Wendy Green:

Oh, welcome to Hey Boomer.

Wendy Green:

The show where we believe we are never too old to set another goal or dream a new dream.

Wendy Green:

My name is Wendy Green and I am your host for Hey, Boomer.

Wendy Green:

My guest today, Ken Dolan.

Wendy Green:

Delvecchio is a licensed clinical social worker and a licensed marriage and family

Wendy Green:

therapist who is guiding people to recover from the loss of a pet.

Wendy Green:

As the co-host of the Pet Loss Companion podcast, Ken shares experiences,

Wendy Green:

recommendations and reflections that help listeners with the loss of their animal

Wendy Green:

companions. Losing a pet is like losing a family member.

Wendy Green:

We all have.

Wendy Green:

Well, most of us have beloved pets and have experienced.

Wendy Green:

The devastation of the loss of those pets.

Wendy Green:

My cat. Angel got to a point in her life about seven years ago where it was time to

Wendy Green:

euthanize her.

Wendy Green:

You can imagine that was an agonizing decision.

Wendy Green:

But it really was the kind thing to do for her.

Wendy Green:

And I was in the office in the vet's office with her as they administered.

Wendy Green:

The dose of medicine that was going to stop her heart.

Wendy Green:

And I'll never forget, you know, our eyes were locked.

Wendy Green:

She was staring at me.

Wendy Green:

And then they closed.

Wendy Green:

And I am not sure how I stayed in the office with her and I am not sure how I could not

Wendy Green:

have been in the office with her.

Wendy Green:

So the feelings around pet loss.

Wendy Green:

Are are enormous and confusing.

Wendy Green:

And those are the kinds of things we're going to talk about today.

Wendy Green:

With Ken.

Wendy Green:

Before that, though, I would like to thank our sponsor, Road Scholar, for their support

Wendy Green:

of Hey, Boomer.

Wendy Green:

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Wendy Green:

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Wendy Green:

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Wendy Green:

So please go and check out all that Road Scholar has to offer.

Wendy Green:

You can look at their website by going to Road scholar.org/hey Boomer.

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And if you use the slash hey Boomer.

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It lets them know that we appreciate their sponsorship of our show.

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I also want to remind you of two important takeaways that you can find on my webpage

Wendy Green:

that are free.

Wendy Green:

First is the vitality assessment.

Wendy Green:

And the vitality assessment will help you find out if you are fully vitalized.

Wendy Green:

Do you have sustained energy?

Wendy Green:

Is your tank half empty or is it time to really take stock of your life and make some

Wendy Green:

changes? You can download the Vitality Assessment for free on the home page at

Wendy Green:

HeyBoomer.biz .

Wendy Green:

And the other thing that is totally free is a 20 to 30 minute complimentary coaching

Wendy Green:

session with me where we can talk about where you are, where you want to be and how

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you might get there.

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You can sign up for a time that's available by going to, HeyBoomer.Biz/coaching and you

Wendy Green:

can schedule a time.

Wendy Green:

I look forward to talking to you about what's next in your life.

Wendy Green:

as

Wendy Green:

I mentioned, Ken Dolan Del Vecchio is a licensed clinical social worker and a

Wendy Green:

licensed marriage and family therapist.

Wendy Green:

He has found a calling, working with people, grieving the loss of their beloved pets.

Wendy Green:

Ken has written a book called The Pet Loss Companion, which you can find on Amazon, and

Wendy Green:

he has created a podcast with another therapist called the Pet Loss Companion

Wendy Green:

podcast, where they answer listeners questions about dealing with loss and the

Wendy Green:

aging of their pets.

Wendy Green:

Ken is a lifelong animal companion enthusiast, having shared his home with dogs,

Wendy Green:

cats. Chickens.

Wendy Green:

Rabbits, cockatiels.

Wendy Green:

Finches, chinchillas, guinea pigs, turtles, mice, one horse and one very special rat

Wendy Green:

named Nero, who sat on Ken's shoulder eating peanuts while Ken studied late in the evening

Wendy Green:

in college.

Wendy Green:

He is also an award winning leader and keynote speaker in the field of workplace

Wendy Green:

mental health, and I am looking forward to the conversation with Ken today.

Wendy Green:

Hi there.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Hey, Wendy, How are you?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Nice to be with you.

