Grief can be a complicated emotion — and for some, losing a pet is no different than losing a family member.
August 28 is Rainbow Bridge Remembrance Day, an occasion for pet owners to reflect and remember their four-legged friends who have died.
The day can be hard for some, but a local funeral home, Windsor Chapel, is helping to ease the pain with a memorial service specifically for furry friends.
General manager and funeral director Scott Lockwood says that losing a pet is no different than losing a human loved one.
“For many in our community, their pets, honestly, are more than just beloved companions for many, they become a part of the family,” Lockwood said. “Much like when a beloved family member passes away, we experience grief and we look for ways to honour their memory and memorialize them.”
Lockwood says that pet grief can often be stigmatized compared to human grief, and he hopes that this event helped change the narrative.
“Sometimes, I think, the loss of a pet and the grief that follows, it may not always be acknowledged as much in the same way [as a human loss] but the grief is just as real,” Lockwood said. “So an event like this provides that opportunity where grief is freely and openly welcomed and to recognize that we’re not alone with others.”
Witnessing pet grief common in animal care circles
Brooke Dumouchelle is the manager of behaviour programs at the Windsor Humane Society. She says a key difference between pet and human grief is the individual effect that the loss of a pet has compared to the more collective effect that a human loss might have.
“If a human passes, there tends to be, more often than not, family and friends with everyone grieving the same person, but when it’s a pet, it tends to just be the owners grieving that pet,” Dumouchelle said.
The Windsor Chapel Banwell location is hosting the “Rainbow Bridge Memorial Service” to honour deceased pets. (Justin Escoto)
“Your family and friends might be understanding, but they don’t have that grieving you’re going through.”
For those who work in the animal care industry, witnessing grief can be common.
Dumouchelle says that in her department, she most commonly witnesses pet grief after families decide to choose to surrender or euthanize a pet.
While everyone’s grief is different, she says one of the best ways to help families heal is to let them share memories of their pets.
“Even though our days are busy, we always try to let them take those couple minutes and let them brag about their pets,” she said.
Lockwood says that it’s most important to actively acknowledge grief to help with the healing process.
“We’re not trying to just get over this, we’re not trying just to move past it, but rather we’re to embrace our grief, we’re to travel through it and all that it entails and what that experience looks like,” Lockwood said, noting events like Wednesday’s can help.
Windsor Chapel holds bereavement support groups twice a month, and though the funeral home doesn’t offer pet-specific services, Lockwood says he does have people attend who are dealing with the loss of their furry friends.
