Anticipatory Grief Symptoms and Signs Before Losing a Pet

Your pet is still here, and part of you may already be grieving. Maybe it began with a word a vet used, or with something small that changed in their days. It can show up as dread, guilt, or trouble sleeping. It can feel like nausea, a short temper, or almost nothing at all.

It’s called pet anticipatory grief, the grief that can begin while an animal you love is still with you. Anticipatory grief symptoms don’t all look like grief, and they don’t arrive on a schedule. Some days they’re loud. Some days they barely show. Below: what they can look like, when they tend to start, and how to tell them apart from the exhaustion of caregiving or from depression.

You might recognize most of them, or none at all. Either way, you’re not doing this wrong. This page is for naming what’s there, whatever that turns out to be.

Key Takeaways

• Some anticipatory grief symptoms don’t look like grief at all. Cornell’s veterinary college lists nausea, feeling withdrawn, and a sense of unreality among the ways grief can show up before, during, or after a death.
• Anticipatory grief can begin with a diagnosis or a gradual decline. LSU’s veterinary school says it can develop from unexpected diagnoses, and a hospice veterinarian writing for other vets says it often begins with a terminal diagnosis, a gradual decline in a pet’s quality of life, or a mix of chronic and age-related conditions.
• Dread can be part of it, alongside anxiety, guilt, and an intense preoccupation with the pet. LSU’s veterinary school says people going through anticipatory grief report all of these, among other feelings.
• Caregiver fatigue and anticipatory grief can come together, but they aren’t the same thing. LSU’s veterinary school names some of what feeds caregiver fatigue: accidents in the house, subcutaneous fluids, several medications, helping your pet get around. Being worn down by it doesn’t mean you love your pet any less.
• If you’d like company, a hospice veterinarian notes that local pet loss support groups often welcome people anticipating a loss, and a psychologist speaking to Cleveland Clinic about anticipatory grief in people says people can get help at any stage.

What Are Anticipatory Grief Symptoms?

Anticipatory grief symptoms are the ways grief shows up while your pet is still here. Some look like grief: anxiety, guilt, numbness, trouble focusing, and changes in sleep and appetite are all on Cornell’s list of some ways that one may experience grief. Cornell notes that grief can begin before, during, or after a death.

Feelings can shift from day to day, even moment to moment, Cornell adds, so a calm morning and a terrible afternoon can be the same day. What’s hardest can change, too.

One day it’s what’s ahead. The next, it’s something small that changed since yesterday. It’s a strange place to be, grieving someone who’s still here.

Anticipatory Grief Symptoms That Are Easy to Miss

Cornell’s list keeps going, and we think these are the easiest to miss:

• Your body can carry it: nausea, aches, weight gain or loss, feeling tense or jittery, restlessness.
• Everyday tasks can get harder, and you may feel like none of this is quite real.
• Frustration, loneliness, embarrassment, or feeling hopeless or helpless can be part of it.
• You might feel withdrawn, or want more time with friends and family, or less, and grief can feel isolating.

If something in your body worries you, don’t write it off as grief. Let a doctor take a look.

And if you’re not feeling much of anything, nothing’s wrong with you. Cornell says there’s no “normal” way to grieve the loss of a pet, and no set timeline. Cleveland Clinic, writing about people, not pets, notes that no two people’s symptoms are exactly the same. Yours don’t have to match anyone else’s.

Dread can be part of it too, sometimes before a vet visit, sometimes out of nowhere on an ordinary evening. LSU’s veterinary school says people going through anticipatory grief with a pet report feeling anxiety, dread, guilt, and an intense preoccupation with the pet, among other feelings.

Dr. Tyler Carmack, who directs hospice and palliative care for Caring Pathways, lists worry, anxiety, guilt, and doubt among the key characteristics of anticipatory grief. She writes that recognizing and naming these feelings can be therapeutic for pet owners, and that people may not realize those heavy feelings are both normal and valid.

When Does Anticipatory Grief Start?

Anticipatory grief can start with a diagnosis, or with a decline you notice a little at a time. LSU’s veterinary school says it can come days, months, or even years before a loss, and can develop from unexpected diagnoses like diabetes, cancer, and paralysis, or from expensive treatments.

Dr. Carmack writes that for many, it begins with a terminal diagnosis, the gradual decline of a pet’s quality of life, or a combination of chronic and age-related conditions. So there isn’t one doorway.

For some people it’s a phone call. For others it’s a birthday or adoption day that suddenly feels different, or the day a vet says the word senior out loud. Our piece on anticipatory grief as a senior pet ages goes deeper into that slower version.

Your grief may not match what you can see. In a survey of people caring for senior dogs in Australia, anticipatory grief was linked with caregiver burden but not with CCD severity, meaning how far the dog’s cognitive decline had gone. So if your grief feels bigger than the changes in front of you, that makes sense.