Wendy Green:

I'm so glad to have you back.

Wendy Green:

You were with us a couple of years ago now.

Wendy Green:

Yeah.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Yeah. Talk about parenting with my parenting book.

Wendy Green:

Right. So welcome back.

Wendy Green:

So let's start with how did you get into working with people, grieving with pets and

Wendy Green:

then writing The Pet Loss Companion?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Well, quite a long time ago now, 2000, I believe.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I was asked by my friend and colleague, Nancy Saxton Lopez.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Nancy and I worked together in a psychiatric hospital in New Jersey, and she worked in the

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

emergency ward.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And I worked in the inpatient and outpatient program.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And she was already running a pet loss support group at a local nonprofit.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And her the person who ran the group.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Opposite her. So she would do it on the first Tuesday of the month and then this

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

other person would do it on the third Tuesday of the month.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

That person left and she invited me to do to facilitate that session.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so that's when I started.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And I did that all the way through 2012.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And I've recently started about a year and a few months ago, started doing it for a local,

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

a local animal shelter.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Dakin Humane shelter here in Massachusetts.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So I've been doing this for about 14 years, I guess, and Nancy had been doing it for

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

about 30 years.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Wow. And toward the end of my time in New Jersey, I said, you know, there's so many

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

lessons that people have shared with us about the experience of loss and the

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

experience of healing and so many themes that it would make sense to compile them into

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

a book. And so that's what the Pet Loss Companion is.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's really all about what we learned through through the experience of

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

facilitating those groups.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And it's an opportunity to give that back to people who are new to the experience of loss.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And then when we when we got.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

A hold of this technology.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

The same, actually.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You were the one who taught me about Streamyard and anchor.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We we started doing this program once a week where a lot of the time we read letters from

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

people who have written to us about their loss and we'll give them some thoughts on on

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

what they're going through.

Wendy Green:

So this has been a journey that you and Nancy have been on together for a while.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

For a long time. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Wendy Green:

Well, it's definitely something that all of us experience.

Wendy Green:

And I never even thought about a support group for it.

Wendy Green:

But before we get into more of the weeds, talk to me in general about grief and

Wendy Green:

grieving.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's very important that I think we focus a little bit on grief because first of all,

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

grief is the elemental human experience we are losing over and over and over again

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

throughout our lives. When we when we go to school and we leave home, we go to nursery

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

school. We've lost we've lost the sanctuary of home.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Our parents have lost us being always in their in their nest.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

When we go to college, we've lost again and they've lost again.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And when we have our first love relationship and it ends as it very often does, we've

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

gone, we go through grief.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so we are going through grief over and over and over again in our lives.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And it has a very familiar pattern.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So it starts out usually with shock, disbelief, kind of a numbness.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And and then we go through a whole tumult of different feelings, often deep, deep sadness

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

and anger, and desperately trying to recreate the sense of the world the way it

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

was before.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But ultimately, we live with it.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We we don't we don't get over grief.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We incorporate the knowledge of the loss into the story of our lives.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And we live beside it is the way that I think about it.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so it's the same with any major loss.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And it doesn't have to be the loss of a human being or a pet.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It can be the loss of a place of work where we were very, very connected.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It can be the loss of our home through whatever change happens.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But so grief is something that I believe all therapists should be very well conversed,

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

conversant with and able to help people with.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And I believe that it's just something that is part of the fabric of everyday life for

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

us.

Wendy Green:

And it is something we try to avoid.

Wendy Green:

I think, you know, like.

Wendy Green:

Right, like the story of my cat when I knew I had to euthanize her and I said I was in

Wendy Green:

the office with her.

Wendy Green:

And we were looking at each other, you know, as her little eyes were closing and.

Wendy Green:

I didn't know. I, I didn't know that I could do that, that I could stand there with her.

