The business of pet photography draws many people who have experienced loss, the kind of loss that leaves a hole that often feels like it can never be filled.
We may come from other genres of photography, landscape or wedding and family portraiture. We look at our cameras and know it’s the tool that gave us so many great images of our own dogs.
But we never turned the cameras on ourselves.
We never got the great portraits of us and our dogs together.
Then they were gone. Our best fur friends posed for our cameras no more. And we were left with silly selfies, digital dust in the bottomless ocean of our social media feeds.
And then we decide to change that for other people. We make a conscious decision to ensure humans have amazing portraits of themselves with their best fur friends.
Printed on their walls or in beautiful photo albums.
My guest today, Nancy Kieffer, is no different.
When her Midnight died of lymphoma at 4, she realized there was more than landscapes that she had to do with her camera.
She started volunteering for rescues in Syracuse, New York, and then Nancy Kieffer Photography was born.
She shares that journey with us today.
What to Listen For
4:58 The event that kept Nancy from being a veterinarian
9:05 Midnight’s devastating diagnosis
10:39 The guilt Nancy felt from thinking she didn’t do enough
13:45 Finding comfort and laughter in Midnight’s memories
19:42 Becoming a pet loss grief specialist with One Last Network
24:20 How Nancy brings meaning to her work
Where to Find Nancy
Angela Schneider
Hi and welcome to One Last Network.
The business of pet photography draws many people who have experienced loss, the kind of loss that leaves a hole that often feels like it can never be filled.
We may come from other genres of photography, landscape or wedding and family portraiture. We look at our cameras and know it’s the tool that gave us so many great images of our own dogs.
But we never turned the cameras on ourselves.
We never got the great portraits of us and our dogs together.
Then they were gone. Our best fur friends posed for our cameras no more. And we were left with silly selfies, digital dust in the bottomless ocean of our social media feeds.
And then we decide to change that for other people. We make a conscious decision to ensure humans have amazing portraits of themselves with their best fur friends.
Printed on their walls or in beautiful photo albums.
My guest today, Nancy Kieffer, is no different.
When her Midnight died of lymphoma at 4, she realized there was more than landscapes that she had to do with her camera.
She started volunteering for rescues in Syracuse, New York, and then Nancy Kieffer Photography was born.
She shares that journey with us today.
Have a listen.
Hello, Nancy Kieffer of Nancy Kieffer photography. How are you today?
Nancy
Hi, I’m good. How are you, Angela?
Angela
I’m great. What we start off by having you tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do, where you’re based, and all the good basic things?
Nancy
Well, I am Nancy. And I live in Syracuse, New York, and I basically service all of the central New York area. I am a photographer of pets and rescues and everything. I got into the … I do have a day job. So I do this on the side. But I got into photography again, once I was kind of stressed out at work and finding that I needed an a creative outlet.
Angela
What’s your nine to five?
Nancy
I am a dietician at a psychiatric hospital right now.
Angela Schneider
Wow.
Nancy
It can be stressful at time, at times. But when I actually got back into photography, I was working in nursing homes and, and was working a lot of hours at that time. So it was just very stressful. I had a management job and, and I just felt that I needed, I needed some release in my life. I always love photography. I started out as, in landscape photography, but then I started with the rescues and kind of transferred over to pet photography.
Angela
How did you get into working with rescues?
Nancy
I’ve always loved animals. So I actually started out volunteering at the zoo. And then my niece was actually working at a rescue and I thought, Oh, that would be great. And so I started volunteering there. When a new rescue opened up by me that they’re special in that they’re training inmates … having inmates train the dogs. So I thought that would be really special because it was a second chance for everyone … a second chance for the dogs and second chance for the inmates. So I actually transferred over to that rescue and loved it ever since. So
Angela
What is it that drives you to want to work with these animals that need a second chance?
Nancy
When I see them, I know that they’re so adorable and so lovable. And I can’t see them being put down, to have a dog put down, when … when they’re perfectly healthy. And actually, you just reminded me of when I was growing up my vet, my next door neighbor was a veterinarian. And because I loved animals so much. I decided to volunteer for a little while to see if I wanted to be a veterinarian. And he was … he tended to, to work with the big animals and his partner worked with the small animals at the animal hospital. So I was with his partner at one time, and someone brought in a litter of blind puppies to be put down and I was incredulous that because they were putting them down.
They were perfectly good. They were just blind. And they were put down and it’s like because this is what a client asked us to do. So we did it, but that really tore me apart. And so that actually kind of made me rethink, do I really want to be a veterinarian? You know, if, if, if I, if people are bringing me these animals that are perfectly healthy other than, you know being blind,do I really want to do that? So maybe that’s part of it.