If the change you’re watching is in how your pet thinks and remembers, our guide to cognitive dysfunction in pets covers what that can look like.

Grieving What’s Already Changed

Some of this grief isn’t about the future at all. It’s about the things they can’t do now, the things they’ve stopped doing, the version of your days that’s already different.

A palliative care handout from Alberta Health Services, written about families of people who are dying, not pets, says that in anticipatory grief you’re not only grieving a loss that will occur in the future, but also the past and present losses such as certain abilities and opportunities. It’s one of the truest lines we’ve read about this stretch.

The same handout describes swinging from hopeful one day to denial the next, and feeling pressure to spend every available minute together. It also says people can find themselves pulling back, at times, from the one they’re losing, and that this can be a defensive response, a way to avoid the pain of having someone you care for taken away.

If you’ve caught yourself doing something like it, it doesn’t cancel out the love underneath.

Anger, Bargaining and Questions of Faith

Anticipatory grief can show up as anger or frustration, and sometimes as questions about faith. It might be anger at the illness or the aging, at the timing, at how little of this you can control. Cornell’s veterinary college, writing about grief that can begin before, during, or after a death, lists anger and frustration among the ways it shows up.

The Alberta Health Services handout, written about families of people, not pets, says that having little control, or no way to prevent the loss, can leave you feeling helpless and frustrated. It adds that you may feel angry about having to go through something this difficult.

And if some of it flashes at your pet in a hard moment, it can still live right beside the love.

Beliefs can get complicated now, too, religious or not. Cornell’s same list includes bargaining with or feeling anger toward a higher power, questioning your beliefs, searching for meaning, and questioning the afterlife among the spiritual ways grief can show up. If that’s part of it for you, our hub on pet loss spirituality and beliefs gathers what different traditions say about animals and loss.

Anticipatory Grief Around Vet Visits and Decisions

Anticipatory grief can hit before an appointment, or while you wait for a call back. Dr. Carmack writes that many people fear when and how the end will come, and that guilt and doubt are common in this stretch. Those feelings can pull in different directions when choices need to be made.

She describes some people holding back from decisions they fear might bring the end sooner, and others feeling pressure to try everything they can. Some feel torn between their pet’s care and their work or family.

Before an appointment, it can help to write down the one question you keep coming back to, and ask it first. If you’re going back and forth, a quality-of-life consultation can give you another perspective. Dr. Carmack notes that virtual quality-of-life consultations can offer reassurance and second opinions to families who are struggling with a decision.

Is It Anticipatory Grief or Caregiver Fatigue?

Caregiver fatigue is about the work of caring for a sick pet. Anticipatory grief is about the loss, whether it’s coming or already happening in small pieces. They can arrive together, but they aren’t the same thing, and the questions below can help you sort out which one you’re feeling on a given day.

When researchers measured caregiver burden and anticipatory grief side by side in people caring for elderly or seriously ill animals, they concluded: Constructs of caregiver burden, anticipatory grief and QoL are not interchangeable. QoL there means the caregiver’s own quality of life, not the pet’s.

LSU’s veterinary school names some of what feeds caregiver fatigue: caring for an animal who has accidents in the house, giving subcutaneous fluids, managing multiple medications, helping with mobility. LSU adds that feeling worn down by it doesn’t mean you love your pet any less. Dr. Carmack describes how the physical, emotional, and financial demands of caring for a declining pet can become overwhelming.

In real life, they tangle together. Three questions can help pull them apart:

• Is it mostly about the tasks, like the medications, the cleanup, the broken sleep?
• Or is it about what’s ahead, or what’s already changed, even on a day the care is easy?
• If someone else can take a turn, does it ease a little, or does it follow you everywhere?

We think the answer points to what kind of help to ask for: hands for the work, which our guide to pet caregiver fatigue covers, or people for the grief. Some days, it’s both.

Is It Anticipatory Grief or Depression?

Anticipatory grief and depression can look alike, and they can overlap. Guidance on grief after a death, written about people, points to differences, like whether painful feelings come in waves or stay constant, and whether your sense of your own worth holds up. If the low feeling stays or daily life slips, talk with a doctor or therapist.

Writing about anticipatory grief and depression in people, the National Cancer Institute says that while these domains may overlap, they have distinctly separate properties. Its section on grief after a death names some of what grief and depression share, like insomnia, guilt, ruminating, and lack of motivation. Here’s how it says psychiatry’s diagnostic manual tells them apart:

• In grief, painful feelings tend to come in waves and are often mixed with positive memories. In depression, mood stays negative.
• The main feeling in grief is often emptiness. Depression is a long, sustained low mood and not being able to expect any pleasure or happiness.
• Self-esteem usually holds up through grief. In major depression, feelings of worthlessness and self-loathing are common.

