Death or Loss of a Pet

When is it time to get help?

It’s normal to experience grief when you’ve experienced a loss. It’s easy to slip from sadness over the loss into depression or anxiety, or PTSD if your pet’s death was violent or traumatic, and can even be a trigger for substance problems. The symptoms of grief are problematic if you’ve been experiencing them for a prolonged time or they are severe enough to affect your daily life – eating, sleeping, working, etc. for an extended time. If this is what you’re experiencing, it’s time to get help.

Grief treatment methods

Grief from the loss of a pet can be treated in several ways. Together with your therapist, you will determine the best treatment for your individual situation. Common treatment methods for grief that are effective include:

• Grief work therapy refers to the methods used in counselling that help people to grieve loss and understand their emotions associated with the loss in a healthy way with the ultimate goal of moving forward.
• Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is an evidence-based approach to treatment that focuses on how people’s thoughts, emotions, and beliefs influence their behaviour and how they perceive themselves.
• Eye movement desensitization reprocessing therapy (EMDR) is defined by EMDR Canada as an integrative psychotherapy approach that has been extensively researched and proven effective for the treatment of trauma and many other mental health problems that utilized bilateral eye stimulation or somatic responding.
• Existential therapy is focused on providing the client with a greater understanding of themselves including self-development, and self-awareness. This therapy works on the individual’s unique set of choices and the meaning behind them, making them know they can’t blame their decisions and the repercussions entirely on past conditioning and/or genetics.
• Person centered therapy differs from more traditional therapeutic approaches in the belief that, while the therapist has expertise in many areas, the client is the expert on themselves and their lived experiences. People are essentially trustworthy and have a vast potential for understanding themselves while also being able to ultimately resolve their own problems when guided properly.
• Faith based therapy is using science-based therapeutic techniques that are administered by a therapist with similar spiritual beliefs or an understanding of those beliefs. This is not based on any one religion or spiritual belief.