Coleen Ellis understands and appreciates the depth of love pet guardians have for their companion animals.
She’s felt it many times over.
Her dogs, her fur kids, are her world and as each one leaves her physical world she finds ways thoughtful, impactful ways to honor the lives they lived here on Earth with her.
Coleen started the nation’s first stand-alone pet funeral home, Pet Angel Memorial Center, which now has locations across the Midwest, southeast and Carolinas.
Coleen also recently released her first book, Pet Parents: A Journey Through Unconditional Love and Grief.
She also operates Two Hearts Pet Loss Center, an online resource for pet professionals to learn more about the grief journey pet parents endure. I am a certified pet loss grief companion under Two Hearts Pet Loss Center.
She is a student herself of Dr. Alan Wolfelt, who teaches that people in grief need a companion, someone to listen and be present, rather than treatment.
Because we are not broken. We simply need others to witness our pain and loss, and support us on our new paths.
Coleen is an incredibly engaging, dynamic interview and I am so proud to have my teacher, my mentor and my friend on the podcast today to talk about the ways we can keep our best fur friends alive in our hearts and in our stories.
And with that, we talk about how to make those final days with your pet peaceful, empowering and memorable.
Have a listen. It is a long one but Coleen gives us so much great information and advice.
What to listen for:
What to listen for:
8:56: What will you do right now to make the end perfect?
11:30: The rules for pet loss are written by the 30% who don’t get it.
31:24: How we can honor the memories of our pets through art.
43:05: Making the decision to attend — or not — your pet’s euthanasia
Find Coleen:
Buy her book on Amazon:
Angela Schneider
Coleen Ellis understands and appreciates the depth of love pet guardians have for their companion animals.
She’s felt it many times over.
Her dogs, her fur kids, are her world and as each one leaves her physical world she finds ways thoughtful, impactful ways to honor the lives they lived here on Earth with her.
Coleen started the nation’s first stand-alone pet funeral home, Pet Angel Memorial Center, which now has locations across the Midwest, southeast and Carolinas.
Coleen also recently released her first book, Pet Parents: A Journey Through Unconditional Love and Grief.
She also operates Two Hearts Pet Loss Center, an online resource for pet professionals to learn more about the grief journey pet parents endure. I am a certified pet loss grief companion under Two Hearts Pet Loss Center.
She is a student herself of Dr. Alan Wolfelt, who teaches that people in grief need a companion, someone to listen and be present, rather than treatment.
Because we are not broken. We simply need others to witness our pain and loss, and support us on our new paths.
Coleen is an incredibly engaging, dynamic interview and I am so proud to have my teacher, my mentor and my friend on the podcast today to talk about the ways we can keep our best fur friends alive in our hearts and in our stories.
And with that, we talk about how to make those final days with your pet peaceful, empowering and memorable.
Have a listen. It is a long one but Coleen gives us so much great information and advice.
Angela
Good morning, Coleen. How are you today?
Coleen Ellis
Oh, I’m better now. I’m so good.
Angela
I freaking love your energy. Oh my gosh.
Coleen
Right back at you. We’re probably going to have to set a timer here because I have a feeling we could go on for days.
Angela
I think that this could be like hours if we let it, yeah. Your journey in pet loss grief starts in 2003 when your girl Mico came down with cancer. Can you share a little about that story?
Coleen
Yeah, you know, I want to back up a tiny bit from there and my journey in death care, let’s start there. That was actually my career right out of college. You know, it’s one of these things that who’d have thunk in college, you’re like, oh, man, I’m gonna get into death care when I graduate. That’s how we’re gonna rock this world. But I did. And I gotta tell you, I find it so rewarding to be able to help people with this one part of win in life. And so let’s go with her.
She was my girl. I didn’t I didn’t have skin kids. I didn’t have any kids. So I had fur kids. And I had a fur kid. And she was my first fur kid. And so she got everything that an only child should have. I mean, she had a nanny, she traveled everywhere with me. She had her own clothes. She had everything. She was rotten. And I love your photography. Because finally one year my mother said to me, she said, Coleen, I know you get her picture taken every year. And she said, but we’re probably not changing much our way. And I’m like, Au contraire, I can see a change every year.
Girl, I forgot to tell you this story. Can I tell you a story real quick about photography?
Angela
Absolutely. I’m here for it.
Coleen
There was a photography studio. And she was probably just a couple years old. And I thought I am gonna go get her professional portraits taken, right. So I called this photography studio and I make I make an appointment. Now this would have been in 1991. I just dated everything here. 1991 Because she was only two years old.
Angela
Hey, that was even still film camera. So …
Coleen
It was because when I went to view the photos, I took a girlfriend of mine to view the pictures. And literally they set us in this room probably 10 by 10. And it was like a really small theater. And they pulled back curtains and started playing, you know, some sort of You Oughtta Be in Pictures. I don’t even know what it was. But my girlfriend is like, Is this happening? Is this happening right now? Like, yes. You better settle in. We had our popcorn and we were watching her show.
So anyway, I call us photography studio. And I said, I want to bring my daughter in for pictures. And yep. So I show up with her. And I’m checking in and they keep looking around me like, did you bring your daughter and I go, mmhmm, I did. Like I’m still can’t see her. And she’s all nine pounds. She’s a little tiny thing. So I, I kind of forced her over the desk, I go right here. And they looked at me and they go, we don’t do dog photography. And I said, You know what? I said, I just read your contract. And it doesn’t say that in your contract. So today we’re going to take pictures, aren’t we?
