Losing a pet is truly one of the saddest things you can experience. Our pets become more than just things we take care of — for many people they are cherished companions. When their pets die, some people react in the same way as if a human died. It’s absolutely normal to feel so strongly.
One woman recently lost her pet cat unexpectedly, sending her headlong into a pretty serious grief spiral. When she got an invitation to come over from her sister-in-law, she saw it as an opportunity to not be alone with her grief. But when she arrived, her unsympathetic SIL had different plans.
The woman lost her cat unexpectedly.
She took to Reddit’s AITA page to see if people had the same feelings she did about the incident. In the post, she explained that she had to put her cat down unexpectedly. The cat, whom she had since she was a teenager, wasn’t just a pet to her.
“He was my best friend, my emotional support, my companion through everything. I cried all night,” the woman wrote. “I took the next day off work because I couldn’t even function — I was in absolute pieces.”
Her sister-in-law invited the woman over, saying she didn’t want her to be alone after such a heavy day. “I thought I’d be able to just sit quietly, cry a little, maybe talk about him if I needed to — basically just exist around someone so I wasn’t drowning by myself.”
When she arrived at her SIL’s home, it was not at all what she anticipated.
“The moment I got there, it was clear that ‘not being alone’ actually meant helping her with her kids,” the woman wrote. She accompanied her sister-in-law to pick up her nephew from school, and had to forcibly remove the small child from the jungle gym. “SIL got annoyed that I wasn’t physically removing him — even though I could barely stand upright without crying.”
After they got back to the house, her unsympathetic SIL pushed her to help her nephew with his homework so she could go make dinner. She took that as an opportunity to bring up her grief over her cat.
“I tried to gently bring up my cat once or twice — I honestly just needed to talk about him — and each time she cut me off with ‘you’re just having a moment’ or said we didn’t need to dwell. I felt completely dismissed,” she wrote.
The woman realized that she was being taken advantage of.
After being asked to help her nephew in the bathroom, the woman had enough of her SIL’s plans. “I didn’t say much — I didn’t trust myself not to sob or scream. I just got in my car and went home,” she explained.
When she got back home, her SIL had a lot to say about her leaving. The SIL claimed her kids were upset with her “storming out.” The SIL even said she was “trying to help me take my mind off things.” However, that’s not how the OP saw it.
People were shocked by the SIL’s lack of empathy.
“In the future, you’ll know that any act that looks like kindness from her is largely self-serving,” one commenter wrote. “Take all the time you need to grieve and perhaps look for some pet grief support groups online.”
“People also grieve differently as well,” someone else commented. “Your sister may have honestly thought she was doing something good for you, that dealing with children would occupy your mind, but that may be what she needs when she grieves, it doesn’t mean it’s what you need. Your sister was insensitive and unobservant, but I do not think you were wrong to take yourself out of the situation. If you ‘storming out’ caused the kids angst, I would ask her if you crying during your entire visit wasn’t.”
“Your SIL sounds incredibly self absorbed,” another commenter wrote. “Idk how she possibly could have thought she was being helpful. You have every right to be frustrated with her just as you have every right to grieve in your own way under your own terms. Losing a pet can be more painful than losing a relative. I’m so sorry you’re going through this. Please take care of yourself during this difficult time.”
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
