I need to go grab a book on losing a pet, in this case it's a dog, but I think a book about other types of animals could still work if it's a great book. Something for the preschool, early elementary years. Suggestions??
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The rainbow bridge poem is usually my go to (makes me absolutely weep though). You can also Google Colorado State University and Washington State University's vet school grief counseling sites, they have excellent suggestions (I posted the links about two months ago on another thread here, shouldn't be hard to find in my recent posts, as I'm not on here as frequently since E arrived)
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A friend just posted on Facebook about this. Dog Heaven
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We went through this in the summer. It was so hard. I'm not going to remember the names of the books unfortunately. One was about a bug metamorphizing. I found it! It's called "water bugs and dragonflies". It was good to show that death is one of life's normal transitions. The other one that was helpful was called *I think* "The feelings book". This one was most helpful in dealing with the sadness and anger about the loss of our beloved dog. Ultimately, we didn't want a book that emphasized a specific religious perspective , so most of the dog specific books weren't helpful for us.
It's such a hard thing to go through, but ultimately I think our girls just benefited from us being very open and talking about it a lot in the course if normal conversation. I'm lucky in that we have child life specialists at work, so I worked through some of the themes and conversations with them before tackling the subject with the girls.
Here's a good list that includes many of the books we read. http://childrensbooksguide.com/death
There's also a nice one in there called "The invisible string" that isn't death specific, but shows how when we think and talk about someone we keep them alive and present in our hearts.
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@T.H.O.U.: My little sister really benefitted from Dog Heaven. She was older than preschool age, but really attached to our dog and it really helped her.
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@lemondrop: holy crap, I don't think I can read that aloud without crying! It's really beautiful though, thank you!
@T.H.O.U.: @ILoveLettie: thanks! I went to B&N & grabbed that one.
@Mrs. Jacks: thanks! I agree that incorporating it into normal conversations is the best way to go! I'm not really into things that explain death in a way that follows a religious idea, but it was presented already & said that the dog was in heaven with other pets we've lost. The idea of them being together seems to be comforting, so I grabbed 'Dog Heaven'. We've had lots of talks about different types of illnesses & how some are much much worse than the types of illnesses we've get, we get sick and rest, drink water, and sometimes need medicine, then we get better, but there are some terrible illnesses that don't go away and that when people and animals get those terrible illnesses, eventually they die and while we miss them, we can feel better knowing that they don't hurt anymore. We talk about scientists who invent vaccines & how people & animals get vaccinations because they can help us to not get terrible illnesses that sometimes cause people & animals die, but that there are some illnesses that we don't have vaccines to prevent or medicines to make better. There have been lots of death questions this year for various reasons, we have a good understanding of some ways people die (old age, illness, accidents) and things we do to keep ourselves healthy (healthy foods, exercise, rest) and safe (carseats, helmets, smoke alarms, etc), but that eventually everyone dies. We're just sad today. It is sad
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