I know the grief. Not just for our own beloved pets we spent years living alongside with, but I feel the grief for when our friends pet goes to dog heaven.
Today is one such day.
We hadn’t seen each other for a couple months and for some reason I texted my friend if she wanted to come by today to have a cuppa, even though the house was in disarray and I looked bleah!
Two hours later she texted she’s at the vet with her dog Ollie.
She asked if he could be buried on our property near our dog he was playmates with.
I write oh no, what’s happening! Of course he can…(since I call my back yard pet cemetery)
She then write he has gone to heaven.
She did come by and I was in tears also. I loved Ollie since he was a pup  and he loved me! Better than her other friends I’m secretly pleased to say!

I also thought of another friend up in Qld that recently lost his little mate and I was on the phone for ages talking about his dog.

We can all console each other in times of grief, vulnerability, and I take that as an honour to be trusted as a sensitive time.

Just a little humour … I was at a funeral for an elderly neighbour (in her 90s) and outside after, I was talking to the funeral director and assistant as he recently had his dad pass away whom I just loved as an awesome dad figure.
Anyway, I happened to blurt out without thinking much of it, that my mum passed, my brother passed and our dog passed… and I cried more for the dog than I did for any human!
And oh boy…. did they burst out laughing! And knew exactly what I meant!
Then their dog stories started!
Such an honour to open up easily about that kind of kindred grief for pets.

Anyway, it’s a dismal day that matches the grief. I will call in on my friend in a few days and take her out for a bit, I’m going to make a special little photo book for her about Ollie.

About a week after a friend's dog died, I was dozing away in bed. I felt the sensation of something jumping up on my bed, sniff and lick my hand. Then it jumped down and leave the room. I think I slowly woke up wondering what had happened. I put it down to having a dream of the ghost of the dog that died.

They do become your best friend. My Daughters dog follows me around all day. He is seldom more than 5 foot away from me. When we lost the previous dog I was looking around expecting him to be there for weeks after.

Dnarever wrote on Aug 26^th, 2026 at 12:30pm:


We had a cat (was daughter’s cat) living with us same time I was looking after my son’s dog in final months.
When the dog had to be put down (I’m still grieving to this day I miss him so much) the cat, was looking for him, she had this cranky look in her face then finally sat on his mat, sniffing, looking, then meowed something like “where are you!”
I could feel and sense all this. She went all sad for quite some time.
I was devastated when she passed away from cancer age 18.
Bless these beautiful souls. I dearly miss them.
I decided no more pets, it’s too heart breaking, then I get sad for my friend’s pets as I bond with them also.

Sophia wrote on Aug 27^th, 2026 at 10:21am:


I think I gave this story before. When our cat had it's kidneys failing, we had to take her to the vet to see if we could do anything for her. At the cat's age of 20, the vet just suggested having the cat euthanised, to end her suffering.

This was our last cat that had been in the family since before I was born. Our pet dog had been in our family for about 9 years and had finally been able to bond with the cat, after saving her from a neighbouring cat. A few days after we had the cat put down, our dog went for an extensive search of the house and yard looking for the cat. It came down to me to explain that the cat had passed away. I tried whatever I could to explain that the cat had passed away to a dog. This worried look appeared on the dog's face and then he started whimpering. I swear he made the sound "oh-no-no-no-whoah-whoah" and then burst into tears. After he cried for 20 seconds, he changed his demeanour and looked at me and started growling and barking. Either I was too blunt in my delivery of the news, or he thought that I had something to do with the cat's death. Mum and Dad had to come out and console the dog. Then they reprimanded me for telling the dog about what happened.

It was another 2 years before Dad found a kitten at his workplace and decided to adopt it. After the kitten had recovered sufficiently, the dog got to meet the kitten. He was in total adoration and basically became the surrogate father.

After having looked after the kitten in his own way, our pet dog finally succumbed to his heart condition. The kitten, having grown into a juvenile, mourned the loss of her "dad".