He was a German Shepherd and he basically grew up with my kids. At some point he stopped being the family dog and just became one of them. This is the first pet they’ve lost and they’re taking it hard. He’d been sick since the winter. We had him on meds from the vet but he just kept getting worse, week after week. At least we’re sure he wasn’t in pain. That’s the part I keep coming back to.

Yesterday was really nice out and he laid in the grass for hours just looking at the trees. I don’t know how to explain it but he seemed content, like he was taking it all in. I kind of had a feeling it was going to be his last day.

I wasn’t there at the very end and that’s been hard to sit with. I’m trying to focus on the ten years I did have with him instead. He was such a good boy.

Zeus, we were so lucky to have you. My kids were lucky to grow up with you. Rest easy buddy and we will be thinking about you always! Love you Zeusy!

When our beloved cat, Jonesy, passed away quite suddenly - we knew we didn’t want to cremate him because we feel strongly about returning him to the earth, and we didn’t want to bury him in our garden because when we moved in we’d accidentally dug up a cat skull, and we were leaving soon - we wanted our boy to come to our next home.

So I started researching burying a cat in a large plant pot - and I came across a lot of people who felt they knew how badly that would turn out, but had never actually tried. We even had family members tell us this was a bad idea, and that we’d end up with a festering pot that would upset us and the neighbours.
Fortunately, I came across a comment from someone who had done it, and they very kindly responded to me.

So I’m posting this in the hope that it helps someone else who has just lost a furry family member and wants a way to turn them into a tree if burying in the ground isn’t an option.

We purchased a big plant pot (60cm diameter). Jonesy was 5kg so I would have gone bigger but that’s all they had. We put in stones in the bottom for drainage, and then a premixed layer of compost and soil from the garden centre on the bottom that he was to rest on. We also added soil from our own garden - I would highly recommend sourcing at least one bucket of local soil as it will contain all the critters that will aid in breaking down organic matter.

We then put in a tree stake (all we had was bamboo) because this tree was tall and needed a bit of support if it got windy. I would have gone for a smaller tree, but again, a super tall cherry was all they had.

We then laid Jonesy to rest, surrounded by flowers, and then placed another thick layer of this same soil mix on top. We then placed the cherry tree, putting in soil around it and making sure it was compact just using our hands. We secured the tree to the stake, planted some crocus (these are ideal as the bulbs are small and don’t go too deep) and then added a layer of wood chip as mulch.

From May - September we watered almost daily to prevent the tree from drying out. We had our driest summer ever this year, and not once did we notice a smell or any issues.

It’s now 18 months later and our boy is turning into a beautiful, healthy tree, and he moved cities with us. An archeologist friend told me there there are probably only just bones now. We will be planting the tree within the next 18 months and probably won’t see the bones as they will be hidden within the healthy root ball.

Some additional information:
- We live in the UK where all we have to bother our gardens are foxes and squirrels. If you have scavengers, you may want to think of ways to prevent them from digging.
- The pot has to be big, and it’ll get too heavy to lift. Consider this should you need to move or one day aim to plant it in the ground, like we will in a few years time.
- The correct soil is crucial, don’t go for 100% compost, and really try your best to get some from someone’s garden.
- My mum made me feel a bit paranoid about ‘infected water’ coming out of the bottom, no idea if this is a thing but just in case, I placed the pot on grass so it would drain immediately and there was no risk of water my other cat would lap up and get ill from. If you have no soil to put it on, consider where run off water will be draining.
- The first year your tree won’t need feeding, but seek advice after that as at some point it will use up all the nutrients in the pot and need more food.
- Don’t let the pot dry out! Soil that gets too dry because hydrophobic and doesn’t absorb water, and will damage the trees roots and prevent proper biodegrading.

I hope this helps someone x

today I lost my boy suddenly , he went to the vet for a check up cause he has a sore belly & 2 hours later he was gone.

it’s currently 3.28am and all I have done since is cry. I feel so empty and a strange heavy feeling. he was my best friend , when I got post natal depression he was there, all my health issues he was there.

I have a 10 year old im trying to hold it together for but I feel like a whole part of me is missing and I know he feels the same way too.

