Grieving Your Animal Pal With Agency

Recently one of the dogs I followed on Twitter passed away. Her passing brought on a new wave of grieve for my now angel dog Max.

As Martin Prechtel writes in his excellent book The Smell of Rain on Dust: Grief and Praise:

“Grief is the sound of being alive.”

This quote inspires me, because I hear the promise of individual agency in there. To me, agency in grief is having the freedom to experience grief as the grief and I need to experience each other.

I am not a therapist or counselor, what I’m sharing with you today is personal and intimate, some ways grief has appeared to me throughout the years. This sharing is not meant as advice or to present professional help.

There’s not a time frame to grief, but in my own life I give it about a year with each animal. Why? Because each holiday, each change of season, each day is the first day without my animal pal until the 1 year anniversary has been reached.

Sometimes…..

…..grief is suddenly remembering that animal is not in the house

…..grief comes in a dream as you are able to meet it

……grief gently taps you on the shoulder when you remember you don’t need to schedule a wellness check

…..grief is disguised as mindlessly scrolling through an animal’s social media account because they remind you of your angel animal.

Our society encourages us to hunker down, grieve by ourselves and to hurry it along, yet grief is not to be done alone.

You and your grief need the support of a community who “gets it” and is able to hold space for you when you can’t. If you feel your grief is above and beyond what you can handle, it’s OK to reach out to grief professionals in your area.

Here’s an invitation for you to join me on this path of true kinship with animals. My work is devoted to helping you show up in the world for animals from the fullness of your authentic self. I hope this encourages you to look at your relationship with animals differently so that a new place of understanding begins to open for you.

Janet Roper is an animist, podcaster, intuitive practitioner, non-traditional animal communicator, mentor and educator and for 20+ years has helped people restructure their relationship with animals. Two of her most popular resources are her monthly newsletter and her 5 email introductory series to her signature program Deepen. Visit her website and give her podcast True Kinship With Animals a listen.