A declining pet’s care can bring depression and anxiety along with it. Dr. Carmack names fatigue, depression, anxiety, and physical symptoms caused by stress among what caregivers can experience.

You don’t need to sort it out on your own. A doctor, a therapist, or a pet loss grief counselor can help you figure out what you’re carrying. Psychologist Regina Josell, speaking to Cleveland Clinic about anticipatory grief in people, says you don’t have to wait for things to become complicated to get help.

Why Anticipatory Grief Is Hard for Others to See

Anticipatory grief can be hard for others to see because there’s often nothing they recognize as a loss yet: no funeral, no cards, and maybe no words for it. People may ask how your pet is doing and not think to ask how you are.

A clinical reference on grief, quoting Kenneth Doka, defines disenfranchised grief as grief that persons experience when they incur a loss that is not or cannot be openly acknowledged, publicly mourned, or socially supported. It lists grief related to the loss of a pet as one example.

Grief that comes before a loss can be quieter still. You might not have the words, especially if what you’re feeling is nausea, numbness, or a strange calm.

If you want someone to know, you can say it first, in whatever words you have.

How Anticipatory Grief Can Look in Children and Partners

Anticipatory grief can look different in each person in the same home. Cornell’s veterinary college says we all respond differently to loss, and that children’s reactions will look different from an adult’s and vary by age. One person may want to talk about it every day while another goes quiet.

Children may not have words for what they’re feeling. Writing about children after a pet has died, LSU’s veterinary school notes they may struggle to express their feelings, either because of their age or because they don’t want to say them out loud. Cornell says listening is most important, and that if you’re sad, it’s okay to let your child see it. Our guide to helping kids prepare for a pet’s passing has sample wording by age, for when you’re ready to talk with them about what’s happening.

Between adults, timing can differ. One of you may feel it early on, while the other doesn’t feel much, or feels it differently. It can help to say plainly where you are: “I’m having a hard week with this. Where are you?”

Anticipatory Grief Symptoms Checklist

This checklist pulls together many of the signs on this page. It isn’t a test, and there’s no score. If some sound familiar, that’s a reason to go a little easier on yourself, and to tell someone if you’d like to, whether that’s a friend, a doctor, or a hotline.

Every sign here comes from the sources linked above. Most come from Cornell’s list, which covers grief before, during, or after a death. Dread, guilt, doubt, and a mind full of your pet come from LSU’s and Dr. Carmack’s writing on anticipatory grief, and a few signs come from a handout written about people.

• Dread or anxiety about what’s coming shows up, sometimes out of nowhere.
• Guilt or doubt creeps in, sometimes for no reason you can name.
• Thoughts of your pet and what’s ahead are hard to set down.
• Sleep is hard to come by, or you sleep more than usual.
• Your appetite or weight changes.
• Your body feels it: nausea, aches, or a tense, jittery restlessness.
• Focusing is hard, and everyday tasks feel heavier.
• None of this feels quite real.
• Sadness, numbness, loneliness, or a hopeless, helpless feeling settles in.
• Anger or frustration flares up, and sometimes the anger is aimed at a higher power.
• You feel withdrawn or isolated, or you want people closer than usual.
• Some days you feel hopeful; other days, it’s hard to take in.
• Grief attaches to things that have already changed.
• There’s pressure to spend every possible minute together.
• Now and then you pull back from your pet, which can be a way to brace for the hurt.

Some of these overlap with depression. If they don’t let up, or daily life is slipping, talk with a doctor or therapist. The depression section above covers how the two can differ.

What Recognizing Anticipatory Grief Symptoms Can Change

Recognizing anticipatory grief symptoms gives you a word for what’s been happening, and a word is something you can hand to someone else: a friend, a doctor, a vet you trust. It won’t make the grief smaller. It can make it easier to ask for the kind of help that fits.

If you’d like company, Dr. Carmack notes that local pet loss support groups often welcome people who are anticipating a loss. If you’d rather hear a voice, our list of free pet loss hotlines has numbers you can call when you’re ready to talk.

One small thing to try today: if one of the signs on this page sounds familiar, name it, out loud or on paper. When you’re ready for what helps, we’d start with our guide to coping with anticipatory grief for pets, with ideas for the hard days and the good ones.

And on a decent day, you’re allowed to have it.

On this topic

Keep reading

• Anticipatory Grief for Pets: How to Cope While They’re Here →
• Does Anticipatory Grief Make Pet Loss Easier or Harder? →
• The Emotional Toll of Long-Term Pet Caregiving →
• Anticipatory Grief: Coping When Your Senior Pet Ages →