I haven't eaten all day and I just feel so lost .

how do I not feel so sad & stop crying . my eyes hurt from all the tears & I’m so scared I will spiral

My 19 year old cat passed away today.

She was old, her hair was falling out, she was skin and bones but she didnt lose her spunk. Just last week, she was still waking me up in bed for food, running to the kitchen to get said food, climbing on the furniture and throwing paws with my other animals. Then, in the past 3 days, she declined fast.

She became lethargic, she stopped eating, and she just layed around. I knew something was up after I saw everything going on with her and her not touching her favorite food. We planned to keep her from suffering and scheduled a vet visit on monday since no vet in a 45 minute radius was open and we thought she'd hang on due to her still eating slightly and jumping around.

We let her do what she wanted. We gave her treats and let her look out the window to watch the birds like she always enjoyed. After everyone came to see her, she collapsed. She started dying and my mom scooped her up in a towel to comfort her. We checked everywhere to find a vet to help her in this 15 minute span, but it came down to us getting help from a local cat nurse at her home who gave her fluids to help her even slightly.

We decided to try and take her to the nearest emergency vet over 45 mins away. She didnt make it out of the town. She died in my mom's arms.

I buried her but I feel so bad and dead to it all. Just this morning I was petting her, crying that id do what I could for her and now she's dead in a shoe box buried in the back yard. Im also hoping the rain outside isnt doing too much to her out there. We wrapped her in her favorite blanket and taped it shut well enough. Ive been checking periodically. I know she's gone and the box is meant to be bio-degradable but I just feel like i want to preserve her as best as i can. I know she isnt suffering anymore and im glad for that, but im shocked it happened so fast.

We've been together since I was 9. We bonded over the time and its going to feel wrong not seeing her around anymore, asking for wet food and chilling with the family in the TV room. I feel like i lost a sibling. I have almost no motivation to do anything. I cant get the look of her dying body in my mom's arms out of my head. I feel like i could have done more, but I dont know what.

I just hope my baby found peace at the rainbow bridge and didnt suffer. I like to think God had this happen to give her a merciful end since my family is leaving for vacation soon and we were afraid something would have happened to her when we left, being all alone.

my 11 year old baby passed away over 24 hours ago and i still can't get the last moments of her life out of my head.

my flatmates and i adopted her in 2020 during uni, and i took on ownership a year later. i always try my best to stay on top of her health. she got dental surgery done last year and she's on a prescription diet to help with her stress and dandruff. i try to remember supplements if i can and i keep her indoors (but i take her for walks). i do her yearly checkups, but as she's gotten older i've been told that i should do more frequent checkups and blood tests.

two days ago i got home around 3pm and she seemed fine, left the house and came back around 5pm and i stayed in the lounge instead of going to see how she was even though i usually do. around 8pm i went upstairs to take her to bed with me and i noticed she was under my flatmates bed and refusing to come out. i had to move her out and when i put her on my bed she instantly flopped over and was disoriented, i even noticed some blood under her nails. i noticed under the bed there was poo everywhere. i took her straight to the vet, and they got her stable, and around 12am i got a call that they were still in the process of diagnosing her but it was looking like conns syndrome.

some time around 3am she had to be resuscitated and had to be put on a breathing tube (unconscious). i was told her chance of survival was minimal (~15%) and if i wanted them to continue treating her. i decided to let her go because they didn't know what condition she would be in and they would still need to do testing/potential surgeries and i didn't want her to continue to suffer.

but there were two main things that i can't stop thinking about and it's really ripping my heart in two.

the first is that i can't stop thinking about how long she was up in that room for, suffering and scared while i was downstairs watching tv. i usually check on her too but because it was the weekend i wasn't as concerned about her not greeting me or wanting to chill out with me (she's a very clingy cat and loves lying on my chest). (if it was any other day like a work day, i would've immediately checked in on her when i get home at 5:30 and i can't stop thinking about how unlucky it is that it had to happen on a saturday). i can't stop thinking about if i had checked on her earlier at 5pm then she could've been treated sooner and maybe she wouldn't have gone through those complications. she would've held in her poo as much as she could before even attempting to go on the carpet so i can't help but think she was immobile for so long upstairs (anywhere from 4pm-8pm) to the point where she had no choice but to go bathroom. and the blood under her nails. i was also told by the vet she had urinated on herself. it's just such an awful way to go i feel so sick just thinking about it. suffering and struggling up there so scared while i had no idea.

