My Mom's beloved little Peanut has passed away, how do I tell my children?

[DisneyBabies]

Hi everyone. I posted this on another forum yesterday, but no one responded, so I was hoping someone here could help me.

The title says it all, or at least most of it. My mom called early this morning to tell us that Peanut passed away last night. For the last year or so he has been having these seizures and they don't usually cause any damage, they just scare and exhaust him (which is bad enough). Well, my mom and step-dad went on their yearly vacation and Peanut went to the doggy daycare (the lady has datshunds (sp?) of her own, so Peanut stays in her home with her and her family; He LOVED doggy daycare ). Well, when they went to pick him up yesterday morning, she told them that he had a seizure while they were gone and it seemed to make him sicker than usual. They got him home and he wanted to be held all day; He didn't want to walk or eat although he did drink a little and slept a lot. Last night they woke up and he seemed to be a lot worse than when they went to bed and mom said he died a few minutes after that .

We haven't told the children yet because we have no clue how to explain. We have tried to talk about Heaven on occasion when the children ask, but they are 3 and 5 years old, so they still don't really understand. We tell them that Heaven is where God and Jesus live and it is on the other side of the sky. But how do I explain why Peanut won't be there when we go see Nanny and PaPaw for halloween? Are there any books? Help please.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

Yes, there are a lot of books available today for this very thing.

Here's an Amazon link, but if it doesn't work, type in Dog Heaven by Cynthia Rylant.

B&N and Borders have some of these in stock if you want the book right away.

You can also read them the story about the Rainbow Bridge.

It might help if they have a little ceremony for Peanut next time they go over your parents' house.

It sounds as if Peanut was very well loved. So sorry.

 

[Belle1997]

hi there, hugs I know how hard it is. One think that helped when I lost my first dog was to make a collage of pictures surround by the the Rainbow bridge story. We talked about all the pics we had.

We talked about how happy she would be right now chasing bunnies and running.

We also as a family lit a candle for the first month. It helped us feel better and let our dog Sparkie know we missed her and were thinking of her.

 

[DisneyBabies]

Thank you so much for your help. I told my DH yesterday that I was actually kind of glad to have an excuse not to tell the kids about Peanut right away because I really don't want to tell them at all. I did find the book Dog Heaven by Cynthia Rylant and I am picking it up from our library today. I am really hoping it helps the kids understand.

Peanut is loved very much especially by the children. I'm not sure how any of us will react when we go to mom's house next month and Nuttty doesn't come running as soon as our car comes in the driveway. He comes running right up to the car and waits until we open the door for him to get in and "rides" with us while we go the last 10 feet to park our car .

I miss him.