Wendy Green:

But I also felt like I couldn't not do that.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Well, I think the way you described it was really beautiful.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And that that's the loving gift that you give.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's not. It's the it's the easing of suffering.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's not when you when you euthanize your pet or have your pet euthanized, you're not

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

killing them.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Whatever infirmity or illness or accident, that's what's killing them.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And you are easing their suffering at the end of their lives.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

That's the best way to think about it.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Now, that said, there's usually a whole bunch of mixed feelings that follow, and

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

people often feel tremendous guilt.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Did we do it too soon?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Did we do it too late?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Were they were they looking at us and thinking he or she is is killing me?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

They go through all kinds.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And it's just that's normal.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

That's what happens.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

One of the things I think it's really important to recognize is that we're a

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

society. And I think you were kind of heading in this direction.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We're a society that is pretty phobic about all kinds of negative feelings, any kind of

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

negative feelings. There's a great book by the brilliant Barbara Ehrenreich.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's called Bright-sided, and it's all about this idea that we should always be happy,

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

happy, happy. And if we're feeling something negative, then there's something wrong.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And that is simply not.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Life. That's not reality.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so I highly recommend that book as a primer on how bizarre it is to think that we

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

should always be happy and never have the ups and downs that really are part of life.

Wendy Green:

Yeah, it's it's very hard.

Wendy Green:

So staying on this topic of euthanasia, you've had I know you've had people write in

Wendy Green:

with letters about that.

Wendy Green:

Just how do you how do you what's the process people can go through to even help

Wendy Green:

them make that decision?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Well, the way I think about it, and I had to I lost two of my dogs last year.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

They were both one was just the day before turning 16 and the other was a couple of

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

months after. And the one who died a couple of months after, she had promised me that she

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

was going to live until at least 18.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But it didn't didn't pan out.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But it's the thing about euthanasia is.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It is almost always an extraordinarily deliberate decision that's made.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So there is a conversation that goes on within the family.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

If this is if there's more than one people who live with this animal companion, there is

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

a conversation that includes their veterinarian and they're watching the process

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

of their beloved pets deterioration.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And the basic formula is that if your pet is experiencing suffering, that outweighs the

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

pleasures of living, then it's probably time to move ahead with euthanasia.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So if they're in so much pain that they can't move and they're obviously in distress,

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

they're not eating, they're not drinking, they're looking at they're looking in a way

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

that's incredibly debilitated.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You're not doing them a favor by letting them linger in that kind of situation option.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so but the way that I like to think about it is use the consultation that's

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

available to you. Talk with a vet who you trust and whose judgment you you have come to

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

rely upon, if at all possible, talk with family members about it and make a decision

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

that feels like it is collaborative to the extent that that's possible and realize that

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

it's not going to be a perfect decision and that and that you're probably going to have

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

misgivings afterwards. What if what about shouldn't shouldn't we have?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's just the nature of processing loss.

Wendy Green:

Yeah. So like another cat that I had, I had I had been away on a business trip.

Wendy Green:

I came back and she could barely move.

Wendy Green:

I mean, she was like a rag doll.

Wendy Green:

I took her to the vet.

Wendy Green:

She had kidney failure.

Wendy Green:

So they said to me, Well, we could put her on dialysis.

Wendy Green:

And I was like, Oh my gosh, that would cost me so much money to take this cat twice a

Wendy Green:

month, twice a week for dialysis.

Wendy Green:

And and is there really quality of life?

Wendy Green:

And so I guess that leads me into the next discussion, though, about.

Wendy Green:

You know, the cost of care for pets.

Wendy Green:

And how do people justify that sometimes or make those choices?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Yeah, the technology has advanced greatly as it has for human beings in the past 15, 20

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

years. And so now you're often presented with an option of, well, we could put your

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

pet in an oxygen tent, or we could give them dialysis or we could do this kind of surgery

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

or that kind of surgery that may cost thousands and thousands of dollars.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And we've heard from people who have spent 20,000, $30,000.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And what we tend to recommend is it's a good idea to have a sense of the limit.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

That you can afford.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And to have that well ahead of hand, well ahead of the need to make that kind of

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

decision. So if you can, you can have a figure of 4000 or 5000 or 1000 or whatever

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

your household may be able to sustain.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

That may be a very helpful reference point when and if that time comes.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And also again, talking with your vet, because there's also we just recently read an

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

article about what's called futile care, which is giving all these kinds of

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

interventions, medical interventions, when it's clear that your pet is going to die

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

pretty soon anyway, that's different than palliative care.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Palliative care is is to ease suffering.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's painkillers.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's it's to help to to help the animal to feel as comfortable as possible.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