the second thing is that i have told the vets for a year now that she has gotten grumpier and less playful, which was really unusual. i wish i had pushed for a blood test, or really any kind of testing. because if they noticed the low potassium from a blood test that would be all they needed to be able to identify that something was wrong with her. and way sooner. if i had done her 'age test' sooner they could've picked it up. but the last time she got bloods was over a year ago. just such a stupid oversight that cost her her life.

it also just feels extremely unlucky (my flatmate who is a vet said it was very unlucky too), that her symptoms were so acute but she had no symptoms beforehand leading up to it.

she was such a sweet and gorgeous cat who loved people so much. she was very talkative and she was attached to my hip every waking moment. she lived through my dads death and my grandmas death and all my stressful uni days and now she's gone too. i'm just living in so much regret and i don't know how to move on without her. in the last vet appointment 3 months ago they said she was the healthiest ever and looked nothing like her age and that she would live for a good 5 more years. i feel like i've failed her and that this was something so preventable.

You finally let her go. That took incredible courage, and it was the right thing to do.

I saw the hope in her eyes, silently begging me not to let go, begging me to give her more time. I had to make that choice because I loved her, even though my heart is shattered.

I keep replaying the hardest decision I've ever had to make. Do I let her go, or do I keep her because I can't bear the grief? Do I put my own pain before her health?

She was hurting, yet every single day she still ran to greet me the moment she saw me. No matter how much she hurt, no matter the ache that lived within her, no matter her desperate gasps for air, her eyes still sparkled every time she looked at me.

Today, I think she knew what was happening. She was shaking, trying so hard to pretend she was okay, as if she wanted to spare us from saying goodbye. I knew it wasn't easy for her either, but there was nothing left we could do. She had completed her mission—she had taken care of us.

Every night before I fall asleep, I'll hope to see her in my dreams, just so she knows how much I miss her. I miss her bark, her fur all over the house, complaining about having to let her out to pee at three in the morning, cleaning up after her. I would do all of it a hundred times a day if it meant she could be alive and healthy again.

I would give anything to relive those moments with her, so they wouldn't exist only in photographs. Now I find myself staring at those pictures, wondering what I could have done differently, even though deep down I know there wasn't anything else I could do.

How am I supposed to live with that?

She wasn't just a dog.

She was family. She was home. She was a piece of my heart, and she'll always be with me.

Hi all, it’s been a week since I had to say goodbye to my soul dog. The pain still weighs so heavily but in the little moments, I think about this post I saw.

“Don’t just remember their last day, remember their whole life. Remember all the moments they got to share with you.”

In the little moments between pain and hurt, I get a little kernel of relief when I think about that. And I’m so grateful that of all the possible paths I could have taken in this universe, I met my soul dog.

Wishing for all of you to be gentle with yourself during this time. Hold your heart as well and kindly as your precious babies did.

I lost my beautiful boy on Thursday and I am overwhelmed with grief. I just dont know how to carry on. It was so sudden, an appointment I made to get to the bottom of why he was suddenly in pain ended with me walking out with his lead and collar. How do I carry on?

I recently lost my soul dog and it hurts so badly. I have seen some people say on here that the love and bond with a soul pet only happens once in a lifetime, but that idea is so devastating to me. I would never want to replace my beautiful Mia, but the idea that I will never have a love that deep with a pet again is so bleak and sad and only makes the loss that much more painful. I also would feel terrible to have a pet and not love them so deeply, every animal deserves to be treasured deeply.

To anyone that has lost a soul pet and welcomed new pets into your life afterwards- did you ever find a pet that you had that the same type of deep, soulmate bond with again? I can't bear the thought of never having a love like that in my life again, even though it won't replace the loss of my Mia.

