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Sponsor:
Don’t Flush the Fish! - What
Parents Should Know When
A Child’s Pet Dies
By Deborah Antinori
Director of Therapy at the Davison
Counseling Center in New Jersey, professional speaker and author.
(BASKING RIDGE, N.J.) What can a parent do when their child’s
pet dies? Many parents buy pets for their children to teach them how to
handle
responsibility, but when those pets die, it is often a child’s first
experience
with death. The way that parents handle pet loss has long-reaching effects
for
children as they begin to form beliefs and ways to cope with death.
"I say not to flush the fish because many children feel that the
way you treat their pet’s death is how you would treat them if they
were really
ill or dying," says Deborah Antinori, licensed therapist and author of
the
award-winning audio book Journey Through Pet Loss (ISBN # 0-9668848-1-7,
YokoSpirit Publications, ©2000, $19.95). "Parents need to show they
care about
the pet because the child cares."
Pet loss provides a golden opportunity to teach anyspiritual,
religious and philosophical values parents have. It also opens up the
door to
talk about other losses that have occurred that children may bring up
— the
death of a grandmother or friend, or fears about the impending death of
an
elderly family member. All of these areas of concern provide opportunities
to
teach children about the most difficult aspects of life, those aspects
they will
encounter with more frequency as they age.
Tips on discussing pet loss with children:
- Give kids an opportunity to express their feelings through
words or drawing - Have a memorial service of some kind
- Take time to teach about the cycle of life with children’s
books that deal with pet loss and read themwith your child - Create a special pet memorial album of
pictures
Antinori also recognizes that parents themselves are surprised
at how devastating it can be when their family pet dies and other people
don’t
understand their grief.
"When it comes to the death of a pet, there’s a tendency for
people to minimize someone’s loss, because they don’t have animals
and don’t
understand the attachment," says Antinori. "Through the book I wanted
to offer
something to people who are being given insensitive advice such as, ‘It
was only
an animal, you’ll get another one.’"
Submitted by:
Elaine Froelich, Publicist
Phenix & Phenix Literary Publicists, Inc.
2525 West Anderson Lane, Suite 540
Austin, Texas 78757
(voice) 512.478.2028 X 206
(fax) 512.478.2117
elaine@bookpros.com
http://www.bookpros.com
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