How Do We Tell The Children?

Oh Jack, 

I am terribly worried about how my children will deal with our dog Eddie's death. I'm concerned with how they will cope with it. My eldest is 7 and my youngest is 4. They both saw our Eddie's body before we buried him, so they both got to say goodbye to him. Later I read them the story of Rainbow Bridge, and they talk about it quite a lot. I think it has helped them come to terms with losing him. In fact, in some ways they seem to be coping better than I am. 

Love, Lydia

Dearest Lydia, 

Believe it or not, in the scheme of things, this is actually a great experience for your children. The people who have not experienced death directly when they were younger can be quite disabled when it happens when they are older.  It will not be long and you will see that you will all be better for having known and loved and "lost" Eddie! Eddie is giving your kids the tools they need to start building their ability to handle grief and loss in the future. It is an important tool to have in a world that brings loss the longer one lives.  

I am happy to report that most children have plenty of diversions and are endowed with a great "imagination"(well, you think it's their imagination, the "fantasy world" they seem to live in, but it's just the  memory they still retain of the world they knew before they came here).  Your kids are still young and the fact that this situation has been incorporated into the fabric of their childhood will be a positive thing for them. You handled the situation with sensitivity and care. You have done everything right.  

When human beings are born, they enter the world like us dogs do, We still have the memory of where we come from and where it's all leading (this life just teaches us and then takes us back to where we came from). Unfortunately, like us dogs, our babies cannot speak of it because they don't have language skills to do so (although many of them  cry cry cry because the world they have come from is so much sweeter and softer and more comfortable than the one they have been born into! The terrible twos, by the way, are just the final letting go as they realize that they will be staying here on earth for awhile and That's That!). 

Pets, as they grow, learn the rules from their master/owner/best friend. Children, as they grow, learn by copying the adults in their lives. Their parents and other family members and close friends are their role models. When your heart is pained because you see your young child crying, please keep this in mind. Often the underlying reason for the tears is that your child sees the adults crying and he is learning that this is the appropriate response to losing someone you love. It is more likely that he is copying or mimicking you than actually feeling the pain that causes tears.  He is learning the ropes of living life from you. The only way he knows how to live is to copy how you live.  Grieving aside, consider this in all that you do. The children are watching you all the time so that when they grow up to live their own lives they will know how to do it. 

Children can be much more resilient than adults. As time passes, however, the babies turn into toddlers, turn into children, and ultimately become adults. As they develop they get caught up in the learning of How Things Are Done Here On Earth.  This is why some of them have a very hard time in their teenage years. They still have a distant memory of the Way Things Are and yet the world around them drills into them, "No. That's not the way things work. You do it this way, not that way." They learn so much everywhere they turn -- at home--at school -- at work --- that they eventually incorporate the way they have been taught to live and they forget most of what they knew before they came here. This is why the concept of "death" is much harder to grasp when we are adults. We can't remember that Everything Is Okay, even death. The younger the child is, the more likely they are to know that their pet who has passed will be just fine. They still know that this life is just a dream. They haven’t forgotten this yet.

This planet earth is just a small part of the universal existence of life.  When our pets leave, they are returned to Paradise, Heaven, the Rainbow, ether, other plane,.. It doesn't matter what you call it; it's all the same thing. The children know this. Do not worry so about them and take care of yourselves. Let the children teach you what you need to remember.

"And a little child shall lead them." Isaiah 11:6

Love, Jack

Guilt and Shame: Stuck in the Muck

So many of you feel so guilty for "letting us down". You did not let us down.  

Kate was working with a client who was being admitted to a nursing facility. The day the family brought in their elderly mother for care was a hectic one. The woman was not safe at home and the family made the decision to have the staff at a nursing home watch her 24/7.  They thought they were doing the right thing -- and from a planning perspective, they were!  

Everyone was gathered around the nursing station, shaking and hands and making introductions. The woman was sitting in the group in a wheelchair while all this was happening. As the family was giving the nurse specific admission information, CRASH!  Down went the lady onto the tile floor! Rushed immediately to the hospital, she had broken her hip.  Even in a facility designed for prevention, accidents can happen.  It took one split second.

Look at how much guilt can occur in this situation.  Kate - for making the recommendation for a plan of "prevention".  The family for "abandoning"(this is a whole other post some day) their loved one. The staff for "allowing" it to happen. Perhaps with all this cycle of guilt the lady herself might have felt guilty for falling and creating all this guilt!  What we do, TO OURSELVES.

We can find reasons to feel guilty everywhere but it doesn't help anything. Things will be what they will be and the only thing we can do is manage our attitude and our response to what happens to us. If you continue to feel guilt and shame, it will create a wall between you and the one you love. Your guilt will leech out and taint the way you see yourself and everything around you. 