Angela
Sounds like it could be. That must have been a very traumatic experience for you as well.
Nancy
Yeah, it was.
Angela
Who is midnight?
Nancy
Midnight was, was my first dog that I got is an adult and he was just my soul, soul dog if you will, he … I got him when as a puppy. A coworker had had puppies or her dog had puppies.
And, and so I went to see them and both my sister and myself fell in love with two of the puppies and Midnight was … was mine and my sister brought home her brown chocolate lab, which was Bo, and Midnight …
He was just, he was so smart from the first. He was, was a troublemaker though at first I had a very hard time he was crying for his mom. We had taken them from their mom too soon, because the coworker’s husband was, you know, ready for them to be out of the house. So so they went out of the house.
But then, after I had a trainer in one day to help me because I was going a little out of my mind with his crying and stuff. But he just turned around, he turned around into my little prince like overnight, it seemed. And he was with me everywhere he would go. We would take long walks in the morning and long walks at night. And he was, he was just by my side all the time. And he was so smart and so affectionate to everyone that would come, come his way.
When he was close, close to four years old I came home from work one day and he had vomited all over the place. And so I took him to the doctor and found out that he had lymphoma. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much they could do. They, they could, I could go down to Cornell to the big hospital, animal hospital by us and spend a lot of money but they would only give him maybe three months. That wouldn’t be a cure at all.We did some things to help him out for a while. But basically, he just turned four when he died.
Yeah, so that was devastating.
Angela
So how did you manage your grief then? Or did you at all? Because it’s hard.
Nancy
Yeah. It is.
I think I didn’t really manage it all that well, then. Luckily, people at work were very understanding. So I think I took at least a day off of work. But I also felt a lot of guilt, you know, because I didn’t take him to the, to the hospital, the Cornell University. I didn’t take them down there. I didn’t spend that extra money, spent a lot of money on him, but not what I would have liked to have spent, let’s say. So I had a lot of guilt with that. I had a lot of guilt thinking was there anything I did? That caused him to get lymphoma? You know,
Angela
Ouch. Oh, that’s a tough one.
Nancy
Yeah, I mean, because, you know, was there anything in the environment or anything that, you know, kind of contributed to it? So, I’m not sure I dealt with it very well, at that point. And that is, around the time that I was getting stressed out at work, too. And maybe that took me back into the photography itself, and that I was taking a lot of pictures of Midnight, don’t get me wrong, because I’ve always loved photography, but maybe the stress of that and the stress of work, is what made me think of going back into photography.
Angela
Now that you’re a certified pet loss grief specialist with One Last Network, can you look back at those days with Midnight and see that maybe based on the diagnosis, taking him to Cornell wouldn’t have mattered?
Nancy
I do see that. I do see that. And, and I think what I ended up doing with him, because I, I knew for two months before he passed that he was going to pass so we did do a lot of bucket list things. So. So we, we look to the bucket list of things I wanted to do with him and you know, go on different walks and other places. So we did some of those things.
Angela
Even, even then you knew to fill his remaining days with love and light and joy and fun things.
Nancy
Oh, yes, definitely.
Angela
That was important to you.
Nancy
And it was definitely important to me and to him. And
Angela
So, you know by now that two things are very foundational to how I teach grief in managing grief for our … helping our clients … helping supporting our clients who are in anticipatory or post death grief, and that is A, stories and B, meaning. I want you to tell us one story about midnight that just sets your heart soaring or makes you laugh or brings back all of the good things that Midnight was … is.
Nancy
Yeah. One of the things that I remember about midnight is again, he was a, he was a sibling to my sister’s dog, Bo, and so We would go take them both to Buffalo to visit my mom and we would clip them in the backseat in seat belts so, so that they would be nice and safe and Midnight would be out of his within 15 minutes.
He knew exactly how to get out so then there was this one time that we’re doing this … we get out. I tighten, tighten the seat belt, tighten the seat belt 15 minutes later he’s out of it again. And not only is he out of it again, he’s chewing Bo’s seat belt so he can get him out.
Angela
Oh no!
Nancy
So he knew exactly what he needed to do to get Bo out of this.
Angela
I’m gonna free you too, little buddy!
Nancy
That is one of the things I will always remember.
Angela
That is a fantastic story. Now, how are you bringing meaning to moments like that and all of the good things about Midnight now that he lives in your heart.
Nancy
Yeah, I think, I think that’s one of the things that drives me in as far as the portraiture is because I didn’t have the portraits of Midnight, of me and him together. That is what I want to give to my clients, is to make sure that they have those memories and my focus is really on getting memories of the pet is what and the client together so so that they have those.
