Colleague compares pet death to relative

[ItsNotTheSame]

So long story short... my mum passed away a few months ago. Very sudden & unexpected, happened at home when she was alone and she was found there. Paramedics pronounced her dead on the scene. No chance to say goodbye obviously very shocking and caused me a lot of issues with anxiety and depression etc since while trying to come to terms with this. She was only in her early 50s and no illnesses before this as far as we knew.

Anyway, I’m back at work and have been for a couple of months now. My colleague has recently had a family pet put to sleep due to illness. Was working with said colleague when she made a comment to me along the lines of how upset she was and said I must know how she feels as it’s the same as my mum.

This really annoyed me and I told her in no uncertain terms that this is not the same and I walked away feeling angry / upset. I now feel a bit bad that maybe I’ve over reacted and been over sensitive. So opinions please.... Aibu?

You are not unreasonable and I have fur babies... which actually makes me gag to say that because it is so fucking infantile! But I do love my Cats and chickens but do their deaths equal my Mum and Dads? No it doesn't because I only get one of each of them. I can pick up a kitten for peanuts at the local sanctuary just have in fact. Many of my pet have been special they are not a human and they in no way outrank a human...ever! People need to get a grip!
I say this as a person who is trying to deal with the death of a women who I lived with on and off for 4 years in the 90's and kept running into as we have 4 friends in common and trust me no cat I have owned has outranked the sadness I feel for this persons death however remote. I love my cats I feel sad and cry when they die, I have made graves and cried years later but they are not a parent!

You are absolutely NOT BU. I’m so sorry for the loss of your mum. It dosnt matter how old we are, it bloody hurts.
Losing a pet is very sad but to compare it to your loss was insensitive to say the least

Was working with said colleague when she made a comment to me along the lines of how upset she was and said I must know how she feels as it’s the same as my mum.

^ Did people actually read this!? "It's the same as my mum". FFS - she's saying that the op losing her mother at a young age and unexpectedly is the same^ as losing her dog. Unbelievable.

Travis no, they are not your children. They’re really not.

You mum was really young, so you must be very young?

In my experience, the majority of people are idiots if you lose a parent as a young adult. People have a tendency to act as if they have had all empathy and compassion surgically removed. They seem to think you should be a little sad for a couple of days and then carry on as if nothing happened. Like it's just an inconvenience.

Which is utter nonsense. I honestly despair of the way some many people in our culture respond to people who've been bereaved.

I'm so sorry for your loss and how it happened. It's devastating losing a parent, especially so young. Comparing it to losing a pet is crass, and I'm sorry you've had to deal with that.

You're not the unreasonable one. Don't be afraid to correct people. BlueBug's post resonates for me. Grief is complicated and lasts a long time. You don't have to hide it, nor do you have to apologise or feel ashamed.

It will slowly become less raw and more bearable for you to carry her loss, but it is always okay to say to people "I'm still grieving" / "the grief is hitting me really hard today" or your own variation on that. Don't put pressure on yourself to be okay if you're not.

You did not overreact. You are not being oversensitive. You are grieving. It's normal. And necessary.

When you get a dog, you are fully aware that it has a maximum life expectancy of around 15 years, of course it's not the same as a beloved parent! And anyone who thinks that OP is U needs their head examined

I have a colleague who I can imagine would pull this exact shit, and she is INSUFFERABLE

YANBU OP

She is an insensitive twat, and I don’t say that lightly. You were right to call her on it. We only get one mum and they can never be replaced and we never stop thinking of them and grieving for them. It sounds like your loss was especially hard, your poor mum was so young and you had no chance to say goodbye. Keep on your journey, my love, grief is a long, hard, twisty road, don’t let silly comments from idiots pull you off the path. She can’t even begin to comprehend it, silly woman, in time the horrible rawness will pass, but we will always feel so sad.

Yes, YABU.

Most animal families are far more loving, and healing of toxic childhoods, than actual humans.

Certainly I will grieve for my cat (15 years old and grumpy as fuck) far more than I will grieve for my estranged mother. My cat has shared my life for the past 15 years whereas my mother has spent the last 15 years criticizing literally everything.

Jesus, Ford, i’m really sorry your mum was so toxic but would you really compare the loss of a pet to that of a parent to a colleague who had recently lost their beloved Mum at a tragically young age without any chance to say their goodbyes? Please don’t do that.

@NotTheFordType You're free to feel that way and I'm sure many others with toxic family members feel the same.

