This is me with a special bunny who is owned by and lives (in the house) with a woman who runs a bunny rescue organization. He has already lived 9 years since she rescued him. He is more like a dog than one could imagine. He fetches, sits on your lap, greets you at the door and makes funny noises when he is happy. When he dies, his owner's grief will be great and she will miss him terribly. He is a family member.

All pets are special and important to their humans. Whether it is a cat, dog, bunny, bird, horse, cow, pet pig, or whatever, they can hold a special place in our hearts. When they die or we must make the decision for them to be euthanized, the pain can be the same or even more than losing a beloved human. The grief cannot be discounted as silly or unnecessary. It is real and it hurts badly.

I began doing casual grief counseling for pet loss almost 20 years ago. When I went back to school to get my degrees I wrote a research paper on my experiences counseling pet owners and included in it some limited studies available at the time. (There was very little internet service available at that time. My laptop then was not even equipped to go onto "The World Wide Web" as it was called).  I will post my paper here when I am able. (To be continued)...