Grieving a Pet

My sweet Yorkie, Clutch, chose to relocate last week to the amazing fields and creeks of heaven. I miss him terribly. My pastor offered coaching help during the early days of my grief. I want to share what she helped me with, in case you or someone you care about is grieving a pet. Her guidance helped me a lot.

Feel free to share this list with anyone who needs it. And realize everyone is different, so some of these ways might not be helpful or relevant in all situations. The key thing is to ask the Lord to guide you through every step of your grief. He knows exactly what you need.

Take the time you need to grieve in healthy ways. Don’t let folks rush you. Not everyone understands the loss of a pet, but just know that your grief is real, whether people understand it or not. The healthier ways you grieve now, the less likely to get stuck in heaviness later on.

Steps that Helped Me Navigate Grief

Here is my pastor’s advice, along with a few things I felt led to add:

(1) Process the grief, don’t just sit in sadness. Invite the Lord into the sadness. When you have a low moment, ask Jesus to come into that space with you. He will help you. This was a big part of my healing.

(2) Let the Lord lead your grieving. Ask Him to show you what you need. Take it one step at a time. Do the next thing. When you feel stuck, ask Him for the next thing that will help you.

(3) Journal your feelings, and don’t stop there. After you write what you feel, ask the Lord what He wants to show you. Write down what you feel from Him, whether it’s a word, a feeling, a scripture, a song, an image you want to draw or color, or a sense of His presence and how that feels.

(4) Write a letter to God describing how you feel and whatever is on your heart—not only your specific sadness, but also things you loved about your pet that you want to remember and joys you want to share.

Symbolically hand God the letter and invite Him to respond to your heart and to join you in your place of pain and memories, whether sad or joyful.

Often, it helps to realize someone feels your same sense of loss. Only Jesus can offer that. It’s been a big help for me to sense He knows my exact sadness and loss.

(5) As each moment of sadness comes, invite the Lord in.

(6) Ask people to pray for your firsts—the first time you experience different moments without your pet. Ask the Lord to join you in each of those moments.

(7) When memories of trauma surfaced for me, my pastor suggested praying in the spirit or listening to the Christian healing 444Hz music streaming on Spotify. That helped a lot.

Each of those suggestions helped me process my grief in a healthy way during the first days.

Grief goes on as long as it takes. I still have moments of grief surfacing, and I know that will continue. As grief surfaces, I continue to invite Jesus in.

But those first days were important not to get stuck in sadness and heaviness.

Additional Things that Helped Me

(1) I played the Jim Banks trauma prayer on YouTube to help lift the trauma of loss off me. I had to do this several times on different days.

(2) I spent the first two nights at my friends’ farm, so I didn’t have to be alone. Their dog spent the first night in the guest room with me. The dog’s presence was calming, and so was the Lord’s presence.

(3) The farm were I stayed those first two nights was the same farm where my dog spent his puppyhood years before he came to live with me, back when I was his pet sitter. We had continued to spend time there, through the years, as we pet sat the dog who lives there now.

During those first two days of grieving, I found it very healing to walk the farm with their dog and take photos of the favorite places where my dog loved to run and explore.

(4) I also made sure to spend some time back at my home, journaling for a few hours, so it wouldn’t be a complete shock of loss when I returned home full time.

(5) I tried to turn every memory of loss into gratitude. Whenever I experienced a sense of loss—wishing my dog were sitting next to me on the couch—I changed it to an expression of gratitude: “Lord, I’m grateful for all the times my dog sat next to me on the couch.”

Seek the Lord’s Guidance if Considering a New Pet

When a pet passes on, some folks will want to get a new pet while others won’t. Some might be ready sooner and others later. In my situation, I already knew I would want a new dog right away. My pastor encouraged me to start looking and praying.

Sure enough, I found the perfect puppy, a baby Yorkie. Having a new pet doesn’t diminish the grief of losing my longtime companion dog. I still experience moments of grief every day. But the puppy certainly occupies my focus, all day long, so I’m less likely to dwell on sadness. I’m just trying to give the new little guy the best start he can get.

The timing of a new pet depends on so many things. Baby animals especially take a lot of energy and cause a lack of sleep. For folks with a family or full-time job, it might be too hard to be grieving, taking care of a new pet, and getting through each day, all at the same time.

Only you will know, with the Lord’s leading, what is best for you, and the right timing. For me, getting the puppy soon after losing my dog was the best option. And I felt that I found the right puppy for me.

I Pray You Will Feel the Lord’s Presence

If you are grieving the loss of a pet, my prayer is that you will feel God’s presence with you, now and throughout each day. Allow yourself the time and space to grieve. Have trusted folks praying for you.

Let the Lord lead you through your grief. He knows everything you will need, and He is your Comforter and Healer. He will be with you every step along this path of grief and into new life.

Please note: This post is about grieving the loss of a pet. For individuals grieving the loss of a person, given the depths and complexities of human relationship, more help may be needed. I recommend the Journeying through Grief series by Kenneth C. Haugk.

If you want to read more about inner healing and trauma healing from the pastor who gave me the advice mentioned above, you can visit her website here.