In the last period of their lives rather than futile care.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so and it's just very important also to listen to your vet like one to when when my

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

dog Abigail, who died in August of the year before last, actually, at this point, she was

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

in great distress.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I mean, she was she was actually dying because we were afterwards we raised her to

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

an emergency vet and she just started dying in the car.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We took her back and and she died at the vets where we were at.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But I remember asking our vet, who I've known for a long time, what would you do if

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

this were your.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Dog. And she said, Well, that's hard to answer because you love her, but I don't see

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

her improving. So her clinical status is that she's probably going to die.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But if you race her to this emergency service 20 minutes away, they will be able to

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

put her in an oxygen tent.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

She may revive and continue for a little bit.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So we did that in our great distress.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It didn't work. We came back, actually.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But it's a very it's good to have somebody who can ask that question to like, what would

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

you do if this were your if this were your animal friend?

Speaker3:

Yeah, it's so hard.

Speaker3:

And, you know, the the.

Wendy Green:

Grief that we experience when we lose a pet.

Wendy Green:

Can be very confusing.

Wendy Green:

You know, I know that when I had to put Angel down.

Wendy Green:

It took me months, Ken.

Wendy Green:

Months. And I kept saying to myself.

Speaker3:

This is ridiculous.

Wendy Green:

You know, this is a cat.

Wendy Green:

This is not your parent.

Wendy Green:

This is not your sibling.

Wendy Green:

This is not your child.

Wendy Green:

Why are you not getting over this?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Yeah, well, it's so important to be gentle with ourselves and not to layer judgment on

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

top of an already very distressing experience.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And this, I think, goes back to the question of our society and its and its ability to

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

teach us about what's normal.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Of course, we're going to grieve when we have any significant loss.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And it's also important to realize that every loss is unique.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And when it comes to pets, we hear over and over and over again.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I'm I'm experiencing this as being more difficult than the loss of my parent or the

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

loss of my sibling or the loss of my best human friend.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And what we've come to understand is that pets live in our homes.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We take care of them in a way that is uniquely intimate.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We are touching them all the time where we have to pay attention to be aware of how

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

they're doing. We feed them, we take them out to go to the bathroom, or we clean up

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

after them and we are communicating with them in a way that goes beyond words.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So it's almost like the way that I think about it.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's very similar to the way I would care for my infant son before he could speak,

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

because our pets never learn to speak.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And we learn to communicate.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We learn to intuit.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

A lot. Like you can almost feel like you're speaking to them because we get so close.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

They are the first living being to greet us in the morning.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

They're generally very happy to see us then and they're happy to see us when we come home

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

from work. It's a very uncomplicated kind of love.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so when we lose them, we lose this huge chunk of our lives, of our daily lives, and

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

we lose a relationship that is so close and so, so much a part of our heart that it often

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

feels so, so much more pressing than than even the loss of a beloved human family

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

member. And there's also that rhetoric that's in the society.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's less so these days.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But what you said it was only a cat.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I mean, how many times have people lost a cat or a dog or a parrot or a guinea pig and

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

somebody and we hear this in in both the support group that I facilitate and from

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

people who write to us for the podcast, people who they thought were very close to

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

them will say things like, oh my God, you've got three cats.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And one of them died. Like, What's the big deal?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You know, it's just a cat.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's like all of this stuff that you wouldn't expect from somebody who has empathy

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

and respect for your experience.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so I believe that that goes down that goes to this idea that we're not a society

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

where we're used to being empathic with each other in our distress.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so if a person all you got to do with somebody who's grieving is be with them.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And be compassionate.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You can't fix it. You can't take it away.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But you can be a compassionate presence.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And yet that's very hard for many people because in order to be close to another

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

person who's in pain, we have to resonate to some extent with their discomfort.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And some people just have very little tolerance for that because we're not used to

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

it. We're not practiced at it.

Speaker3:

Yeah, Yeah.

Speaker3:

And a lot of people don't.

Wendy Green:

Understand the loss of a pet.

Wendy Green:

You know, they they'll be with you if your parent dies for a little while.

Wendy Green:

For a little while.

Wendy Green:

Even in that situation, you know, they don't know what to say after a while.

Wendy Green:

So, you know, just you don't talk about it to them.

