Dearly Departed Pets
Catherine in PEI on the day she adopted Prince in 1993. Prince passed away in 2006.
|
In her article, Joanne Laucius interviews Lyne Laurin who talks about her 11-year-old Bernese-Rottweiler dog who died two years ago. She talks about how few people have empathy for her sorrow.
Mrs Laucius also talks to Veterinarian Dr. Lianna Titcombe, director of the Pet Loss Suport Group in Ottawa. Dr. Titcombe says that many people feel the loss of a pet more deeply than they do the loss of a distant relative.
Mention is made of the Ontario Veterinary College at Guelph University which is hiring, what may be, the first full-time bereavement worker at a Canadian veterinary college. For the last nine years, the university has had a pet-loss hotline because bereaved pet owners have no one to talk to. The hotline gets about 100 calls a year. Many of the callers find close family and friends are not supportive. On the contrary, many people who lose a pet face indifference or ridicule.
Catherine Kovacs, who is taking over Eternal Companions, a crematorium and pet memorial centre, says business has been increasing by about 30 per cent a year. The six-year-old business, which recently moved from Montreal to Rigaud, Que., does about 100 pet cremations each month. She estimates about half of her clients are from Ontario.
Eternal Companions, which has a chapel and quiet room, does not do "group cremations" -- the client wants a guarantee that the ashes they get are his or her pet, she says. The service costs between $275 and $450, depending on the size of the animal.
Some pet owners go to the crematorium to say their last farewell. Others want to stay for the entire cremation, which costs $100 to $175 extra. Sometimes clients request that a pet's toy or blanket be cremated as well.
A representative from Eternal Companions, which has two full-time and two part-time workers, will even go to the vet's office or to the pet owner's home to offer support when a pet is euthanized.
One cremation for a cat had 23 people present, says Kovacs. It was followed by a sushi and champagne reception with a red-and-white colour theme -- the cat had been born and died on Valentine's Day.
People want to know their pet is treated with respect, says Kovacs. Eternal Companions has performed individual cremations for rats, goldfish, birds and a lizard. "People want to know that their pet is not mistreated or treated like garbage," she says.
All News RSS feed