Grief Support

Pet Loss Quotes

There's a lot of comfort to be found in reading pet loss quotes and quotations about grief. It doesn't often matter if the words we read were left to us by literary giants, philosophers, or just commonplace folk; a quotation–read at exactly the right time in our pet loss grief experience– can move us deeply. When that happens, there's a chord of understanding between the writer and reader, and the resonance of it is loud, clear, and true.

We've gathered together a few of our most-appreciated pet loss quotes, and offer them as a tool for you to use in your grief work. They could be used as "writer's prompts" in journaling, or simply as a way to ease and comfort your aching heart. (We also share some of the best sources for quotations we've found on the web to support you in the search for additional quotations about grief.)

In Grieving the Loss of a Pet, we wrote about the close emotional connections we have with our pets. These bonds are strong and complex. Pam Brown, the Australian author, affirmed (and beautifully described) the nature of this bond when she wrote, “If there is a heaven, it’s certain our animals are to be there. Their lives become so interwoven with our own; it would take more than an archangel to detangle them.”

Many people have read My Dog Skip, by Willie Morris. Certainly, the story is heartwarming, and its closing paragraph never fails to tear at the heartstrings: "The dog of your boyhood teaches you a great deal about friendship, and love, and death: Old Skip was my brother. They had buried him under our elm tree, they said—yet this wasn't totally true. For he really lay buried in my heart."

Here's another of the many pet loss quotes we've collected. It too captures the enduring nature of the emotional connections we have to our pets, and is certainly enough to make you reach for a box of tissues. The following words can be found in Patricia McConnell's book, For the Love of a Dog.

For the Love of a Dog

"There's a stone I had made for Luke at the top of the hill road, where the pasture opens wide and the setting sun highlights the words carved into its face. "That'll do, Luke, that'll do." The words are said to working dogs all over the world when the chores are done and the flock is settled: "That'll do dog, come home now, your work is done." Luke's work is done too. He took my heart and ran with it, and he's running still, fast and strong, a piece of my heart bound up with his, forever."

It seems to us our pets never truly pass out of our lives, they only disappear from view; taking up permanent residence in our hearts.

John Grogan, author of the wildly-popular book, Marley and Me: Life and Love with the World’s Worst Dog touched upon the joy and interpersonal change our pets can bring to our day-to-day life when he wrote, “It is amazing how much love and laughter they bring into our lives and even how much closer we become with each other because of them.”

Dean Koontz, in his wonderful book, A Big Little Life: A Memoir of a Joyful Dog, had this to say: “No matter how close we are to another person, few human relationships are as free from strife, disagreement, and frustration as is the relationship you have with a good dog. Few human beings give of themselves to another as a dog gives of itself."

In this next quotation, the French novelist Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette firmly declared (and used only nine words to do so): “Our perfect companions never have fewer than four feet.”

The wisdom of opening our homes (and our hearts) to a dog is the topic of the next quotation about our willingness to endure the grief of pet loss time and again. It's from Rudyard Kipling, the English short-story writer and author of The Jungle Book; who penned this rhyming quotation about pet loss:

The Jungle Book

There is sorrow enough in the natural way

From men and women to fill our day;

But when we are certain of sorrow in store

Why do we always arrange for more?

Brothers and sisters I bid you beware

Of giving your heart to a dog to tear.

And then there's this, from American author, Amy Sedaris: “Sometimes losing a pet is more painful than losing a human because in the case of the pet, you were not pretending to love it.” She's so right, there is no pretense in our relationships with our pets; it's an authentic mixture of love, responsibility, loyalty, and devotion.

Where to Find Additional Pet Loss Quotes

In our search for meaningful pet loss quotes and quotations about grief, we've visited many quotation websites; and can personally recommend these three quotation websites to those of you who are committed to the search:

Brainy Quote

Goodreads

The Quotations Page

The DePaul University Library website page, "Quotations" offers a list of quotation websites that you may find useful, including (among others):

Quoteland

Respectfully Quoted

Bartlett's Familiar Quotations

Famous Quotes and Authors

In Closing