Wendy Green:

Yeah. So are there besides just being with somebody, do you have suggestions on what to

Wendy Green:

say to somebody that I'm very sorry.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I'm very sorry.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I know this hurts tremendously.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You just what you do is you just acknowledge the pain and.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And you ask if there's anything that you can do just to.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

When we lose a human family member, you might go shopping for the person or you might

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

bring them.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You might bring them a glass of water if they're clearly in distress.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You But but really, it's all about just bearing witness and being an empathic,

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

compassionate presence who is validating what that person is experiencing.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And as you said, it can go on for a very long time or a very short time.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Each of us grieve differently.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And for some people, it's going to be waves.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And, you know, grief is not linear.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's like you might be feeling awful one minute and then you're feeling pretty okay

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

the next. And then a few minutes later you might hear a song or you might see a reminder

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

and you're just totally distraught again, So true.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And that can go on for a long time.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And the way that I think about grief is that we take this very unpleasant, unwelcome news

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

and we emotionally chew on it over and over and over and over again until it's no longer

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

such fresh news.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And it can't.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It can't. Rile us so much.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

For the most part, it still probably will at anniversary time.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

The anniversary of the pet's death.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Maybe their birthday.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Maybe the change of seasons.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Holidays tend to be very evocative, but we really just have to kind of wade through it

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

and allow ourselves to experience whatever it is like for us.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And eventually it wanes.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It decreases.

Wendy Green:

So I'm thinking of two questions right now.

Wendy Green:

One is I was talking to a friend about being a single person with a pet.

Wendy Green:

And, you know, you talk about the intimacy.

Wendy Green:

I mean, we are bonded, you know?

Speaker3:

Yeah. Yeah, right.

Wendy Green:

And the thought of losing her.

Wendy Green:

Her name is Pepper. The thought of losing her is just something I can't even.

Speaker3:

I can't even wrap my arms.

Wendy Green:

Around it at this.

Speaker3:

Point.

Wendy Green:

So my question from that statement is.

Wendy Green:

Are there things that would help prepare us emotionally?

Wendy Green:

I mean, I guess I felt the same way about the loss of my dad.

Wendy Green:

Like I didn't think I'd ever get over it, you know?

Wendy Green:

But how do you prepare for a loss?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Well, first of all, I don't think we ever do get over it.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Actually. I think we I think we integrate it into our experience.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Like, I think both of my parents are gone.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

They've been gone for quite a long time.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I think about them every day.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I think about my dogs regularly pretty much every day.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so I think that they're just sort of present with us in a different way.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And you can describe that a lot of different ways depending on what your spirituality is

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

and the way you think about the narrative of your life.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But I think that as they grow older, we need to acknowledge that we won't have them

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

forever and we need to.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

One of the things that I think helps us is to recognize is the ephemeral nature of

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

everything. So when I got my new puppy a couple now it'll be about a year and a half

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

ago. Her name is Hildy.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I remember she's a little eight week old puppy.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And I said, You know, 12 years goes by really fast and so I need to I need to hold

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

this little being with as much love and care as I can every day because probably I'm going

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

to outlive her and I'm going to go through this again.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So I think the first thing we do is we cherish them all the time, all the time.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And we realize that we're not going to have them forever.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And that makes it even even sweeter in a way.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And we as we if if they decline slowly, we let other people who love and respect us know

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

that this is coming and this may be very hard for us, that's a good idea.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And we we talk with our pet, too, about how much we love them.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We try not to have any loose ends.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We may do things like create things that will help us.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Remember. Then we take videos, we take pictures, we, you know, we do the things that

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

will help us hold on to them.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And it depends on the way you think about pets.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So for me, I got to have more than one all the time.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Like I have two cats, a dog and 22 chickens and and that does not feel.

Speaker3:

Like you live on a farm that.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Does not feel like enough.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so, so if my husband were of a different sense, if he thought if he were a different

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

sensibility, I'd probably have more than two dogs.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so and I used to tell people, I try to stagger them.

Wendy Green:

I know, I know.