And we marched to the back of that studio. And girl, I gotta tell you something. The photographer comes out and he’s like, I’m not used to this. And I said, I’ll help you. Oh, I know. I know what she responds to. I know what words you can say. So we’re gonna get the perfect shot. I know all this kind of stuff. And so he is now having a blast. I’m saying the word treat. I’m saying go for a ride in the car. I’m saying all the stuff, you know that we know ears are gonna go up and all that. My most priceless picture though, was he was changing the film in his camera. Gosh, we’re dating ourselves so badly. He was changing the film. And she laid her head he had her on a chair. And she laid her head down and she cocked her head. And she didn’t take her eye off of him like I don’t know what you’re doing.
And it was the most priceless reflective photo. And I am telling you about two months later, I drove by that photography studio, which sat on a prominent road. And there she was bigger than life in the window with a sign that said we now do dog photography.
Angela
Oh my gosh, you changed somebody’s world.
Coleen
I love that.
So OK, so that kind of tells you what she meant to me. That kind of helps us. So now we’re approaching the day, and I was in the funeral industry. And man, I tell you what, when the day came it, it rocked my world and I’m probably like a lot of your listeners here. I didn’t know what my options were. I mean, I knew what my options were when people died, right. And I’ll never forget the veterinarian coming in and saying to my husband, what our what our option was at that point at that clinic, which was a really, really, really unacceptable option.
And I said, No, not happening here, not with my baby girl. And I said, we’re gonna load her up and she’ll come home with us. And like I said, she’s all of nine pounds, I scooped her up, took her home, we found a human funeral home that finally helped me. And but prior to that, we kept her home for a couple days, I had to arrange everything, I had to arrange my own little funeral. I had to arrange my own little memorialization pieces, I had to do everything. Nobody was there to help me.
In fact, when I went to the funeral home and mentioned that I wanted an urn, they said, you know, people just don’t do that. People don’t do that. And I said, well, I apparently am not them. Yes, I will. And I did a bunch for her because it’s what I wanted to do for her.
And as she was dying, Angela, I started looking around. And I said, Where? Where are the operations that handle people and pets? Like, I know, we handle people and people? Where is that? And I didn’t find what I believed it should look like. And so I created it. And she is the legacy for me behind the push in the why fire in my belly. That every day I get up and I say why do I do what I do when it comes to end of life care for pets, and it comes back to Mico, and she is my why fire. And she drives me every day that every Mico out there, and Bellas, and all of them, they all deserve to have dignity and respect in the end of life walk and you know who else deserves that? Angela, you and I, you and I, because our heart has just been ripped out of our body.
And I want something that gives both of those the dignity and the respect, and the support and the space and everything it deserves to honor this precious little creature who was put here for one reason: to love me.
Angela
When you talk about dignity and death, and you having been in the industry for so long, have we gotten better when it comes to pets and end of life care? I mean, I know that there are support and services out there now. I don’t know that the average pet guardian is knowledgeable enough about them. And that’s why, that’s one of the reasons I’m doing what I’m doing. So has it gotten better in your eyes?
Coleen
You know, when it’s gotten better is when a pet parent has been empowered to ask for what they need. And that’s when it’s gotten better. And but now let’s be real. We don’t wake up. If I’ve said this once I’ve said it a million times. We don’t wake up on a bright sunshiny morning and say today I’m gonna go figure out what my death care options are going to be for my precious, beloved Bella, we don’t do that. OK. We say one day, one day, I’ll figure it out. We say if it happens, right? If it happens, no, it’s a when, it’s going to be a when.
And then we get in this position, that we’re making knee jerk reactions because it’s now and we didn’t stop and think. And I tell people, here’s how it gets better. It is going to happen, OK? When you’re there, let’s talk about it in a few different aspects. When you’re there. What I want you to do is I want you to project yourself out six months from now. And I want you to look back on this end of life walk. And I want you to ask yourself, what will I do right now to make the end perfect. When I look back on this day, six months from now, I don’t want to say dang, I wish I would have or boy he would have really loved … I want you to do that.
If he got such great joy out of barking at the UPS guy, load him in that wagon to go chase that UPS guy. If he loved McDonald’s nuggets, I want you to go get him McNuggets 19 times today. I want you to do everything.
Oh man. I gotta tell you a story. I had this, I had this girl. I was at a veterinary conference and here she comes down the exhibit hall and she’s waving her hands because she’s Coleen, Coleen. And I get to her and I’m thinking man, I wish I could remember when I saw you. And she said last year when we were together and I must have sat next to her at something. She said I shared with you that it was time for my girl. It was time. And she said, you told me about the six month,s you know, think about the six months. And she goes, I did. That’s exactly what I did. And now she’s sobbing. And she says Coleen, the end was absolutely perfect.
(dog barking in background)
Angela
She has an opinion.
Coleen
And this one’s going to answer her.
She says, I gotta tell you what I did. She said the weekend before we put her to peace. She said, I went and I painted her portrait. And she said, then the next few days we did our bucket list items … Wednesday was the day. And she said, so I went out in the in the driveway, and I painted a rainbow with sidewalk chalk. And she said, I invited all my friends and family over to say their goodbyes. And when the time came, we went out in the rainbow, put her to peace, walked across the proverbial Rainbow Bridge. And she came in and she laid her baby in state under the portrait, and for the next two days, had a visitation.
She backed up and said hello, as she prepared to say goodbye. Do you love it? It’s so when you think back on that, and as a family to say, you know, when it comes to end of life, we move from cure to care. And I know there’s nothing more that can be done, I know what’s going to happen, I’m going to take this event, either of death or euthanasia, both, I’m going to take this event, and I’m going to make it an experience. And during the time that maybe the veterinarian’s there, she’s going to be eating chocolate, she’s going to, she’s going to be having ice cream, she’s going to have a little slice of heaven right here on Earth.