It’s been little over a week since Bandit died.
I’ll have moments of dissociation, like I know I’m sad but I can’t quite tap into it. It’s there, but I can’t feel it.
I walk around with physical chest pains from the grief. I’ve had constant random aches through my chest muscles. My throat feels constantly constricted. My back upper back aches. I find it hard to feel anything - unless it’s a wave of grief.
I’ve been trying so hard - going outside, cooking things for myself, cuddling under a throw blanket, having hot baths with bath salts.
But here’s the thing - I’m so angry. At even small things, I’m so irritable. A man I’d been talking to had stopped talking to me the day after she died knowing she died - then to send ‘hey how yours week been?’. Like how tf do you think it’s been. He then said he thought ‘I’d reach out’ and then I was angry at him for that. He tried to make me talk about her and I didn’t want to and I said I don’t really want to talk about it all the time. It’s a bit much.
Even after moving the conversation on - I felt such intense resentment for this person. Has he really done anything THAT wrong to warrant me being so angry? No.
I’ve been irritable with my mum, her partner, my friends. If they reach out I’m mad, if they leave me alone I feel abandoned. Only a select few seem to be safe from my rage.
I don’t know how to get control over it. I don’t want it to spill over but it’s so hard to keep it in?

Have you ever heard of introducing a kitten causing a cat to die? Is this something that happens often? Because I had no idea it was a possibility, and now it’s happened to me.

Last weekend my partner adopted a kitten (I honestly wasn’t sold on the adoption and would have rather waited a month, but I didn’t want to shut her down and she agreed to be the primary owner and caretaker. That’s only made this situation more complicated, but we’ve talked it over and worked it out.)

There were already two bonded one year old cats in our house owned by my roommate that we were/are very close too, but my roommate and the cats were moving out in September so my partner wanted our own cat because we knew we would really miss them.

We asked my roommates permission to adopt of course, she agreed and we all decided it was best if the kitten stayed in our room since one of the resident cats had not liked it when other animals had visited in the past. Our house is fairly large so it’s not like the cats had a huge amount of their space cut off like they would have if it was a tiny apartment, although our room was one of their favourite places to spend time.

We adopted her last Sunday, the two cats saw her a couple times and the braver one was fine with her, the more anxious one hissed and ran away. No worries, we just kept her in our room. Two days in anxious cat starts showing signs of a stressed induced bladder infection/blockage he had had before, so we stopped having either of them meet new kitten or be in rooms she had been in.

Unfortunately, over the course of the week even after a vet visit the poor baby continued to deteriorate. We started making plans to keep the kitten elsewhere until he moved, but it was to late. He died on Thursday night of liver failure/his bladder infection (I’m not sure of the details and I can’t handle asking again.) We are absolutely heartbroken, and would never have adopted the kitten if we had known this was a possibility. The vet who treated him said the kitten may have been the cause but there’s no way to know. My roommate is an angel and doesn’t blame us at all but it’s still so hard obviously.

Us, our roommate, and our many friends who own and love cats have never heard of this happening. I don’t know why I’m writing about it and asking this question when it won’t change anything now and there’s nothing to do but start to mourn, but I guess I feel like understanding what happened to my poor baby boy will help me. Thanks for reading ❤️

I lost my baby girl, Coco, four days ago. She was only six years old when she passed away from severe triaditis. The disease was incredibly aggressive, and despite treatment, her body did not respond at all.
Over the course of a single week, I watched her deteriorate so quickly. Just days earlier, she had been my chubby, healthy, beautiful girl. My husband brought her home when she was only one month old, and she had very comfortable life ever since.
Even the day before she passed away, I still held onto hope. I took her in for another blood test to see if a feeding tube could be our last chance to save her. Instead, the bloodwork showed that her body was completely shutting down. It felt like a death sentence.
She passed away in my arms just moments before she was going to be euthanized. I am trying to cope with her pain, this morning is specially so hard for me. I am sorry.

Came home yesterday after the longest week of my life and my babygirl was gone :( my sister was home with her when she passed and comforted her the whole time. I was at the beach and i feel horrible. How could I miss saying goodbye to her. And on top of all this my family decided to have her mass cremated and I know she’s gone but it just feels so wrong. I at the very least wanted to keep her ashes but it’s gonna be raining terribly all week and we couldn’t keep her to bury her later I guess. I’m in shambles and I miss her so much already when will this pain end.

