Having kids around when a pet is euthanized.
One of our cats has been sick on and off for awhile now. We just got a call from our vet saying that he's almost certainly in or about to go into renal failure. His recommendation was euthanasia. My wife and I are talking about whether to have our 5 year there when it happens. Growing up I was there for my pets, but my wife wasn't. I think he's old enough to understand what's going on but my wife disagrees and thinks he's still too young and it would just upset him. We had another cat die of old age three years ago, and we're always careful to say the cat died (not he went away or things like that). Has anyone had to deal with this?
PS - not my cat, random google picture.
Kids dont really understand what death is. No need to be there. Cat being gone is enough.
Cat doesnt care for your kid anyway
>>2015258
The cat sleeps in his bed and follows him around the house so if disagree about that at least.
>>2015254
Exposure is good, and lying about death is bad. The more lies you tell your kid in general, the more resentment he will ultimately feel towards you.
>>2015258
This. No need to traumatize your kid. He'll understand what happened. He doesn't need to fucking watch it. Stop getting parenting advice from /pol/.
>>2015273
I hope to christ you never have children. You're going to fuck them all up trying to make them "hard" and they'll end up hating you for it.
death isn't something that should be treated as a "traumatizing" or "negative" thing that should be shunned and hidden. it's a part of life that should be regarded with just as much reverence and awe as birth. i think if you're going to let your kid be there you should have a talk about death in general. teach them about trophic levels, how energy goes on, the grander scale of the universe and other things like that. i think letting them see that will teach them the value of having an animal and re-enforce that it's not just a toy. also make sure that you let them know it's good to mourn and to think of all the fun times that were had in the cat's life. there's no need to coddle your child from something so natural (inb4 someone makes the argument that it's the same as letting a child watch adult pornography). it's not really about desensitizing your kid or anything like that, it's about letting them know how precious life is.
>>2015299
Pet death? Traumatization? This is the first im hearing of this. I lost plenty of pets before entering elementary school, including 2 rats, 2 mice, a cat, and a bird (most of the pets were around a while before i was born) and i saw their corpses every time, and i cried every time, but i got over it every time
But other than that, i was never beaten, starved, or thrown out into the wilderness with a pocket knife, and im certainly no psychopath with no concern for animal life. If i am traumatized in any way, it's so subconscious that it's completely meaningless. There's more finesse to this than what you're saying. That being said, maybe this situation is different if you just have one pet, so maybe I have the wrong idea here
Euthenasia is a really touchy subject that really shouldn't be discussed untill your kid is old enough cause they don't really understand suffering and would want the cat to live through the pain. 5 seems a little young
>>2015254
I wouldnt want my child to be there simply because I dont want to have to keep an eye on my child when all my focus should be on my pet.
Just explain that the cat died. Though if you truely want to bring him I dont see the harm, but dying and euthanasia are two completely different things and Im not aure a 5 year old can understand euthanasia.
I learned young, my cat chose my room to die in when I was six or so. We didn't move her. Dad and I took turns dripping water into her mouth until she went. We wrapped her in velvet and buried her together.
I actually reacted much, much worse to when he took our other cat away to be euthanized a year or so earlier. He came home with an empty box, and the cat had been mass cremated. That was much more traumatic for me than watching the previous cat die. I had no closure. I cried harder when I found out he didn't bring the ashes home, so I couldn't even put him under the rose bush.
Every kid is different, though, and it's hard to tell in the moment what the best choice is for the individual. In the end, I'd say it's probably not necessary to let the kid be there while the cat passes, but you should try to keep a momento or bury the cat/spread the ashes together.
>>2015353
Not the previous cat. The later cat.
I think you should skip bringing the kid along, but you should bring the body home so he can say goodby. You can talk about how nice a cat he was, and your kid can say some nice things.
I agree it's important to teach kids about death and grief. However, not every euthanasia is calm and clean. What if the cat struggles, or vomits or has a seizure? That can be hard on anyone.
This is alot more common then you think in the horse/ranch world.
You dog and catlovers really need to get over yourselves and acknowledge yourselves as such. it's hilarious going through my animal science classes and the most close minded people are the dog and cat students. Hell, even when some animals just needed care, big or small, alot of them realized they didn't want to deal with animals when they werent cute and fluffy anymore.
