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The Guardian: Have our children been harmed by having pets?


Boronia
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excerpt :  ( the last bit) 

 

People agonise over getting a pet and all the responsibilities involved when in reality you should be worrying about the end of the relationship. It’s a double whammy for parents who love the animal but also love the heartbroken kids – I would seriously swap various humans if I could get Silkie back for the kids. Sacha and Daisy are only two, so hopefully further tragedy is years away – though I know it will come eventually and for the first time I’m wondering if we’ve done our kids harm by having pets.

It’s glorious when all goes well, though training, picking up poo and paying horrendous pet bills are nothing compared with hand-feeding elderly animals, carrying them to the loo when they are too shaky, worrying that every illness will be the last and trying to soothe away the anguish on the children’s faces when you know they know things don’t look good. Even the pain of having my knee broken last year by the whippet pales into insignificance beside our current agony.

I also feel strangely angry with our animals for dying and guilty that I couldn’t save them for my children. There’s a rock on my chest – and I know that to anyone who doesn’t have pets, I must sound like a fool – and I have suffered genuine bereavement when my dad died, but this also feels suspiciously like the real thing. Watching my children being almost unable to breathe or move for grief makes us seem not such brilliant parents after all – seriously, do the benefits of always having a tiny furry shoulder to cry on make the eventual agony worthwhile?

Why is the death of a pet so painful?

Jon Patrick, consultant psychiatrist in psychotherapy:

“Joan’s feelings aren’t unique or unintelligible. She suspects this grief for her cat is “like the real thing” but from a psychoanalytic perspective it is the real thing. The family have dared to get their feelings entangled with their animals, and this process of untangling during bereavement is a pain not dissimilar to depression. We lose not just the object who dies but also the parts of ourselves we locate in them through unconscious projection – a risk we take when we project parts of ourselves on to any other thing, whether it be a pet, football team, child or partner. Love often physically hurts.

“The good news is that time heals but the loss will remain, which – it seems to psychoanalysts – is as it should be. Denial of these losses, or too quick a replacement of our pets or other loved objects, leaves their predecessors ungrieved for. It robs us of the chance to do the psychological work required to truly move on and also to keep hold of our loved ones with us when they have gone.”

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Death is a part of life... and we will all have to deal with grief at some point... be it a pet or a friend or relative...

 

I still remember getting a letter from the people who adopted our first ever dog that we couldn't bring back to Australia from PNG... Nuppy had passed away. I was 15 and I sobbed my heart out for days. Nuppy's new family had always sent us photos and letter from Nuppy having her birthday parties and Christmases... for 5 years... but that last letter was the one I will remember most...

 

I'm sobbing a bit about it now actually... and it's a good thing... because I'm also remembering so many of those amazing moments that a kid and a dog get to share... Nuppy having puppies as she walked down the drive, and me scooping them up and trying to get her to come to her special box I'd made for her to do it in... Nuppy chasing the local rascal gang down the road never to be seen near our place again... Nuppy tracking muddy footprints over the freshly mopped kitchen floor... and all the snuggles and kisses a dog saves for their special human friends...

 

There have been many pets over the years now who have shared part of my life before their own journey changed phase... and I remember each and every one of them full of life and love and silly antics... not those final moments that hurt us all so much.

 

T.

Edited by tdierikx
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Yes, I still remember the sadness of finding out my first "adopted" kitten (stray in Indonesia that became sort of a pet) died when I was 4 or 5, but the pleasure I got from playing with her was greater.

 

We had the delight of (accidental) baby guinea pigs then learnt about desexing pets so we didn't have any more baby guinea pigs, we lost the female GP to a dog attack and nearly lost the male to shock and then pining for his mate until we got him a new friend.

 

We had cat die unexpectedly of illness, we had a cat disappear and we had several pets die of old age as kids. We always saw their bodies and held funerals for them and cried and felt sad and missed them but understood that death is a part of life and learnt that you can move on and that joy you get from living with and loving pets far outweighs the sadness of losing them.

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As a child whose parents never broached the subject of death so I had no idea until my grandmother died and the terrible impact that had on a 7 yr old. I made sure my child learned about this from an early age.  Pets help very much in this respect, the love they give and the grieving process that is normal .

 

So right Simply Grand.

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