Wendy Green:

I've thought about that.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So but I think that I think that we just take and we also just take the best care of

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

ourselves that we can always mean The best solution to grief is to take care of oneself.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's to make sure that you get up in the morning and that you take your shower or you

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

take your bath and and you get yourself dressed and you follow through with the

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

activities of the day as best you can.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

They may be a bit lessened because you are in such a sad place that day, but you do.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You kind of try to keep the pattern going as best you can.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You do some kind of exercise or movement or meditation or stretching or yoga or whatever

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

you do to take care of yourself.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You try to nourish yourself as best you can.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You try to get rest, even if it's hard, even if you can't fall asleep, or even if you are

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

spending a lot of time in bed and you're not getting that much rest, you know, you try to

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

keep your structure going.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And again, I don't think there's I don't think there's a recipe.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's not avoidable.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

That's another thing I think it's important to keep in mind.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's not avoidable.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We are we are born to lose and to gain over and over and over again.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And grief is the cost of having loved.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And it's a good thing to love.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Love is important in our lives.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so why not do as much of it as you can and realize that?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's all it's everything is a femminile.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Everything is just for now.

Speaker3:

Yeah. Yeah.

Wendy Green:

And that's a that's a kind of a positive spin to put on it.

Speaker3:

That it's everything.

Wendy Green:

Is to love. I like.

Speaker3:

That.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

There's, there's one other point I'll make, Wendy, and that is that there's a great book

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

by Duane Elgin.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's called Voluntary Simplicity.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And it's just a brilliant little book.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And he has a passage in it that the passage has a title and the title is Let Death Be

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Your Friend.

Speaker3:

And it's called Voluntary Simplicity.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Voluntary Simplicity.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Okay. And it's absolutely brilliant, soulful book.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And his his thinking is, again, it's very simple that if you realize that everything

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

our lives are going to end, every relationship we have, everything we cherish

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

is going to end. It makes it so much more valuable.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Every moment is more valuable if we understand that and we embrace it, and

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

certainly with our pets, unless we've unless our pet is a turtle or a parrot, you know,

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

you know, they might outlive us.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And then we've got to have a succession plan for them.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Yeah. And so but we're we're born to lose and we're born to love.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And and lose and then love again, hopefully.

Wendy Green:

So what do you think about memorializing them?

Wendy Green:

Memorial services, keeping their ashes, those kinds of things.

Wendy Green:

Do you think that helps people deal with the loss?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

There's no because there aren't set ways.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Like if you belong to a community of faith and a family member dies, there's often a

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

prescribed ritual, right?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so that kind of structures the beginning of our grief experience and the memorializing

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

with pets, that's generally not the case.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And there's there's a myriad of options.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so there is you can you can take your pet's body and bury it.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

If you have land to do that in, you can have them cremated and save the ashes or not save

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

the ashes. You can.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Now there's a new way of body bodily disposal called acclamation, which doesn't

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

require fire, but provides you with something akin to ashes.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Some people actually have their pets freeze dried, so they they they retain their body in

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

a desiccated form and it can be posed like a stuffed animal or like taxidermy.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

The way that that I think about this is you you do what feels right for you.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And that will vary so that, for example, we have four of our dog's ashes on our hutch in

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

our dining room.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We have I have cats buried in the yard.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I've left cats at other locations where I lived and rabbits and birds.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And I think you do what feels right.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And many people will keep the ashes.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Some people will have the ashes contained within a bit of jewelry, or at least some of

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

the ashes in a bit of jewelry.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Some people will make what they what they tend to refer to as altars.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So we've had people come to our groups and also write to us and they'll have either like

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

a little corner of a dresser where they have their pets collar toys, maybe a footprint in

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

clay, those kinds of things that are that are for holding on to the memory.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But the way I think about this is you do what feels right for you and for those others

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

who who loved your animal companion.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And that's what's right.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

That's what's right for you.

Speaker3:

Yeah, we're getting some comments here.

Wendy Green:

Josephine's says that her pets are her babies so much a part of every day.

Wendy Green:

Barbara says she's lost without her baby, Cody.

Wendy Green:

I'm sorry, Barbara.

Wendy Green:

And Michelle says she wants her.

Speaker3:

Ashes co-mingled with her pet at the end.

Speaker3:

So they're going to rest together.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

That's great. I might do that as well.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I might, Yeah.