But surely you don't think that you losing your cat would be on par with someone losing a much loved close family member?

I'd add, most people don't have the misfortune of losing their parents young and really lack the ability to comprehend the impact it has. I have no time for people who act as if losing a parent 60 seconds past your 18th birthday is identical to losing a 96 year old parent.

If you find people older than you who still have living parents, or people who lost their parents in their late nineties, trying to tell you how to grieve or pressuring you... You would not be overreacting to tell them to get lost.

These people have no clue what it's like to lose a parent young. If they don't have the ability to empathise and recognise that it is not remotely comparable to losing an elderly parent (or how they hypothetically imagine they'd feel when their parents eventually die), their opinion is irrelevant.

Yes, losing a parent at any age is devastating. But losing them before you have the chance to have an adult relationship with them, or share that stage of your lives together, or have their support as you build your life, or even see them live to build their own life after you've flown the nest, or to retire, is an entirely different thing. Especially as you watch all your peers, and people years older than you, merrily take it for granted that their parents will be part of their lives for decades to come.

It's not just their loss you're grieving, it's your shared future and dreams too - a future that everyone around you is busy living out. Never mind the shock. When an elderly parent dies you know to expect it and gradually prepare, when a young parent dies you don't and can't.

Op, it's ok to feel all the things you're feeling. It is survivable. Finding other people who can relate helps so much, as you'll be able to talk about it without having to explain why you're feeling how you are. The turning point in my grief was the first time I got to talk to somebody else who'd been in similar shoes to me and just "got it". There are often support groups if there is nobody in your own circle you can connect with. I hope my posts haven't been too much, I just wanted you to know you're not alone. Anything you're feeling is okay.

The "some parents are toxic" rule doesn't remotely apply to the OPs own situation. In this instance, the colleague was trying to equate two things which were not remotely equal.

Ford that was uncalled for. Sorry that your experience with parents wasn’t good but to say that op is being UR to be upset that a colleague compared the loss of her pet to op’s Mum is totally shitty

Aaand NotTheFordType would be a shining example of the kind of person I was talking about in my post...

Pets will never be even close to the loss of a human. I mean, your beloved cat would likely watch an intruder stab you to death and then eat its supper without batting an eyelid.

I think it sounds like a slip of the tongue comment tbh. I doubt she genuinely believes that losing her pet is equal to you unexpectedly losing your young mother.

Having said that I know someone who during the wave of light day compared her early first trimester miscarriage to a full term stillbirth or neonatal death. Which, as sad as it is, totally isn't the same.

You are being unreasonable in your reaction. For some people losing a pet is just as hard as losing a family member and although it’s nowhere near the same to you she was probably just trying to help / talk to someone who was also grieving.

YANBU

I’m ashamed to admit it, but I do get a little frustrated when people are devastated when they lose a 96 year old relative. My father died when I was 12, I’d lost all my grandparents by 18, and my best friend died at 35. I know there’s no grief Olympics, but I do think there’s a difference between someone dying after a long and productive life as opposed to a tragic death when young. Is that awful? Obviously I’d never say that to someone recently bereaved.

Sorry for your loss, OP. I meant to say that in my previous post.

Perhaps she meant that the loss of her pet was of the same magnitude to her as the loss of your mother is to you? We all love in different ways and grieve in different ways too.

Yanbu. I love my pets but they aren't fur babies or children, they're beloved pets. Those who call them their children nearly always replace them when they die. You don't do that with parents or children, it's not remotely comparable.
Your colleague was massively insensitive, even if she genuinely believes that they are the same she was bloody stupid to say it.

RatHammock having lost one much loved parent at 15 and the other recently at 51 I can tell you the pain and grief is not much different.
I think people assume that it hurts less to lose an elderly parent for some reason...it's just a different kind of pain.

OP I'm very very sorry for your loss.

@MostIneptThatEverStepped. I’m so sorry for your losses and I hope I didn’t sound insensitive. I suppose there’s no sense in trying to quantify grief. Maybe I just get a bit envious of people who have many years with their loved ones. I always wonder what sort of a relationship I would have had with my father as an adult. Still, I should count my blessings as my mum’s still going strong. I think she’s going to make 90! I hope so.

Don't be annoyed with her.

To some people, pets are family. Maybe she wasn't wise to say what she said but she didn't mean to be insensitive to you and feels her grief strongly.

I'm so sorry about your mother.