Guilt is not real, it is an illusion and it lives only in your own mind. If we meet someone else who embraces guilt too, then the game begins... you only weaken each other, trying to place the blame for your pain on someone else. It actually works for a little while! You can even play the Guilt Game with yourself.  The innocent pure part of you points the finger at the part of you that you judge to be BAD, guilty, wrong, selfish. It may sound strange, but you can actually create a "relationship" with another part of yourself. Then you focus on that instead of on the pure part of YOU. 

It is defense mechanism, guilt. It feels easier to be angry and point the blame than to feel the incredible undiluted sadness of loss. It may feel easier to point a finger, but it keeps you in Denial and delays your healing. As long as you are looking at someone else, you are not looking at yourself. If you are not looking at yourself, you cannot heal your pain.  

We can be destroyed by guilt and shame, but we are all healed by LOVE. Once you center yourself and see things more clearly, you can finally begin to heal. Instead of looking at Who's to Blame, focus on the love and focus on the fact that you did the very best you could under the circumstances.

Guilt Runs Rampant

DO YOU HAVE FEELINGS OF GUILT? YOU ARE NOT ALONE. Kate suffers from it too. In fact, most human beings do! She posted this on my support group page and it generated quite a bit of dialogue and thought:

"I keep seeing the guilt that keeps running amuck in our lives. I experienced some more of it today.  We all LOVE LOVE LOVE-ed our best friends. I loved Jack more than I loved myself! I put his needs before mine (except for my having to go to work to pay for the things we needed...and I felt guilty about that too).  He ate better than I did! Now that I have Immy and Joey, we are walking many miles each day -- morning, noon and nighttime too.  It is more than I ever walked with Jack. Today we were out on our two mile morning walk and I found myself crying again.  "Maybe," I said, "just maybe if I had walked Jack more, he'd still be here." 

We cannot beat ourselves up. I have to tell myself that if he were alive today, he might have to endure a worse fate -- like becoming old and crippled into his senior years. He never had the chance. Instead of declining for months and years, he went with dignity in a matter of days. 

Someday I hope I can look back on this -- after I have completely healed -- and know that it was perfect and By Design. We can only do what we can do."

~ Kate

"Control The Wild Horse of Your Mind"

I know it doesn't seem this way, but pain and suffering are the choices we make. We feel victimized by our loss. We feel out of control. When we finally begin to heal, we can choose a better thought. We know what it is like to watch our best friend suffer. Your best friend does not want to watch you suffer either. 

How To Find Me

Don't try to look too far for me. 

When you try too hard, you cannot see. 

On earth I was always at your feet. 

It would have done no good for you

to look around the town for me. 

I am not there. I am with you. 

I am here. 

Do Dogs Feel Guilty Too?

Would you forgive this guy for not being perfect?? 

Kate and Joey and Immy were out walking today and they crossed paths with a older couple walking a corgi mix. They said Hi and the other dog's only response was to snarl and growl, lunging and straining at the leash, barking his head off at them.  

"He's been like that since we rescued him six years ago," they said matter-of-factly. "There seems to be no cure. He just doesn't like anybody!"  They added, "We love him anyway. We'll always love him no matter what."  

Their dog does not feel guilty about his behavior. He doesn't care if he's not perfect. He is what he is. He knows that they love him, they know that he loves them to the extent he can love, and that is enough. Please don't keep revisiting your past behavior and and finding more guilt and shame there. Guilt and shame exist only in your mind. Your pets love you despite everything and, like these human owners, they don't think twice.  It's just the way it is. Unconditional love wins. Let it win the battle over guilt and shame.  Let it in. Let love win. 

Letter to Jack: We All Have Something to Offer

"A dog can wag its tail but a dog needs more than that. Just like a person needs a purpose, a dog needs a purpose too. We don't feel good when we are just taking up space."  

(from Jack McAfghan: Reflections on Life with my Master")

Dear Jack: 

That is how my Dad feels right now. He is older now and he has been so used to being productive that it's hard for him to be so limited. I try to think of projects he can help me with. 

Ann

Dear Ann: 

You make a very important point. 

A lot of what applies to us, applies to people too.  We are, each one of us, loaded with vast potential.  We were each brought into this world to serve a unique purpose. People should really think about this before they harm, abuse or abandon someone, two legged or four legged. Each of us has a gift and every one of us should be honored, respected and appreciated for what we have to offer. 

If we don't or can't fulfill our purpose, we feel an emptiness inside that nothing else can ease. Please keep trying to create opportunities for success in your father's routine. Please tell him we love him, that always helps. We love you too. 

Jack