Signed off sick for pet grief

[MellowYellow552]

I'm a pet sitter. One of my furry clients was PTS last week, the day after I concluded my assignment. I'd looked after her for a few years and she had health issues but I noticed something wasn't right with her. Since then the family have been in deep pain. One of them has been signed off work because of reaction and the little boy has begun acting differently, whilst the mum is holding it all together. I lost my cat a few weeks ago and understand completely. People don't take this seriously enough ("it's just a bloody animal" kind of responses).

I'm going to start pet grief counselling training which I had thought of after losing my last cat but this has pushed me to it.

Exactly. My original post was to discuss the issue, and how pet grief affects people. I never intended for it to be compared with losing your granny, your aunt Fanny or any relative. Sorry if I sound flippant, but I do feel it's been hijacked.

My employer gives time off for such things relating to pets, inuding time off to take pets to vets etc

Not appropriate to be signed off? 🙄 Whag a horrible attitude.

It is not appropriate to be at work if you're too upset to work. People deal with grief differently. Some people will write about their loss on mumsnet like it is a drama and get another pet quickly, others can't talk about it without crying and never have another pet...and everything in between.

There was literally one post that brought up a child, it was in response to someone saying something like "an animal dies and you can just get another one" then someone else replied along the lines of "well you wouldn't say to go out and replace a child that died"

Literally nobody else has said anything else about an animal death being worse than a child, people jumped on that one comment.

We all grieve differently, not as single death will ever affect your poor friend the way the death of her child has. That doesn't mean she doesn't love or care about other people.

Just about nobody's death will affect me the way my pets do. I spend more time with my pets than any person, I'm with them day in day out, it would be physically impossible to spend that amount of time with anyone else and I wouldn't want too. They are with me through everything in life, I'm going to mourn them far more than someone I see a few times a year because in day to day life I'm without them anyway.

Nobody is minimising the grief that a person feels for another person but people are minimising the grief a human can feel for a pet because they wouldn't feel the same. People know what they feel, only I know what I experienced when my dog died and I'm insulted that anyone can minimise that.

Yes it can be just as bad or worse. We lost a young dog and it was devastating. We all felt much worse than when we'd lost relatives. Everyone is different.

Someone put it perfectly when I lost my cat over the summer. They are my children,they just have 4 legs and a fur coat.

I don't have children, I live on my own, some days the cats are the only living soul I speak to. They were also the only constant in my life, they kept me going through a horrible, abusive relationship and the subsequent separation. They were my reason for getting up and carrying on.

My grief for my cat was very real and very raw. It's a different grief to losing a person, but it is still grief.

My cats are everything to me. 😻

Grief counselling can make a difference. I lost my cat to cancer in August and I still cry now if I think about the day she was PTS. I miss her so much. After her death, I tried speaking to an online pet grief counsellor but I didn’t find it very comforting as they were only saying very generic things and it was like they were reading from a script. If it was done properly, I think it could have helped a lot. I was so attached to my cat and I’m still sad about it.

But they're not your children - they're your much loved cats. They are not comparable. I have a dog and I adore him, I do so much with him but I know that by the laws of averages he will die first. I will give him the best possible life he can have while he's on this earth, but he's not my children or my husband - he's my much loved dog. I'm not minimising anyone's grief, I'm saying that the trauma and impact that losing a child or partner has on your life is not comparable to that of losing a pet.

Yep. Some absolutely cold-hearted fuckers on this thread.

Eh??

Did you deliberately miss the bit where I said I don't have children and live on my own?! I have no husband, or children. So why the hell would I grieve for a child or husband I don't have?

We prefer the term “resilient”

No, I didn't miss that bit.

No. It really, REALLY isn't. And yes, I have experience of both.

I have lost adored horses and cats and it hurts like hell when they die. It's horrendously painful. But comparing this to the loss of a beloved human - the mother who's been your anchor all your life, a child diagnosed with an unsurvivable genetic disorder, the horrors of enduring MND with a loved one, knowing you can't even help them put an end to their suffering without facing a potential murder charge, an aggressive cancer wiping out a loved one in mere weeks and having to say goodbye without even having processed their imminent permanent absence, are all things that have happened within the immediate circle of my family and close friends.

To compare issues like this to the loss of a loved animal isn't going to garner much sympathy in that direction, I fear. I frankly find it insulting.

This is coming from one who did grieve my lost animal companions fiercely, and thinks the OP's idea for a support system with this grief is wonderful. People should not undermine this by comparing it with a situation that's frankly incomparable.

Speak for yourself! When my cat goes I now I will be much more upset than I was when my brother died. It depends on the relationship people have with family members.

Both of my parents and my eldest sibling died before I was 10 years old. I'm very 'resilient' as a result of the childhood trauma I experienced. Thankfully it hasn't made me a cold-hearted fucker like some people. And despite the losses I've experienced in life, I never compare the horror of my childhood to the trauma or losses that anyone else has experienced, even those who have 'only' mourned the death of a a beloved pet.

When my cat goes I know I will be heartbroken and I may well decide to seek help from a therapist.

@SerafinasGoose but people have pointed circumstances

Why would I grieve an absent mum more than I would a horse I've spent a decade with? Or someone grieve their abusive father more than a much loved dog?

Is this your personal low? Are you feeling quite smug?

You obviously have no idea what it takes to overcome a difficult childhood, the lack of parental love and the impact this has on a person for the rest of their life. My life would have been so so much easier had I grown up in a supportive household where I mattered as a person. You do not remotely understand the place pets can take when there is no human to lean on.

When I was a child I had nobody on my side. The only living being I could turn to was my cat. The pets I have as an adult are special to me. I never take them for granted. I never take the view 'well, it's just a pet'. I had a period in my life where I realised I loved my cat in a way I was never loved as a child. Can you even imagine what this is like?

Now, what exactly was your point about resilience? I think you meant ignorance.

What if you've never had a mother who cared about you? What if you have no family at all? What if all you have is your companion animals?
Then it could be your post that is termed insulting.

We should never ever judge someone else's life against our own. If you have close family, friends and loved ones then you are very fortunate but not all of us are that lucky in life.

I have a dog and a cat. They are my family.

I once had a colleague who thought the deserved dependant’s leave for their cat? They felt it unfair people with children could take dependant’s leave but people with pets couldn’t.
The aftermath of the death of a spouse/parent in terms of probate, funerals, lost income (partner) etc. is surely not equivalent to the death of a pet?

Comparative, competitive grief is unhelpful. Everyone has a right to feel their own way.

My Managers were absolutely wonderful when I lost my boy last year.

If my cat got ill and needed surgery for example and couldn't be left alone at home I would actually look into this as well. I would question the character of anyone who finds that 'strange'.

Dependents leave isn't just for death.

I always sympathise if a friend loses a pet. But I think time off sick from work is really not on.

You’ve made an awful lot of assumptions based on one comment, most of which are wrong

when my dog was pts sleep I acknowledged that I had been through worse, a whole lot worse and I’d get through it. My childhood is not the subject here.