I HAVE TO SAY…

TW: death of a pet

So, our family dog died a few weeks ago. We’ve had her since I was in middle school, over a decade ago. My daughter has known her since she was born. And while Sweetie, our dog, annoyed me at times, she was family and my daughter loved her.

Explaining death to a 3 year old was something I was unsure of how to do. I wasn’t sure if she would notice, and she didn’t for a while, but it was important for her to know. After a few days of processing myself and googling approaches, I decided I wanted to be honest.

I told her Sweetie was gone because she passed away and we don’t have her anymore. She took it better than I was expecting, even after I checked with her to make sure she understood.

A few nights ago, she said she wanted to talk to Sweetie. That she missed her and she wanted a dog. It seemed she also needed time to process. My heart broke, because I obviously can’t bring Sweetie back. I don’t know if we will get a new dog because we live with my family; I’m not sure how my household feels about that yet.

In the few days since, she still casually mentions Sweetie, more than she did the week I told her. Like there was water on the floor from ice melting and she said Sweetie peed (which Sweetie was doing more often in the house before she died). I know her reaction is normal and I just have to remind her that Sweetie isn’t here anymore. Still, each time I recognize that she misses her and I feel powerless, because even if we get a new dog, it won’t be Sweetie.

Meanwhile, we’re still waiting on getting Sweetie’s ashes back. I believe the plan was to have all five of us sprinkle her ashes in the backyard or something. My daughter’s been watching Dug Days on Disney+ and now that I think about it, she’s been clinging more to her blue dog stuffed animal that she calls Puppy. I wonder if that’s a part of how she’s coping.

Anyway, I’m not sharing for advice, but 1) to journal my thoughts in a way and 2) to say some parts of parenting make you recognize how little control you have over things.

Life and death are natural occurrences. So much is out of our control, including our children to a certain extent but that’s a different conversation, and it’s our job to help our children navigate through the motions. Knowing this doesn’t make it easy though. Sometimes the reality of it causes my heart to ache, even though I know she’ll be okay.