And I want you to … we have to plan those things. We plan those things. So the end can be perfect. And we can look back and say yeah, you know what, I don’t like that it happens either. But there’s nothing we can do about it, it’s going to happen. What I want you to do is to look back on it and say it was exactly as it should have been, she went out exactly like she lived, like we lived.
Angela
When you think about end of life care for human, we often plan our own end. We have a will, we disperse the things that we have in the ways that we want to. We can pick our own casket, we can ask for whomever to do the eulogy, we can write our own eulogies if we want. We plan it out. Is it because pet end of life, pet care is still such a stigmatized area?Is it a shameful piece or an embarrassing piece to put yourself out there and say, I’m doing this for my dog? When, when at the core of it, all you’re really saying is I love my dog that damn much.
Coleen
You know what, let’s unpack that a second. 70% of our population has a pet. OK, one more stat. Well, actually a couple more stats. 83% of the 70% refer to themselves as mommy and daddy. So you and I, we look at our pets as family members, right?
Angela
Totally.
Coleen
Pet loss is still referred to as a very disenfranchised grief. Here’s what’s interesting. The rules for pet loss, the rules for pet grief, the rules for pet mourning, the rules for pet rituals are written by the 30% who don’t get it. Right? So the 30% turned to us and say, Angela, you are extreme. I mean, it’s just a dog, you should probably get over that. Yeah, and you’re gonna have a funeral. I mean, that’s just that’s just downright out there. You just need to bring that in a little bit.
And so instead in our very vulnerable state of this grief and this loss, and the fear of being shamed, we choose to do nothing. Because, first of all, I’m struggling, I’m hurting. And so to have the strength to do something, I don’t have that strength. OK? I am fearful of who I ask to help me. For fear of them shaming me and saying you don’t need that. You just need to suck it up and get back to work tomorrow. And it’s all going to go away. OK?
And so instead of doing any of that we do nothing. This is the six month goal that I keep talking about. I want to I want to give you permission, I want to give you permission to do whatever you want to do. And I find it interesting when people come in and they say to me, I want to have a service for my animal, I say great. And when they say that, a lot of the times they whisper it to me. And I say I think that’s awesome. They’re like, don’t you think people think I’m crazy? So what do we care about what people think? What do we care? What do we care?
Let me tell you something in my kitchen right over there. Mealtime in our house is a very happy time for animals. OK, I have every food bowl from every animal living and deceased, that line is my kitchen. Oh, that’s my way to pay tribute to them for a very special time in our house. And people kind of look at me and they’re like, what do other people think? And I said, what do I care? And if they don’t like it, they can leave my house. It’s my mortgage. It’s my house. And if you don’t like all the food bowls lining up there, I don’t care. I don’t care.
I gotta tell you. I did a funeral service for a little kitty cat. I’ll never forget this. His name was Vincent. A little orange tabby cat. He was so beautiful. His mommy Vicki … beautiful relationship. Beautiful funeral service, memorial service. Memorial service means nobody present. So we had Vincent’s urn there. OK. After the service was over, this gentleman came up to me in a little tear in his eye. And he says, and I always hate this because I’m like, man, I’m about to hear something. I’m not going to unhear ever. When he says to me, can I have a confession? I’m like, Oh, seriously, right now. Here we go. Here we go. And he goes, I have a confession to make. I said, OK, what? And he goes, I only came here to the funeral day because I love Vicki. He goes, but I came here to the funeral today, because I’ve never been to a funeral for a cat. And I just wanted to see what it was like. I said, oh, I said, So what do you think? And he started crying. And he goes, all I can tell you is I hope my funeral service is as beautiful as this one was. Oh, love that. But just yeah. And you know that the love we have our animals? I mean, it’s just, it just radiates the room. It just radiates the room. How can you not love that?
Angela
How do we move more towards a place of acceptance for people like us? Or do we bother caring? Do we just take care of each other?
Coleen
Well, we take care of each other and we help each other. We help each other get through it. We don’t get over it. We don’t get over it. It becomes a part of us. And you know, I gotta tell you. It wasn’t that long ago, my husband and I were out. Mico’s been gone almost 20 years, almost 20 years. And we were out to dinner and I just … I had a grief burst. Angela had a great verse right there in the restaurant and the fondue restaurant. I felt so sorry for the waiters. He was like, Can I … Oh, never mind. He got all freaked because I’m having a burst moment. Right?
Angela
Woman being emotional, red alert, woman being emotional.
Coleen
Oh, yeah, totally. And my husband was like, we’re just talking about a little doggie we miss. You know, just give us a minute. You know, and, and we had a little moment there for Mico, and it’s OK. It doesn’t mean you’re crazy. It doesn’t mean you’re stuck. It doesn’t mean any of that. WhatI want people to do is I want them to, to first of all be kind to themselves. OK. And that’s my first rule. I want you to be kinder to yourself, I want you to treat yourself like your own best friend who’s hurting because of the loss they’ve had. That’s what you are, be your own best friend, wherever you are right now is exactly where you should be.
And number three, honor the journey, honor the life you’ve shared, honor this chapter of your life. It who who this chapter right here as the name Bella on it, nobody else will have that chapter. It’s got Bella on it. And it’s a chapter in your life story. And so I want us to give ourselves permission to make space.
Let me tell you, here’s what I tell people. When grief, when she knocks I want you to open the door and let her in. And I want you to bring up a chair. And I want you to say I want you to sit down because I want to tell you all about Mico, because that girl rocked my world. She rocked my world, and I want you to know about her and let the world know about her. And I want you to listen to me.
