one night in particular.

My ex-girlfriend has borderline personality disorder (BPD), and while I have no desire to vilify in her the slightest — she’s a wonderful person — our relationship took a massive toll on me. It left my mental health in tatters, and it isolated me, forcing me to neglect nearly everyone besides her, until all my friends and acquaintances were gone. Eventually, when I had no one left but her and a few family members, she broke things off with me, two days before Christmas.

My little sister was visiting from Texas at the time, so I was hanging out with her and my dad for a couple days after the breakup. It wasn’t too bad when I had them around, but then they went to Texas, and I was left there alone, in an empty apartment. Days would go by in silence. Not a single notification would light up my phone screen. I was consumed with sadness at the break up and stuck ruminating on everything I had lost trying to make the relationship work — only for that to fail as well.

I spiraled there for days. I vacillated between feeling angry and sad — and more of each than I had ever felt before. The handgun I had purchased earlier that year began to draw my attention as a possible way to escape my pain. I don’t think I was seriously suicidal, but I’ve certainly never felt closer to being so.

Right at my lowest, the cat, who wasn’t allowed in the bedroom to begin with, strut through the open doorway like she owned the place. Stretching her legs out, front and then back, without a care in the world as she did so, and just like that my mood flipped. I laughed despite myself.

A lot of my love for my cat, “Fluffy” (named by my then 8-year-old sister), comes from a place of gratitude. I was all alone and at rock bottom, and without even meaning to she happened to saunter in and stop the momentum of my emotional decline completely. On a hundred other occasions since then, she’s managed to raise my spirits whenever I was feeling down. After all that, I’ve felt it as something of a duty to return the favor and try to make her life a little better too.

Through that commitment, I’ve subsequently formed about as close a relationship that a man and a pet can. I can’t say I’m ready for the sad day when I have to say “goodbye,” but looking at the situation from all the different angles above, I think I can see it for what it really is. All good things must end, and my time with her was just that — a good thing.