Speaker3:

That's kind of sweet as well.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And, you know, there's no there's very few right or wrongs here.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

I mean, when we got we had a beautiful little Chihuahua whose name was Lily.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And when I got Lily's ashes back, I had to open them and stick my finger in them.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So I had to touch her.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Oh, and and we do.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

What we need to do is the way I think about it.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And as long as nobody gets hurt, it's right, you know?

Speaker3:

So what about when is it right to replace them, you know, after one dies there.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Again, the way that I think about this one is don't do it.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

If you're ambivalent, you can always insert more time, always, right?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You can always give a little more time.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But we have seen situations where people rush out and they get a new animal and it

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

adds to the stress in a way that is not constructive because grief is grief is really

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

the pattern of our response to a major stress loss is a major stress, right?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

So what grief is, is what we go through.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

We're what we call that response to this major stress, adapting to this new change in

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

our life. That's been very, very stressful.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

If you bring a new puppy or a new kitten or a new horse or and you are you are not at a

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

place where you're feeling ready for that.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It can just make things harder.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And we've had some cases where people actually adopt a pet and then they give the

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

pet back because it was too soon.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But generally what happens is you kind of know when it's time.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And so if you're not sure, do things like volunteer at an animal shelter and go and

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

socialize the cats or socialize the dogs, take them for walks, be with them and see how

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

it feels.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But don't ever assume that if you bring a new pet into your life, it's going to short

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

circuit the grief. It's not going to do that.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You're not going to feel like, now I don't have to grieve because I've got this new

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

friend. What you're probably going to feel is even more intense grief because the

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

presence of your new animal companion punctuates emphasizes their difference from

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

the relationship that was lost.

Speaker3:

Yeah, it's funny how.

Wendy Green:

You say you kind of know.

Wendy Green:

You know, with Pepper, I, I waited.

Wendy Green:

I think it was a year and a half to two years after Angel died and I had my grandkids

Wendy Green:

here and I was looking for something to do, So I was like, Well, let's just go to the

Wendy Green:

Humane Society and visit the animals.

Wendy Green:

Right. I'm not getting another pet.

Wendy Green:

And I mean that.

Wendy Green:

Immediately we saw each other and that was, you know, we knew we had to be together,

Wendy Green:

Pepper and I.

Wendy Green:

And then they helped me name her, which was even more special.

Wendy Green:

Um, so it's funny how if you we learn to listen to ourselves and think, like you said

Wendy Green:

earlier, you know, being gentle with yourself, learning to listen to yourself.

Wendy Green:

I think these are life lessons that we can get from our pets and from grieving.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Yeah. Grief is a great teacher.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's a great, great teacher.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It opens us up in ways that are often able to help us understand our priorities better,

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

to understand what's whose most important in our lives because of the ways they respond to

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

us at a time of great vulnerability.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It allows us to gain wisdom about the truth of the way life operates and how very

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

fleeting it is.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

All these things are part of the lessons of grief, I think.

Speaker3:

Well, it's.

Wendy Green:

It's important work that you're doing.

Wendy Green:

And I don't think it's that common.

Speaker3:

To find this kind of.

Wendy Green:

Support for pet loss.

Wendy Green:

So I appreciate what you're doing.

Speaker3:

Um, let's see. She said she's someone else said I have six dogs.

Speaker3:

Had six dogs.

Speaker3:

The last of my pack is almost 16.

Speaker3:

He has Cushing's and has lost most of his muscle mass, but he still walks with me in

Speaker3:

the dog park. Slow but steady.

Speaker3:

I will take time before I rescue my final dog.

Speaker3:

Platinum plan on getting an older dog so I won't have to grieve losing me if I die

Speaker3:

earlier than expected.

Speaker3:

Well.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Yeah, Yeah. Very thoughtful.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

That's a very thoughtful way to think about this.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And to be very planful is a good thing.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And. And sometimes when we have.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

If we're at a point in life where we're older and that includes many of us, we can

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

adopt a pet with the knowledge that we may have to have someone in mind who is who has

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

agreed to take them.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Who has agreed to take them if we are incapacitated or if we die.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And and so I have a an incredibly energetic 95 year old aunt who has a 14 year

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

old dog whose name is Bella.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And I will happily take Bella.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

If Gladys Aunt Gladys is not able to care for her anymore, she certainly is able to

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

care for her now.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And but but there'll be people lined up to take Bella to.