I don’t, I don’t shut the door. I don’t lock it. You know, I always describe it. I know our listeners can’t see there’s like a soda bottle here that I’ve been sipping on. Grief for me … and I tell people like this. I describe it like this. They said pretend as if in my in my grief. I’m shaking up the soda bottle. Okay, because it’s how we feel were shaken up, right? I’m shaking up the soda bottle, and I keep this lid tight and keep it tight. And then one day, something happens that reminds me of her. And all of a sudden this lid just comes off and you know what will happen with a shaken up soda bottle? It explodes, right? That’s what we do. Versus with grief. Little bits of letting out that emotion, a little bit every day, every morning, we do a little bit to open that lid and to release that pressure, which doesn’t mean we’re over it, it doesn’t mean we’re never going to cry again.
It means we’ve reconciled and said, you know what, she, she has been a part of my life. She is now part of my story, forever a part of my story. And I remember her not in the physical way, because she’s not here anymore. I remember her in my memories. I remember her through this chapter that she had in my life. I remember her through the lessons that she taught me that now every day I do that thing, just for her, because she taught me that lesson. And that is how the chapters get to bleed together and move together to create my life story.
Angela
What an incredible segue to start talking about storytelling. I have a friend who she’s,she’s doing some of our podcasting with me. Her name is Darlene and she just lost her 14 year old husky last month. And it’s still, she’s still very much in the acute stages of grief. And you know, she’s not ashamed. And I love her for that. And she’ll break down with me, and I will, I will let her sit in that grief. And then I will just ask her a simple little question. Tell me about Kota’s ears. You know, and all of a sudden, she’ll start telling me a story about Kota’s ears. And then she starts to smile. And she starts to feel that love from Kota again. And I hope that it brings her a little bit of comfort to go back into that space where Kota is more present.
Coleen
I think the comfort, honey, I for me, I think the comfort is the fact that you asked her about him. That’s the comfort. You know, the honor I get is to tell you about him to tell you about Kota’s ears and you know, and 19,000 other questions that you can ask me about Kota. The fact that you asked me, the fact that you let me share, the fact that you let me share my story. You know, I tell companions that all the time I said when you ask somebody “”tell me about Kota’s ears,” and she gets to tell you about Kota’s ears that doesn’t come with “Well, can I tell you about my dog’s ears?” It doesn’t come with that. Right? You want to set that aside. Because right now, our world is so hungry for when we say how are you? And they want to say, “I want to tell you exactly how I am” versus “fine, because I don’t want you to really know” or “fine, because I’m not sure what will happen if I really tell you how I am. And that scares me a lot.”
My husband laughs at me all the time. He’s like Coleen, I think you’ve got something on your forehead that says “Just tell me everything” because I got it. I can handle it. And I hear things that I’ll never unhear. I hear things from people that other people are like, I’ve known them for years and I didn’t know that. I’m like, yeah, it’s right here.
Angela
I have that tattoo, too. Yeah, I do. Yeah. I’m OK with it.
Coleen
I am so OK with it.
Angela
I love hearing people’s stories.
Coleen
Me too. Me too. I just think the wisdom of stories and to make space and to active listen, you know, our world doesn’t active listen very well. And so to active listen, we here’s what I tell, when I do my classes. We listen to reply, we don’t listen to understand.
Angela
Completely.
Coleen
Right? And when we embrace … I call this an animal quotient, an AQ, what we learn from animals to be better people. When we embrace being curious longer, like a dog does. If you look at him, looking under a bush, man, they look hard, don’t they? They keep going not like “at least, good, I got it.” No, I want you to be curious longer. And I want you to say tell me more. Tell me more about Kota’s ears. Tell me more about Kota. Tell me about Kota. If Kota were to have a job, what do you think he would have done? What do you think his job would have been? How do you think Kota’s voice would have sounded?
Angela
One of the reasons I latched on to you so hard when I saw another interview with you is because of your intention around creating memories with your pet while they’re still alive, and especially in those end days. And as a professional pet photographer, that’s what I do. I create … I help my clients create those memories. I’m taking them on an experience, a journey, an adventure. And building a story for them to tell. Why is the memory and the storytelling so important to you?
Coleen
Angela, I have two answers for you on that one.
Answer number one. And I told you this before you hit the record button. Anybody can take a picture. We’ve all gotten iPhones now or whatever phone you have, anybody can take a picture. But to capture a memory is a completely different act. It’s a completely different act.
And this is the second answer, and then I’ll unpack both of them. I have a drawing of Mico that’s sitting above me on the top of this shelf, and it’s a pencil drawing. And it was done years and years and years ago. And I found this artist at a bakery and his work was just beautiful. And so I had him do this pencil drawing of Mico. What was interesting … it took I stared at I didn’t like it, the first one that he did, I didn’t like it. And I couldn’t figure out why. And finally, it dawned on me why I didn’t like it. His interpretation of her personality and her spirit was in her mouth. Whereas her personality and spirit were actually in her ears, you know what I’m talking about?
Angela
I do.
Coleen
And when it finally dawned on me that that’s why I didn’t like it is because he had made it in her mouth versus her ears. And I took it back, I said, you have to redo her mouth, that is not where her personality’s at, by the way, you’ve drawn this. And I think that the amazing work that you do, and to understand where where are your animal’s personality? Where’s their spirit? Where do you where do you feel the love from them coming from, and then tell me about the life that you all share together. And then you take all of those things, and you don’t take a picture, you capture, you capture a memory, you capture love, that’s completely different than the act of taking a picture completely different completely. And like I said, anybody can take a picture, but to capture what you capture, and for our listeners out there to capture more than just a picture is really a powerful, powerful thing that will happen.
