There was an interesting news report on Breakfast News this week about people coping with the loss of their beloved pets, it focussed on how deeply this was felt by many people, how it is all too often overlooked and minimised as if the grief for our companion animals is lesser than our human losses. To many people especially in our twilight years this may be the only relationship that endures, we often spend more time with our animals over family and the loss that is felt when they pass can be deeply traumatic yet we can find ourselves with much less empathy and understanding so that grief has nowhere to go. Without a way of processing this and fear of talking about it in case it is mocked in some way can cause ptsd, anxiety and depression. My own experience of losing my two dogs was that I was expected to return to work and grieve my loss silently and felt I should be over it in a matter of days. My reality however was very different, I found myself overwhelmed with grief especially as one of my dogs died suddenly and unexpectedly at a young age, I felt unable to find a place to release this terrible hurt, it affected my physical and mental health and I turned to online support groups with others who had experienced such loss, its been over a year and I still feel such sadness and pain and if society would properly acknowledge death of companion animals I think we could live in a kinder, healthier society.

The death of the wonderful Dolly Parton this week has also reminded us that even though we didn't know her personally many of us were deeply saddened upon hearing the news and that grief and loss can come in many forms, affect everyone differently and that empathy for all is needed.