Die Trauer über den Tod eines Haustiers kann genauso groß sein wie die Trauer über den Tod eines Familienmitglieds. Ungefähr ein Fünftel der Menschen, die den Verlust eines Haustiers oder eines Menschen erlitten hatten, gaben an, dass Ersteres schlimmer sei. Die Symptome schwerer Trauer bei einem Haustier waren identisch mit denen bei einem Menschen, und es gab keinen Unterschied darin, wie Menschen Verluste erlebten.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2026/jan/15/grief-pet-death-family-member-survey
26 Kommentare
I love the studies that confirm what we already knew to be true.
Lots of people consider them family
I’ll never forget a cold and callous manager berating me in a team meeting because I took off 3 days after my beloved dog of 13 years passed. I quit on the spot and walked out.
For some people, a pet will be the most stable and longest lasting relationship they’ll have.
Grief is the price of love.
It’s because we „humanize“ pets: rats, dogs, cats and other animals who feel empathy for us, understand or make us think they understand us even though „they’re just animals“ (add fish and turtles for kids. I feel less grief for them now than when i was a kid). It’s like that Terry Davis quote about bird that makes the best it can do and we tend to root for those who aren’t completely understand the world and yet they do those cognition things like cats guarding human infants in their cribs. That’s why we love elephants or, let’s say, orangutans.
And humans are often opposite: we’re considered smartest and yet we have tiktok challenges and do other stupid things that don’t make us feel empathy. It’s obvious
Roman Epitaph:
“My eyes were wet with tears, our little dog, when I bore thee (to the grave)… So, Patricus, never again shall thou give me a thousand kisses. Never canst thou be contentedly in my lap. In sadness have I buried thee, and thou deservist. In a resting place of marble, I have put thee for all time by the side of my shade. In thy qualities, sagacious thou wert like a human being. Ah, me! What a loved companion have we lost!”
The pain of losing my pet rat when I was young was so painful that I can’t bring myself to own pets today. He was so smart and loving…
I’ve experienced the loss of family members and friends. But I just lost my dog the day after xmas, and its been the hardest grief I have ever dealt with.
It’s been over ten years since the dog we had growing up passed and I still get a little misty-eyed when I see a dog that looks like her. The day I held her while the vet put her to sleep was one of the worst of my life.
I’be had to put several pets to sleep over the years. I’m always there with them until the end. My wife can’t handle the emotions, but I feel like I must be with them until they are no longer there. I will stare into their eyes and tell them I love them. I’ll hold them in my arms until they expire. It hurts so much, but it’s necessary, important. I cry like a toddler when it happens. Their death is very intimate.
Contrast that with the death of a friend or both of my parents. Those hurt alot, but were less intimate. I’ve shed tears, but nowhere near as much, or as intense, as I have over a pet companion that had been a source of daily joy every day for over a decade.
Love Zoey, you will always be remembered, even only being with us for 15 days. Taking care of you was a blessing, we fought so much for you to live, but we know that you came to our house so we could take care of you in your last days on earth. <3
Does anyone else feel pretty hollow because of this? I always felt like people love animals much more then humans. It breaks my heart. And of this study confirms grief for a pet is stronger then for humans, it just kind of prooves this feeling of mine.
This really scares me. Obviosly bond with pets is incredibly important and strong, but knowing my own family would mourn the cat or dog more then each other, really makes human connections shallow.
Does anyone have similar feelings?
I had my soul cat for 19 years. I adopted her when I was 9 years old. When she passed in my arms, I was inconsolable for weeks. It’s been a year since she passed and I still think of her everyday. Yeah, I agree with this research 100%.
This study goes a long way to proving what many pet owners already know.
What many people don’t understand, is that how much we love something is unaffected by what species that thing is.
One person can pour an equal amount of love into a pet, as another does a person. My cat doesn’t decide how I feel about it, and neither do my children about them. For most people, they don’t even consciously decide it for themselves.
Judgement from others over the death of a pet is improving, compared to what it was 30+ years ago. I think a lot of that is because people are less afraid to show that they are actually grieving, and will stand up to those who mock them.
Hopefully, we see more studies like this.
Grief is one of the best ‚opportunities‘ to see who around you needs an empathy boost.
9/10 of the times when someone is grieving, there will be people who immediately try to downplay it. „Oh, come on, don’t be sad, it’s just a cat! You’ll get another! It could be so much worse, *I* lost my mother/grandfather/etc when I was just X years old!“. They think they are being helpful, that they are doing their part, but essentially they just want to make it about them. Pet grief draws this kind of behavior the most out of any kind, but it happens in other cases as well. I recently lost my grandfather and I had people constantly telling me that I should not cry, he died painlessly, he lived a full life to 90. Never mind that we were really close and I’ll never get to see him again, I guess I should wipe the tears and throw a party.
Grief is a very personal emotion, and you are allowed to feel it for anyone you were close to, including pets – and even abstract concepts. If you feel it, you feel it, and telling someone *not to feel it* just because you have some kind of rational explanation is a very dumb & self-centered thing to do. Just because someone’s parents died tragically in a car crash when they were 5 doesn’t mean I’m not allowed to cry when my cat dies of natural causes.
Some things need to be more common sense, but glad there’s research backing it.
For most people you may lost someone close to you that you spoke with a lot, maybe even saw most days. When it’s a pet, it’s someone who’s been by your side 90% + of their life and 90% of your time with them in it.
It’s such a close connection that it’s on par with immediate family, cuz they are.
This makes a lot of sense. Humans will bond with anything, and our emotions don’t distinguish between human and not human. A pet is an animal like us and just like with humans we can love them and bond with them and share memories and experiences with them, and they love us back too. A lot of people like to discredit pets as not being real family members, but they mark all the boxes. I personally don’t think a relationship with an intelligent animal is any less valid than one with a human. That love you feel is real. And the grief that comes with it is too. Humans can grieve ANY emotional loss, regardless of what it is, and animals are no exception by any means.
When my cat died in 2019 I needed a week before I stopped crying. My grandmother, who died around the same time „only“ made me cry for a day, and I loved my grandmother. But my cat was my friend who was always there for me, and helped me (emotionally) through very hard times (aggressive cancer diagnosis, for one), more than any human could for me at the time.
I still miss you, Oscar :`(
I’ve experienced both at a young age and I can guarantee you they both suck
I lost two dogs in one year, both of whom I loved so much. Easily amongst the hardest years of my life and I still think of both of them constantly.
Reading this exactly one month after loosing my cat. Hurts every day.
„As for a family member“
Uh… they ARE a family member….
It’s always funny when people writing this stuff fail to see this. Are adopted human children Pets? Or are they family members? You don’t need to literally be birthed by a person to be family
That’s definitely the case for me, I mean it was 20 years of constant companionship
Lost mine 11 days ago. Very difficult. 15 year old Staffordshire Bull Terrier.
I wonder if the fact that they’re so dependent on you is a factor, you feel a complete responsibility to take care of them. When a relative that you don’t take care of and aren’t responsible dies you feel sad, of course, but you don’t feel the same level of responsibility for their life or death (even if it’s natural and unavoidable). I wouldn’t compare dependent children to pets, but I wonder if that’s also a factor in why a child’s death hits so hard too.
10 years to grieve my Dalmatian. She was 17. Had her since a pup. She was my very best friend and confidant. I did not realize how hard it would be or that it would change who I was in the process. In contrast, it’s taken 2 years to grieve my brother. Can’t explain why, but the dog was so much worse.