Angela
Yeah. A few weeks ago, I took Bella to the coast to have a couple of sessions with two of my dog photographer friends. Because I can take epic pictures of Bella. I have taught her how to pose, she knows “hold your pose.” She knows you know, she knows to stand and she knows to not look at the camera because she can be a little bitch sometimes. But what I couldn’t do is get a great picture of the two of us together. And I will tell you, Coleen I just I’ve had my gallery showings now with both of my friends and I am throwing money at them in ways I never thought I would. I’m spending 1000s of dollars to get wall art and photo albums done. Because the work they did. in seeing the way Bella and I are together. I can’t do that myself. I can’t. That’s the value of what I do. And that’s the value of what my friends Marika and Holly do.
Coleen
And Angela, you know what is so key about what you just said? What is so key. And I do this in all my marketing as well. Those pictures behind you of Bella are absolutely spectacular. But do you know when, do you know when things jump off the page, off of the canvas, off of the whatever is when there’s a human in there that models the human-animal bond and it’s so tough with these precious babies, it’s so tough to not have that just exude when you’re sitting there with her, you know, and that and I tell my social (media) girl all the time is when you put a picture out, it’s got to have a human in it. Because that’s the power of our relationship. That’s the power of the bond is when you can see those things together.
And I’m going to back up just a tiny bit here too. You know, I think it’s one of those things that as we get to the end of life with our pets, we look back and say did I take enough? Did I take that? Did I capture enough? And I think it’s bigger than did I take enough pictures? But the bigger question is is did I capture enough of life and love and us and what we were together or did I capture enough of that. I go all the way into even the videos you know when capturing their walk, capturing how they bark. They all bark different, some raise their heads, some bark three times, whatever it may be. You know is all of that captured for perpetuity?
I have an urn that I wear a lot of times. This urn comes apart and in the urn is a USB port. And I’ve got my portraits of the babies. I’ve got their video, the audios of them barking, so I know it’s always close to me and the other half of the urn is the hair and fur and a whisker of all of my living and deceased babies. So they’re always right here next to my heart, every part of their being in the love.
Angela
Wow. What are some of the other ways we can hold close to the memories of our beloved pets other than, you know, photography and keeping bits of their fur and stuff? What are the ways we can build our stories around our dogs? Or pets?
Coleen
You know, the way I tell you what I could go off on two days with this one because you know the options are going to the options are going to mimic the things that everybody enjoys to do together. Yeah, I’ll give you one. I’ll give you one. I worked with a lady years ago, and she was a Great Pyrenees mama. And she and Pumpkin … Pumpkin was her heart. OK, Pumpkin was her heart. Do you know what she did with that Great Pyrenees from the minute Pumpkin came into her home to the minute Pumpkin died? If she brushed that dog and sent that that fur off and had it woven into yarn, and at the very end of Pumpkin’s life, she was just about an inch shy of a king-sized blanket for her bed. So when Pumpkin died, I shaved Pumpkin, which I know the spinners don’t like that it was shaved but it was our last … it was what we had. And so I shaved and she finished out her blanket.
So my story there is that whether it’s creating a diamond, I have a friend who has a company called Let Your Love Grow where we can mix the ashes with a product that makes it very good for our ground to ash to scatter ashes is bad for the ground. But it takes and makes it very good. So for gardeners a beautiful way to say this was Harry’s garden, I’ve done a rock out there by my garden pond where I swear to you every time after grooming — after grooming, only after grooming — he’d go stand in a dirty garden pond. So there is now a rock out there that has his actual paw print on it. And it says Harry’s Pond. And so we need that.
So the amount of relationships and how we mix with our pets and what we do and in the personalities and the things that create memories like him standing in my garden pond. Those are all the various ways that we can capture those memories, and that we can do things to honor those memories.
Some people make diamonds out of ashes, some people again scatter the ashes, tons of things that you can do. People sometimes get all worked up. I know you’re looking there and there’s a portrait right there. Of one of my little pups. Yeah, he’s actually a Yorkie Chihuahua. That is an actual portrait on a canvas that was sent to me by a friend when Crisco died. It’s, it’s a canvas, it’s a wrap canvas. And when that showed up, and I unwrapped it, my husband gasped, and he said, Coleen, all of those colors on that piece are exactly what I saw on Crisco’s urn. So do you know what we did? We cut the back away from that canvas print and his ashes are in the back.
Angela
Oh, that’s beautiful.
Coleen
So whether it’s cutting a tennis ball and putting the ashes in there … my brother, I’m from western Kansas, my brother’s a hunter. He has German shorthaired pointers. And after his dogs die, or when his dogs die, he will wrap up hunting season, pheasant hunting season, as he’s loaded their ashes into shotgun shells. And the final shot of the season is of those ashes across the favorite field of that dog.
So you see how we could talk for days?
Angela
Yeah.
Coleen
So it’s really for people to kind of back up we have I can’t tell you how many people I’ve told them when they share with me what a treat hound their dog is, I’m like then use his treat jar. That’s the perfect urn for your dog. It really is yours, the treat jar.
So there are so many ways that you can take what they love and craft that in to be their permanent memorial and, and to, you know, put those up and to show those. That little, the toy right next to his piece up there is a free HeartGuard snowman that came out when he was a puppy. And I’m not even going to tell you what year because he was almost 17 when he died. And he carried those everywhere. I had to do an all call after he tore up a couple, I put out an all call for HeartGuard snowmans, I need HeartGuard snowmans. And so one went to cremation, and that one will forever be by his urn.
Angela
That’s amazing. Really what we’re talking about here is experiencing your pet. And learning to live more in the moment in the way that they do, aren’t we?