Angela
That is such a common thread in our industry. It’s true for me that the pain of losing my special dog helped drive me toward what we do. How do you take that pain and manifest it into something so beautiful?
Nancy
Looking back at those memories is, is just a remembrance of, of all the joy and love you had even though it might be a hard moment in time but it reminds you of everything that you had prior.
Angela Schneider
Do the images of Midnight that you have bring you comfort and healing even today?
Nancy
Yes, they do.
Angela
You can now look at those memories and laugh and think about seat belts and the crazy things.
Nancy
Yes definitely. Yeah, that today they are definitely memories that I look at from time to time. I, you know, I still wish that I had more of them of the two of us together I have plenty of him. I have tons of him and he did a lot of agility work and stuff too. He was very, very good at that.
Angela
What drew you to One Last Network and learning about pet loss grief and trying to have a deeper understanding of it?
Nancy
It drew me because of what I felt I wanted to give my clients and I wanted to give them pictures for, for their dogs, for yeah pictures for them, for the, for their memories and I wanted pictures of them with their dogs and how can I best support them so if, if I’m doing this for them I want to support them in that so I want to, want to learn what I can in order to, to give them that support. So that’s what drew me.
Angela
We’re not always in our clients’ lives for a long time. And we’re not always in our clients’ lives for a good time. How do you take what you’ve learned and shift your sessions for people who are in anticipatory grief and support them in ways that you may not have before?
Nancy
I think I start talking to them a little bit about bucket list things now that I didn’t before. I also approach even my regular sessions a little bit differently because you never know. You don’t know what’s around the corner next week or next year. You know, midnight was only four years old.
I do take some different shots … like of their ears or their fur, something that people might not think of immediately that they want but down the road they might.
Angela
When you were talking earlier about rescue dogs and the working with the inmates and that program, you used, you used the term second chance a few times when you think back about those blind puppies that weren’t even given a first chance what does it mean to you to give those dogs a second chance and help them find their place in the world?
Nancy
It definitely brings meaning to my work because I have had a number of times when I was told that seeing a picture of mine either in my blog or, or on social media or something is what brought prospective adopters into the, into Second Chance and they fell in love with the dog that they saw so so yeah that I love that that that means everything to me.
Angela
Yeah, that’s great. So now if you could give people in the New York area one piece of advice whether it’s about adopting a dog or getting their portraits taken or making their bucket list or what have you, what would it be?
Nancy
Get pictures of your dog. Have images taken whether, whether it’s by a professional or not, but I feel that you need to have images taken. Ultimately, I think, I think going to a professional like me would be great because you’re not taking the selfies that are all angled and, and weird positions and but take pictures of yourself with your dog.
Angela
Do you see things differently not just your photography sessions but do you see life differently since what you went through with Midnight?
Nancy
Oh definitely. Definitely I’m trying to think … oh yeah he … Midnight was, I got Midnight at a time after I had been through some physical things I had had breast cancer and stuff so he … even though I got him afterwards, he was still a comfort to me. Every for … I was … had moved to new place, I had taken on a new job and so he was my comfort in all the transition that I had at that time. Losing him I guess I felt how much of a support he was to me and, but yeah I do see life differently.
Angela
Nancy, thank you so much for joining us today. It’s been a pleasure getting to know you a little bit better and learning about midnight and his wiliness. Let’s call it wiliiness.
Nancy
Okay.
Angela
Many animal lovers often hashtag our Instagram posts with “pets are family.”
But really, they’re even more than that. They are our constant companions, like Midnight who never left Nancy’s side, and they are our confidants, like Shep who comforted me through a lot of personal pain in the 2000s.
Their love and loyalty are unconditional. I know Shep would have defended me to the death if he had to.
And when I flipped through his photos after he was gone, I realized the only photos I had of us together were silly selfies.
I asked my friends on Facebook, many of whom were hobby photographers like me at the time, if they had any.
They came through for me. They shared quick snaps they took when they knew I wasn’t paying attention. They saw us as we were … the bestiest best friends.
It was a sign for me too that there was something more I could be doing with my life than copywriting for telecommunications companies and job search websites.
It’s how I and many of my colleagues fall into this business and it’s the best dang job I ever had, even better than hanging around hockey rinks and writing about the games.
Next week, Nancy takes over the question-asking and talks to Linda Colletti of the Pet Loss Resource Center in Wisconsin. Linda is dedicated to providing a safe place for pet parents experiencing grief from the loss of their fur friends.
Until then …
