Good Grief: Finding Peace After Pet Loss: Personal and Professional Insights on the Animal Lover's Unique Grieving Process

by Sid Korpi

Author Sid Korpi explains, “The pain of losing a beloved animal companion is unlike any other. However, because our society on the whole discounts our grief as frivolous since we’ve "merely lost an animal," too many of us feel we must keep silent in our anguish or be labeled somehow defective. Good Finding Peace After Pet Loss ends the misperception that we must suffer in solitary confinement and thus prolong, or stay permanently stuck in, our grief. The book melds the author’s personal perspectives, as both a pet lover and animal chaplain, and astounding stories with those of professionals (such as veterinarians, animal communicators, and religious leaders) and other animal lovers the world over to help you make the pet-grieving process as positive as possible.

Genres: Nonfiction

317 pages, Paperback

First published August 24, 2009

About the author

Sid Korpi has combined her decades of varied professional experienceas an editor, writer, journalist, English teacher, actor, and ordained minister/animal chaplainwith her lifelong devotion to the animal companions who have blessed and shared her life in creating "Good Grief: Finding Peace After Pet Loss." She lives in Minneapolis with her husband and their seven animal family members, Blanche, Keely and Ambrose (Westies); Gile and Xander (cats); and Atticus and Scout (finches)."

Reviews

[Koren · Rating 3 out of 5]

Found this book at a library book sale and was hoping it would be helpful. I cried through most of this book. I lost my dog last year that I had for 13 years and still miss him so much and now in the last two months I have lost 2 cats. One was a stray that I had been feeding and had tamed him quite a bit and the other I found as a stray when he was around 3 months old and had for 4 years. I read this book wondering why reading about other people's losses would be helpful and read the stories about pets contacting their humans after death with a bit of skepticism. But at the end of the book I read this: Mourning following a loss is inevitable, appropriate, even neccessary, but suffering interminable misery is a choice we make. Going forward, I am going to try to remember this.

[Gabby · Rating 3 out of 5]

I started reading this just days after my kitten passed away from a horrible disease. While I have lost pets before, the depth of my grief for my lost kitten was deeper than anything I have experienced (am still experiencing, since it was almost a month since I lost her). I felt that, especially at work, I would have to hold in a lot of my tears and my grief, and reading this book, allowed me to freely shed tears, and I do know this did help alleviate the burden on my soul somewhat.

This book was filled with a lot of personal anecdotes that were collected from many people. It was comforting to know that there are many that grieve for their pets as I grieve. There were also sections on different approaches to grief and honoring one's pet, including mentions of spirituality and faith.

As another reviewer mentioned, I had hoped that this book would have been a little more clinical (but still compassionate) in helping me recognize and honor my grief and also ways to work through it.

As I read this book and am experiencing grief, I also recognize that there is a bout of depression hanging over me, which has been hard to shake. I have tried some of the approaches mentioned in this book to help, and also a few mentions from others on ways to ease my soul's suffering. It has helped, but I definitely might try other books to see what they have to say.

I will say that there are also a few experiences in the anecdotes that I wish I were experiencing (pet come to you in a dream; feel them close; letting you know they're still there), but perhaps that's not for me. I do know that one day I will see my beautiful little Sumi again, in the next life, but oh, how I do miss her!

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall, the book was a helpful band-aid during the grieving process. Some parts were better than others. Regardless, it's was comforting to read about similar people who love and grieve the loss of their pets like the family members/children they are.

[Sid Korpi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Full disclosure: I wrote this book. I'd be nuts not to love it!

[Meagan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Overall the book just felt redundant. While I appreciated the different stories at some point they just oversaturated the book. The author also had a rather spirituality heavy approach to grief, ignoring more secular beliefs.

[Natalie Gruchow · Rating 3 out of 5]

Too many submitted stories, they were all sweet but I found myself skimming over those. I did enjoy this book though and found it helpful and relatable.

[E · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book did not provide quite as much direct comfort in the face of loss as I would have wanted. But it brought healing in different, unexpected ways, too.

If you're a hardcore skeptic about souls, the afterlife, and that kind of thing, you'll probably find this one annoying. If you have even an inkling of belief, though, you'll get something out of it.