Coleen
Absolutely. Yeah. And think about the power of that. You know, I always talk about the gift that our animals give us as presence. And it’s always presence. And that’s why I love when those guys are sitting right me. They’re sitting right behind me, they are my strength. There’s days I wear an urn that has all the hair and fur. I’ve got another pendant that I wear that is Mico’s paw print. And so every day that I get up, I just kind of feel where I’m at that day and what I need, what kind of strength I need. And sometimes it’s a legacy strength from Mico. And sometimes I’m like, I just need y’all behind me right now. I just need y’all behind me. So I’ll wear one of those. But it, but it’s living in the moment. It’s honoring, it’s honoring the gift of presence, and honoring the gifts that they give us in that way. And animals are so fabulous about teaching us how to just be, just be in the moment.
Angela
Yeah. And when I need to find my center, I take Bella and I go for a hike. And I talk to Shep and I ask him for some guidance on where I’m supposed to be and what I’m supposed to do because I believe that he put me on the path to where I’m supposed to be. And so I trust in him to tell me where I’m supposed to go. Yeah.
Coleen
And you know what, let’s talk about that one second. Because I get a lot of people that feel guilty when they get a, when they get a Bella, you know, following a Shep. And you know, first of all, I tell them, we are not going to use the word replacement, another personality. And that’s, that is too big of a request to ask them to replace. Don’t do that. And I sent him when the time is right. And I don’t say go do this right now. I say when the time is right. Then if you’re ready, bring another baby into your home. OK, when the time’s right, and here’s what I want you to remember. Animals, if there’s another animal in the house, or when we bring this one in, they make the best therapists there are. So you can sit over there and cuddle up on that couch and set Bella up next to you and say “I got to talk about Shep today.” Because it’s remembering Shep day. And you know what? They sit right there and listen, they don’t tell you “We have heard this story. Are we seriously going to talk about this one again? We’ve been around this barn. We’ve been around this barn countless times.” Oh, you know what? They sat right there and they look at you and they say in their eyes. Tell me more. Mama. Tell me about Shep. They are the best therapists there is.
Angela
I knew she wasn’t replacing him. I knew he opened my heart up for her.
Coleen
Oh, love that. Love that.
Angela
Because my heart was very closed before I met him. I didn’t, I didn’t trust, I didn’t even know the meaning of the word love until I met him.
And now you know, there’s no question. I loved him. I love him. I still love him and that love is never going to die. But, and I don’t feel bad in saying this. I love her more than I could have ever loved him, because he allowed me the space to learn how to do that.
Coleen
Yeah. And isn’t that the cool thing about animals? It’s OK to tell them you have a favorite. They don’t care.
Angela
They don’t care. She’s gonna be over it pretty quickly.
Coleen
Totally versus skin children. You’re like Mom, seriously, I’m not your favorite. No, uh uh, the middle one I loved him most.
Angela
You have resources on the Two Hearts Pet Loss Center website. One of them is the template for a bucket list. How important is it that we do bucket list items with our pets when we know their time is coming?
Coleen
You know I think the importance comes if that’s important to you. And again, I’m gonna, I’m going to talk about the six-month rule, OK? So I want you to put yourself out six months from now, look back on today, and are there things that you think should be checked off? And you think things that you could do that could create those final memories? OK, then if that’s the case, do the bucket list, do the bucket list.
And sometimes, here’s what else I tell people. Let’s just say you call this morning, and you set the appointment, and this afternoon is going to be the time, OK? And then all of a sudden, you go, Oh, my gosh, I didn’t … I didn’t even know about a bucket list. I didn’t even know about a bucket. We didn’t do a bucket list. I say yes, yes, you can. You still have time to take that walk in the park, you still have time to, to do something that as you stop for a minute, as you stop for a minute, and to say, what can I do over the next few hours that can give me those final memories.
I’ll give you another story. Sometimes it’s not about the walk. But it’s about the experience of the event, OK? And here’s what I mean by that. I had a group I was working with in Canada, and they were … one of our vets was going to be going out that evening to assist a family with their kitty cat. And I had asked the young lady who had set the appointment, I said to the mommy of the kitty cat is there anything, you know, interesting to you about the kitty cat? She said yes. She said she made mention that the kitty cat loved her husband’s socks. And I said, so what I might recommend when we get to the house tonight is that we say, might I recommend we put this kitty cat to peace in your husband’s sock drawer.
And they did. And imagine, Angela, now as they think about, as they think about that final act of love. They’re looking down and that little pussycat is laying in his heaven on earth, in the sock drawer. Something you will never unsee in that when you think about kitty cat. In the end of the pussycat’s life, the thing that you think about is the look on his little face laying in that sock drawer.
So those are the things that I talk to families about too is when the day comes, when the time comes. I want you to even be empowered to say I want the end to happen here. Because he loved that. I can’t tell you how many families I’ve gone to assist and the dog was … and the dog was in the backseat of the car, because that’s where he loved to be. And so the veterinarian put him in the backseat of the car.
The empowerment, the empowerment to say, this is what I want the end to look like. Because it won’t happen. How do you want it to look?
Angela
Is it a privilege to, you know, there are a lot of people out there who think I don’t know if I can do that. I don’t know if I want to be in the room. I don’t want to be there when my dog dies. And again, you know, we talk about the individual experience and I think it’s OK to not be there if you can’t be there. But at the same time, is it not really or is it really more a privilege in you know, the act, the ultimate act of compassion and love to say goodbye to your pet when your pet needs to say goodbye? Did I jumble that up too much?
Coleen
No, I think I got you, I think I got you. I think people want them to know what they can handle. OK, I want them to know what they can handle. However, let’s go back to the six-month rule again. Do you believe that you’re going to look back on this day, six months from now and feel guilty because you weren’t there to say goodbye?