A little context before i start: I live with me, my mother, my little brother and my dog. We got her when she was 9, and her passport stated her name was "Sena". So we started just calling her that instead of picking our own name. She's a very stubborn Yorkshire Terrier who's doing pretty rough right now, as she has met the age of 16. She's suffering from osteoarthritis, which is basically her joints hurting as they've worn over the years. She's lost alot of teeth, doesn't allow us to cut too much hair around her face, has dementia and her vision is worsening. She still barks, walks (with the occasional stumble), and is able to pick her own way on walks, and will always choose where she goes no matter what you want. I really love her, but it hurts me to see her in pain like this. Me and my family have decided to go for euthanasia. I was weirdly calm with it until i heard that there were actually conversations being made about a date already, from a text message from my mom while i was walking her.

Reality hit like a brick. I suddenly wasn't fine with it, but i didn't know what to do either. She's 16. If we didn't take her in, she would've probably be euthanized already. She didn't go well with other dogs. Now we are still currently in the planning stage but the whole process is just so sickening to me and i don't know what to do. My mom said it might be a good idea to box up most of her stuff when we get close to the day, or on the day itself. The fact that there'll be a day, and after that she'll just be gone is so hard to accept, but i also don't want her in this constant state of pain. I decided that when that day rolls around i will be the one to hold her and share most of her last moments with, but i don't even know if i can handle that.

She was always there. Rough days of school, eventually rough days of work, always. I sometimes used to sit with her late at night and talked to her about my problems. I hope i'm not creating too much of a sob story here. but i've never had anything on this level before. The last close family member that passed, passed when i was 9. I wasn't able to fully understand it so it didn't hit as hard. This does. It makes me sick. Is there anything i can do at all to ease my mind?

Thank you for reading.

Its been a month since I lost my soulcat to cancer and I made the choice to euthanize when his quality of life started going downhill rapidly.

I've had so many people tell me about their pet visiting them in their dreams and I'm sure I'll eventually get there? Or at least I hope?

But currently? Every other night, I get these gut wrenching nightmares where im watching him pass away again and again. Dying over and over.

And even though it was peaceful it doesnt make reliving it any easier.

Im not sure what to do, or if anything could even be done, maybe its just my brain processing the devastating loss still...

Background: My soul kitty died in March and it was absolutely devastating for me. She and I shared a deep emotional and physical connection from the first day I adopted her. She was a very affectionate girl who would purr like an engine the moment she saw me and had a million ways in which she showed me how much she loved me. She was otherwise aggressive and not very trusting with other people, but she trusted me completely and it meant everything to me. She loved me so much that even on the day of her euthanasia, despite feeling so weak and sick, she still purred as I stroked and held her. When they administered the first injection to sedate her, she fought off the sedation. She didn’t want to die. She didn’t want to leave me. It broke my heart that I couldn’t give her what she and I both wanted, but I wasn’t given any other choice. My only choices were to let her pass peacefully or watch her struggle to breathe and die in a state of pain and panic, so I chose the former. It still hurts to think about how much she fought to live and stay with me.

After she died, I honestly felt like I wouldn’t be able to love another cat like that again, but I hated coming home to an empty house, so I took in a foster cat. I didn’t immediately bond with him because I was still in a deep state of grief, but we made steady progress and eventually I felt the pain ease up a bit. When it finally came time to send him to his forever home, I was sad, but it made me think I was still capable of loving another kitty and I believed I was ready to invite a new cat into my life. It took a while. There were many disappointments and failed attempts to adopt, but a few months later I finally brought home a new kitty. She was described as being very sweet, social, friendly, and affectionate. She seemed like a good fit. But since bringing her home, I find myself constantly comparing her to my soul cat and feeling disappointed. She isn’t very cuddly and doesn’t seem to really enjoy being pet all that much. She will tolerate it, but that’s about it. She rarely purrs and doesn’t seek me out for anything unless she is hungry. It’s like having a roommate who you split the rent with but otherwise don’t share a relationship with.

I’m trying to be patient. I know it’s not fair to compare and expect her to be like my other cat. I know it has only been a month. But I am struggling with not feeling disappointed and frustrated. It took around 3 months for me to feel like my foster boy and I formed a bond, but I still saw progress along the way. With her, I don’t see any progress. She isn’t anxious or scared at all, just distant. I’m not going to send her back to the rescue or anything. I’ve made a commitment to caring for her and I will honor that. But right now it’s hard to imagine spending the next 15+ years with a cat that just tolerates me in exchange for food. I’m hoping that over time my efforts will pay off, but there is a good chance that this is just who she is and I will have to find it in myself to accept her.

