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Family pet passing....

Sharone - posted on 02/05/2009 ( 4 moms have responded )

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Hello all! My husband and I are getting really close to putting our beloved dog down. She is 14, has bad hips cant go up or down stairs, cant get away from our 3 year old and 19 month old quick enough, and unfortunetly, we decided on having her put down, sad. :-( My question is, what and how do you explain that to a 3 year old? I know my 19 month old wont understand whats going on, but both kids will definetly know when our dog is gone. My husband and I have different opinions on this also, I think the kids should say good-bye to the dog before we put her down, my husband thinks it will be too tramautizing if they did before hand and thinks we should just take her to the vet. I'm torn as to how and what to say to my kids. Any suggestionseas/tips would be great.

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Rhionna - posted on 07/09/2010

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We lost our cat when Jon was 3, we told him how poorly our cat was and that he was hurting a lot. We let him say goodbye. He knew the vet was going to give him an injection to make him go to sleep forever and that he wouldn't be in pain anymore. We brought home his body and Jon helped to dig a hole to bury him, we told him it was just like an empty shell. It was really sad, but we talk about him all the time and sometimes Jon talks to the headstone where he was buried. We have other cats, but Grissom was always so good with the kids.

Jaymie - posted on 02/12/2009

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I think it would be nice for them to say good-bye even thought they probalby won't understand why?



It won't be traumatizing for them as they won't understand...they'll just wonder where their dog went. Maybe take a picture of him with them and put it on your fridge so they'll remember him :)

Sharone - posted on 02/10/2009

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Hi Meredith! Thank you so much for taking the time to respond. I agree with you that the kids would not understand the gravity of the pet passing away. Ugh! I just wish we didnt have to do this in the first place, but thank you for the advise!!

Meredith - posted on 02/08/2009

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I am sorry to hear about your beloved pet. We lost our dog, Hershey, on this past Christmas day. He went on his own, so we did not have a choice about saying goodbye. If we did have a choice then I would not tell our daughter beforehand. I don't think she would understand the gravity of the situation.



Once it was time to tell our daughter, we said that Hershey could only stay with us for awhile and it was time for him to go and live with other dogs. We told her that we would miss Hershey very much but that he is happy. She did not question this and really has not asked questions about where he is.

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