And I am not saying that to … to make that be a judgmental question, or one to shame you. All I want you to do is answer the question, if you believe — I know I had to do this with my father, when my brothers called and said we’re there, you coming home? And I had to stop and think and put myself out years from then and say, “How will I feel with the decision I just made” and I needed to be comfortable with that. And I’ve still been comfortable all these years later. I’m comfortable with it.
But I stopped and I thought about it and I was mindful and I was intentional with the decision that I made. And that’s what I want pet parents to do. I want them to be very mindful of the decision that they’re making, to be there, to not be there. And, and no judgment, no judgment. OK? I know how I feel but, you know, we live in a society right now that if you feel different than I feel, then you’re wrong.
And I don’t believe that.
Angela
So true.
Coleen
It’s so true. What I want you to do, though, because six months from now, I don’t want to be holding you in my arms, because you say, I feel so guilty, I wasn’t there, I need you to think about it, I want you to stop. And I want you to remove the emotion for a minute. And I want you to think about it, how will you feel six months from now with a decision you made to be there or not be there, it doesn’t matter to me. Make sure you’re comfortable with whatever.
Angela
So that’s gonna be a really tough conversation to have when somebody is in a very emotional state.
Coleen
It’s not, it’s not at all. It’s to say, I need you to stand tall for one second, I need you to stand tall, you have a decision to make. When in grief, we have a huge need to be understood that very little capacity and understand. I need you to I need to move the blood from the back of the head to the front of the head. And I need you to help me make a decision right now. OK, I need you to think for a minute. How will you feel six months from now about your decision?
Angela
So is that a way of easing the guilt that can often come, you know, the Dr. Kubler-Ross’s five stages of grief, and how powerful the guilt stage can become, especially for pet parents, because we often think if I could have just gotten him to the vet sooner, if I could have or maybe I should have, it’s a very powerful state of being, and it’s very easy to get stuck in that state too. I know I was in it for years with Shep. And it’s only really since I started studying grief that I’m realizing I couldn’t have, I couldn’t have changed what happened. And so the guilt is, is going away now. But that, you know, he died eight years ago, that’s a long time to stay in that stage. Can the planning and the … and the thoughtfulness of, of going through the stages of pet loss grief with someone like you, can that alleviate some of that guilt?
Coleen
Alleviate some of it. You know, I think there’s always an element of guilt, Angela. Just because you know, and maybe it’s a guilt because I feel bad I traveled so much for my job and I wasn’t here. You know, it might be that and I missed days, and I miss precious time, and I missed all that.
So I think there’s always going to be an element of guilt, even through all the planning, OK? And then with our pets, you know, just like anything, we can plan and plan and plan, and then best-laid plans, we end up in the emergency room. And something has happened.
So I think it’s, it’s being kind of, kind to ourselves in saying I did the best I could at that particular moment with the information I had. And I made the best decision. And so that can help with part of it. I think some of the other aspects of it, and I know from my perspective, when I start to get the coulda shoulda woulda questions … the search for meaning is a part of our journey. It’s a part of our grief journey, in the asking of the questions.
And when I ask questions to say what could I have done different? Okay, what I tell companions, and when I tell grieving hearts is those answers have to be your answers. Not when Angela tells me … when I say what could I have done different? You know, when Angela might say to me, she might say Coleen, you need to, you did everything. You were a good mommy, you didn’t miss a thing. That’s not what I need to hear. OK, that’s not what I need to hear. In fact, what I need you to say to me is what do you think you missed? What do you think you could have done different? Because just like where you got to, Angela, when you finally got to the point that said, you know, I looked at it and I really did do everything, I really did. And to have somebody as a good healthy support companion help you with those questions … again, not my answers. These are not my answers, OK?
Just like when somebody says to me, do you think pets go to heaven? That is not my answer that matters. It is your answer that matters. Because I want to believe whatever you believe. That’s what I support. I’m not here to argue with you. And when we say things like, Angela, stop, you were a good mom, you did everything, you should never question yourself, your tummy starts to turn into a knot. And you’re like, shut up, just shut up because that’s not how I feel. Right?
Angela
Yep.
Coleen
Versus saying tell me what you believe you could have done different. Tell me what you believe you missed. Tell me what signs you believe he was giving you. And you help somebody with the with the answers to the questions, their answers to the questions that gets them to the point that says, “You know what? I did do everything. I did. I did, I did do everything.”
And I think … let me tell you something else back to you and what you do, what I tell people a lot of times is … in the end of life walk and you’ve had friends just like I’ve had friends where we look at these precious little loves that are in their life and we know it’s time but mommy and daddy aren’t there yet. I tell them a lot too is take pictures, take daily pictures. And this is from the physical aspect only.
OK, this is different than your beautiful photography. This is just to see a physical change that then can give me one more nugget. When it’s only a nugget. Give me a nugget to say and I want to talk about is it time or is it not time? I want to talk about that for one second.
Angela
Sure.
Coleen
Because fatal part of the guilt conversation that I get that I get nine times out of 10 is I think I made the decision too soon or too late. And here’s how I want to reframe that. When it’s time, when the time is here, it is a window. It is a window. We are in a window of time. Because it’s not a finite time. It’s a window of time. And when we’re in the window of time, anytime in there is the right time. It’s the right time. There is not a finite time that says it was the right time.
