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Dealing with loss and dealing with guilt, are they the same or different.


Gary55

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A question I've been thinking about, I hope its OK to ask. I've read so much about the feeling when our fur babies die. We have to deal with them not being in our lives now, they may have been through so much with us. They are innocent and loving and it's so hard. On so many occasions also we have to suffer with guilt, real or imagined. All the what ifs etc. It's almost 8 weeks since my boy Goldie passed, and apart from missing him I've agonised over the what ifs. I didn't mistreat him, it's more that I left him on certain days or think that I didn't pay enough attention to him. The point of my question is, is guilt felt automatically, or perhaps would it be easier if we accept we are not guilty. Much of the pet loss I've read about all feel guilt. We kinda know that their lives are short, but in so many ways it all comes down to the last minutes, hours or days, as guilt does not let us think of the good times. Does it have to be like this, can loss and guilt be separated, must they go together, and does the it make any difference to the grieving process. Sorry if all this is not clear, but id be interested in any thoughts. 

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I'm afraid guilt and regret are one of the hazards of grief.  What you are talking about is what most of us experience, things we'd do differently if we'd only known, but what we have to realize is we ALL get caught up in day to day life and HAVE to do other things, HAVE to leave them at times, and aren't perfect beings, but we're damned good pet owners, we just need to give ourselves credit for all the things we did RIGHT!  We didn't leave them tied up in the mud and pay no attention to them.  Some owners do, they aren't the ones who come here, they are the ones whose animals get taken away from them (hopefully).  Have you read these articles?

http://media.wix.com/ugd/0dd4a5_e934e7f92d104d31bcb334d6c6d63974.pdf
https://www.pet-loss.net/guilt.shtml
http://www.griefhealing.com/article-loss-and-the-burden-of-guilt.htm
https://www.griefhealingblog.com/2019/08/pet-loss-when-guilt-overshadows-grief.html
https://www.griefhealingblog.com/2017/07/pet-loss-when-guilt-goes-unresolved.html

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Thanks KayC for your reply. These are very helpful articles, thank you so much. You are right in what you say, we clearly are good pet parents or we wouldn't be here. Also we do get caught up in things. I do tend to forget anything I did right, I must have done something right at some point. Thanks I appreciate your wise words. 

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