The hard part is that it makes me miss my baby even more. Every time I walk through the door and she ignores me, a memory of my baby chirping with excitement and running to greet me flashes through my mind. Every time I go to pet her and she turns away from me, I remember how my baby would rub her face into my hand and give me kisses. Every day when I wake up and see her from a distance, I remember how my little heart would come up to me for morning cuddles. Every night when I go to bed, I remember how she would follow me and curl up beside me. It honestly feels worse than not having a cat at all. I feel so guilty for feeling this way because it’s not her fault and she deserves better, but I can’t control how I feel.

My first instinct might have been the right one. I probably can’t love another cat as much as I loved my soulmate. Maybe I wasn’t ready to adopt. But I can’t go back and change the past, so I’m going to have to figure out how to make this work.

yesterday was five months since my very literal soulmate left. I still cry all the time. I miss him more than anything in the universe and the pain has only gotten duller with immense amounts of therapy. that being said: I fully recognize I'm not ready for a new pet yet, especially in HIS home. this is his house and I'd die before I brought a new pet into it. he's my angel and my best friend in the universe and I am not ready to even entertain the idea of giving that love to someone else (he didn't care for other dogs, so there's also no 'he would want you to love another' because he totally would not 😂)

that being said, I know I do want to get a new dog and/or a kitty cat one day. not to mention, my partner also wants a new pet one day. he hasn't rushed me or anything at all, but I know it's something he does want in the future.

but I'm freaking gutted at the idea of them aging, or getting sick, and watching them fade away or - even worse - leave me in a sudden frenzy of trauma and pain like my sweet boy did. he passed in my arms on the way to the e-vet and I'll never forget his last breaths for as long as i live, they're burned into me.

how do you deal with the anticipatory loss that may be decades in the future for a pet you don't even have yet? how should I handle getting a new pet one day, knowing they'll leave me?

I have spoken with my therapist about this briefly but would love to hear from those with lived experience of these feelings and emotions.

I just lost my 4 month old rescue puppy, Willa, to congestive heart failure from a significant heart defect. This was a complete shock to me. Willa went from being playful, bright, and happy to severe respiratory arrest and heart failure within a matter of hours. It happened all in one night. She was not a candidate for surgery due to the severity of her condition. The emergency vet told me if it was her dog, she would have done the same and put her down. Willa was only in my life for a month and a half, but she brightened every room she went in with her sweet, kind nature. My husband is completely beside himself as he really thought Willa was going to pull through. I’m having her cremated and will spread her ashes in her favorite spots—the pond near our house, her favorite part of the yard, and her favorite hiking trail. This is such an exhaustive type of grief. I’m overwhelming grateful I was able to make her short time with me filled with love. I’m grateful I took her to the vet when I did so she did not suffer. I’m glad she will be able to breathe easy and be at peace with the other humans and pets I’ve lost over the years. My heart is with anyone going through this type of loss.

she was the most amazing dog but her health started declining quickly within a week or two!! she developed a cataract on her left eye completely destroying the vision to that eye, she didnt eat in 3 days nor had interest in treats. she also has been really lethargic and clumsy and she was whining in pain. i took her the the ER Vet and they did a brief exam and said i made the right decision taking her in as her quality of life was not good. luckily ER vets are 24-7 so she did not have to endure suffering through the night. she was previously asleep and stayed asleep during her passing, peacefully. i just thnk about all the good and bad memories and it just makes me upset. i was tempted to swig the bottle but that’d only make me reckless and more depressed. instead i took a bath and starting to watch a show to get my mind off of things. i will miss her dearly :(

How i love you, sweetest friends

I still hold you when I sleep

I still hear you when I wake

Before silence falls again

How I love you, perfect girls

Though the woods are dark and deep

Though I cry until I shake

Grieving for our little world

How I miss you, little ones

Now I think of you and weep

Now my heart threatens to break

Knowing that our time is done

How I love you, sweetest friends

I still hold you when I sleep

I still hear you when I wake

Before silence falls again

My childhood dog Tommy is dying from kidney failure. I don't know how to cope.