I want to layer onto that. I was mindful enough with Crisco. I was mindful enough to know that he was going to die like he lived. Well, all of mine did, but Crisco was the most, Crisco was the most visible. He was going to die like he lived. And I told the veterinarian, my beautiful Dr. Kimmy Simpson, when she came over, I said, Kimmy, I said he’s a poophead. He’s a poophead. He’s a big poophead, and I said he is gonna die like he lived and he was a huge poophead, all eight pounds of him, now six pounds. He’s a poophead. And so please know that this euthanasia is not going to be easy. And she went, I got it. Girl, after needle number three, because he was fighting and being a poophead, he was ready, he was ready. And she’s white in the face now. And I say to Kimmy, I told you he was not going to make this easy on any of us.
This one is unbelievable. But I was mindful enough to know that’s exactly what he was going to do. That’s how he was going to go out. He went out exactly like he lived. Exactly. He’s a poophead.
Angela
What a beautiful way to remember that moment, though. Ya know, because Crisco always had that personality. And he did it right to the end.
Coleen
To the very end.
Angela
And you can hold onto that and go he was a little shit, right up until the last.
Coleen
Right up. And I gotta tell you, I’m gonna say this on this, I believe in a platter of resources for pet loss and grief. OK? I believe in Reiki, I believe in in alternative medications. I believe in memorialization, I believe in in grief support. I believe in animal communicators. I believe in all of this. Do I do all of them? No, I don’t. But I have this plateau of resources that says here you pick what you need, OK? So we did, we chatted with the communicator and I said please confirm with me he was ready. I said I think he was just being a poop. And she howled. She goes, Oh, all those little noises he was making? She goes he was F bombin’. She goes he was F bombin’ all the way out. Angela, not surprised.
Angela
Sounds like my kind of dog.
Coleen
Oh, yeah.
Oh, all feisty. 6, 7, 8 pounds of him. And so for our listeners, it is being mindful of … my big Harry … he went gentle. And he waited until I got there … On the middle of a trip over to Tampa to teach a pet loss class. I get the call, I get the text, he collapsed … today’s the day … and Southwest Airlines, God bless them and I will forever be indebted to them, got me back here to Dallas. Midair turnaround, boop, got me back here … 15 minutes before he died, and he waited till I got there and then died gently. As he lived, as he lived.
So as a pet mommy, it’s catching your breath a minute and saying, how will I see this? What will happen? I want to be eyes wide open into what will happen with them. And what will happen? What … how we’re going to do this. Eyes wide open. I’m going to craft that. But I’m also going to be ready for an audible that may come in from the side. Life may have other plans, I may end up at an emergency clinic, whatever … eyes wide open.
Angela
We enter into relationships with pets not necessarily knowing that there are things that are going to have to be done, but it really is inevitable, isn’t it?
Coleen
You know, I love to embrace the Garth Brooks song, The Dance. It’s gonna happen. And I’m glad I don’t know how the end will happen. I’m just … I’m gonna live in the moment, I’m going to embrace every day, I’m going to sit, I’m going to just be and I’m going to know that one day it’s going to happen. But I’m not going to, I’m not going to be in fear of it. I’m not. I want to, I want to show up on that day and know that I gave 100% of love and my heart. And they gave it back to me. That’s all I want.
Angela
My husband gives me grief sometimes because he’s not so comfortable with the camera being around all the time. But for me, I need to have those pictures of her. I need to have those stories of her. Because I’m so much better a photographer now than I was when Shep was alive. And I look back at some of the pictures I took of Shep and I’m like, Oh my God, those are garbage. Why are you holding on to them? Because they’re my bubba. I don’t want to forget those moments, whether their cellphones or my old Nikon 40. You know, five camera bodies later. You know, and my Bella, I don’t to lose a moment. I want to hold on to all of those stories.
And it’s just the stories that I’m going to be able to tell of her after she is gone, they mean everything to me and they’re going to bring … they’re going to keep her alive for me. Just in the same way that Shep does. And I think that, you know, trying to normalize how we feel about pets in general, not just about pet loss grief, is part of it, too.
You know, in my photography business, I do say I want you to feel empowered to tell people I love my dog that damn much. You know?
It’s OK. What’s wrong with love? What’s wrong with giving your love to a four-legged hairy creature?
Coleen
There’s nothing better.
Angela
Because they give it back in so many ways.
Coleen
Yes. Yes. I love it. Yay. How fun is this been?
Angela
Oh gosh, it’s been such a treat. Colleen, thank you so much for joining us here today. Um, if there’s one thing you want to leave our listeners with, what would it be?
Coleen
I’m gonna leave two things.
Angela
OK. Good.
Coleen
Two things, first, be kind to yourself and honor that journey with those precious loves. And secondly, secondly, you don’t get a do-over. So you have got to capture the memories for absolute, permanent forever. You don’t get to do over. Always remember.
Angela
Thank you.
Coleen
Yeah, thank you for letting me be with you.
Angela
We really could talk for hours. There’s so much to dissect about living with our pets, losing them and the grief we experience before and after they leave our physical world.
Coleen is a … well, she’s pretty fantastic. If you pick up her book, it’s full of stories of pet parents who have come to her for assistance on that last walk with their fur kids. You’re certainly to come away with a few nuggets on how to handle that journey yourself … in addition to all the nuggets she gave in this episode of One Last Network.
I am so proud to be a graduate of her pet loss grief companion program, and to call Coleen a friend.
Next week, I sit with another friend, Carol Bryant, whom I met when she was the president of the Dog Writer’s Association of America. At the annual awards presentation in New York City … just weeks before the entire world shut down with COVID … I met her in person, along with her beloved boy Dexter.
More than a year later, Dexter died very suddenly, very traumatically but Carol chose to share that journey and her grief publicly on her social media platforms. We talk about what that was like and how storytelling can be healing for the griever and helpful for pet parents who are unsuspecting of that most insidious disease, cancer.