Speaker3:

Take.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And want to be first on that list.

Speaker3:

So that's that's. Well I.

Wendy Green:

Hope she knows.

Speaker3:

That.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

There's a there.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You know, there's a lot of ways and I've told my husband that if I were to get hit by

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

a bus. Each of my dog because he's he's not really he doesn't relate.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

They're not his dogs.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

They're my dogs. They live in our house.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And he's loving toward them.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But they're my dogs.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

And we understand that if I get hit by a bus, those dogs go to a particular the very,

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

very kind shelter with endowments.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

They both have significant endowments.

Speaker3:

Do they?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Oh, they care for them because you never know, right?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

You never know.

Speaker3:

And you also never know if he'll.

Wendy Green:

If he'll be ready to give them up.

Wendy Green:

You know.

Speaker3:

My.

Wendy Green:

With my mom and dad, he had he was the animal person.

Wendy Green:

He had this little dog, Reggie, that adored him and he adored this dog.

Wendy Green:

And my mother really barely tolerated the dog.

Wendy Green:

And when my dad died, I was ready to take Reggie and she said, no, she couldn't.

Wendy Green:

And Reggie would sit on the chair and, like, talk.

Wendy Green:

Oh, you know, like he was talking to my dad.

Wendy Green:

And finally, Mom learned to love Reggie.

Wendy Green:

It was really amazing transition that happened there.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

How can you not love a dog?

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But I know there are some people for whom that that is that is true.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

But to each his own.

Wendy Green:

I know in the middle of winter when you got to take him out for a walk it's you're glad

Wendy Green:

you have a cat. So Ken, this has been amazingly helpful, incredibly helpful.

Wendy Green:

And it's not something that we've talked about before on this show.

Wendy Green:

So I really appreciate that you agreed to come on and share this with us.

Wendy Green:

If you have questions for Ken, you can email him at Ken D.

Wendy Green:

D That's David.

Wendy Green:

David V like Victor at gmail.com.

Wendy Green:

And he might even use one of your questions on his show, The Pet Loss Companion, which is

Wendy Green:

a podcast and also the name of his book, which you can find on Amazon.

Wendy Green:

So I totally I'll hopefully not calling you anytime soon for help with pepper for the.

Wendy Green:

I know, but.

Speaker3:

Thank you for this, Ken.

Speaker3:

Very much.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

Thank you for having the opportunity.

Ken Dolan Del Vecchio:

It's always it's always a pleasure and a privilege to speak with your audience.

Speaker3:

Thank you. Thank you.

Wendy Green:

Before I go, I just want to remind everybody about the vitality assessment that you can

Wendy Green:

download that from hey, Boomer biz and find out where you rank.

Wendy Green:

Are you fully vitalized or is it time to make a change?

Wendy Green:

You can also go to, Hey, Boomer Biz slash coaching to schedule a complimentary 20 to 30

Wendy Green:

minute conversation with me to talk about what's next for you in your life.

Wendy Green:

And as always, I ask you to please support our sponsor Rhodes scholar.org slash.

Wendy Green:

Hey, Boomer. So my guess next week.

Wendy Green:

Her name is Cathy Kulesa.

Wendy Green:

And Cathy spent three decades in the hospitality industry, moving up in ranks in

Wendy Green:

management training, customer service, loyalty, marketing and executive leadership.

Wendy Green:

Now she's a consultant and a speaker helping leaders and multigenerational workforces.

Wendy Green:

And we are living in a.

Speaker3:

World.

Wendy Green:

Where there are up to four generations.

Speaker3:

In the workplace.

Wendy Green:

Today. And so we're going to talk to Cathy about some of the challenges, the

Wendy Green:

opportunities for learning and building those connections across the generations.

Wendy Green:

And I like to leave you with the belief that we can all live with passion, live with

Wendy Green:

relevance, and live with courage.

Wendy Green:

And remember that you are never too old to set another goal.

Speaker3:

Or.

Wendy Green:

Dream a new dream.

Speaker3:

Thanks again, Ken.

Speaker4:

Oh, thank you.

Speaker3:

My name is Wendy Greene, and.

Wendy Green:

This has been.

Wendy Green:

Speaker3: Hey, Boomer.