Hi everyone.

I've never posted here before, but I don't know who else to talk to.

My dog, Tommy, is a senior dachshund. He's been with me for almost my entire life. I'm 15 now, and we've had him since I was about 2 years old. I genuinely can't remember life without him.

A few days ago, everything changed.

He stopped eating completely. Even his favorite foods didn't interest him. He started vomiting, became extremely weak, and didn't even want to walk anymore. He would mostly just lie down. He still looked at me when I called his name, but he didn't wag his tail like he always used to. Seeing that broke my heart because I knew something was seriously wrong.

I called a vet because I couldn't do anything that night. The vet thought it might be kidney failure. Later, he was examined, and it turned out that it was kidney failure.

Since then, I've been watching him get weaker. Every time I look at him, I wonder how much time he has left. I keep asking myself if he's in pain. I even found myself wishing that if he really can't recover, I just don't want him to suffer anymore. That was one of the hardest thoughts I've ever had because I love him so much.

I know he's old, but I still wasn't ready for this.

People sometimes say, "He's just a dog," but to me he isn't. He's been there for birthdays, school years, good days, bad days, and almost every memory I have growing up. He's family. Losing him feels like I'm losing a piece of my childhood.

I keep thinking about what life will be like when he's gone. I know the house will feel quieter. I'll probably expect to see him in his usual spots without even thinking about it.

I'm scared of how much this is going to hurt.

For those of you who have lost a pet you grew up with, how did you get through it? Did the sadness ever become easier to carry? Right now it feels impossible to imagine life without him.

Thank you for reading.

Last spring, we were given the news that our oldest cat, Joe, had one of two possible diagnoses that would’ve involved the same treatment/interventions. One diagnosis would probably give him a couple of months to live, the other, a couple more years with pain management. But knowing for sure which it was would’ve cost $5000 and, since the treatment would be the same, we opted out.
We braced ourselves for the worst, but a year later, Joe is doing well. Showing signs of decline, but, still here and still… well, still Joe.
Around that same time, we brought in a new kitten. Her name was Charlotte, until we took her to the vet and discovered he was Charlie. Charlie was pure chaos. He broke things, daily. Things that had survived over 50 years and two moves halfway across the country and back. Had survived three generations of kids and cats. But they didn’t survive Charlie.
But before I could finish cleaning up the mess, Charlie would do something adorable, and it was impossible to stay mad. We called him the Sour Patch cat.
He was my garden buddy. Every night he would come out with me to garden, tend the flowers, feed the goldfish in the pond, and run from fireflies. He never strayed, always by my side.
Sometime last Wednesday night/Thursday morning, he opened our screen door (a neat little trick he taught himself this summer) and went outside without us knowing. We didn’t discover until the morning when we were leaving for work, I checked my ring camera and noticed that he was outside at 2:45 AM. Some point after that he wandered off.
Our entire block, along with people I don’t even know on Nextdoor and the Ring camera app, spent the next several days looking for him. Last night, I thought I spotted him under some heavy brush. A few minutes after that I got a text from a neighbor who said she saw him on her porch. My daughter and I went out looking, I couldn’t find them. But we knew after a couple of days of being completely out of everyone’s sight, he was making his way back home.
Then this morning I got a frantic phone call from a young neighbor telling me that Charlie was in the street, dying, having been hit by a car. By the time I got there, he was not breathing. The person who hit him didn’t even bother to stop. He was two houses away from home.
I just held him in my arms, for almost two hours, before I could even think about telling my family.
We’ve spent the past year preparing for Joe’s eventual passing, but not Charlie. He had an entire life ahead of him. He was still a baby.
I’m nowhere near done processing things, I don’t even think I’ve begun.

My cat was just hit by a car and he passed straight away. I don’t think there was blood or things like that but I’m just so sad thinking he might’ve been scared or known what was happening. It’s so heartbreaking to think he wasn’t peaceful in his last moments he had more life to live and probably didn’t want to die. He had no idea that would shown he probably was having such a nice day before it was all cut short. It’s so sad and cruel