Pet loss can be a devastating experience, and there is no correct or wrong way to express and process grief. However, knowing that you are not alone in your time of despair and mourning can make one feel less isolated.
Hopefully some or many of these quotes about pet loss can help you or someone you love appreciate that bereavement has many forms and phases, and that love is not limited to our time on earth.
Pet Loss Quotes about Dogs:
“The world would be a nicer place if everyone had the ability to love as unconditionally as a dog.” — M.K. Clinton
“Heaven goes by favor. If it went by merit, you would stay out and your dog would go in. ” – Mark Twain
“If I have any beliefs about immortality it is that certain dogs I know will go to heaven, and very very few people.” – James Thurber
“Dogs’ lives are too short. Their only fault, really.” — Agnus Sligh Turnbull
“Dogs have a way of finding the people who need them, and filling an emptiness we didn’t ever know we had.” — Thom Jones
“I have sometimes thought of the final cause of dogs having such short lives and I am quite satisfied it is in compassion to the human race; for if we suffer so much in losing a dog after an acquaintance of ten or twelve years, what would it be if they were to live double that time?” — Sir Walter Scott
“Dogs are not our whole life, but they make our lives whole.” – Roger Caras
“If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went.” – Will Rogers
“A good dog never dies. He always stays. He walks beside you on crisp autumn days when frost is on the fields and winter’s drawing near. His head is within our hand in his old way.” — Mary Carolyn Davies
“The dog is a gentleman; I hope to go to his heaven, not man’s.” – Mark Twain
“Dogs…do not ruin their sleep worrying about how to keep the objects they have, and to obtain the objects they have not. There is nothing of value they have to bequeath except their love and their faith.” – Eugene O’Neill
[Check out the Top Five Pet Loss Books for Children]
Pet Loss Quotes about Cats:
“What greater gift than the love of a cat.” — Charles Dickens
“No amount of time can erase the memory of a good cat, and no amount of masking tape can ever totally remove his fur from your couch.” — Leo Dworken
“No heaven will not ever Heaven be. Unless my cats are there to welcome me.” — Anonymous
“If you have a cat, you will most likely outlive it. To get a cat is to open yourself to profound joy and prospectively, to equally profound sadness.” — Anonymous
“The love of a cat is like a symphony. It is a waste of time trying to explain its depths to those who don’t cherish it.” — Anonymous
“No one can truly understand the bond that we form with our cats we love until they experience the loss of one.” — Anonymous
“Someone asked me what the most difficult thing about having a cat was. I replied: ’the goodbye’.” — Anonymous
“The loss of a cat is immeasurable. But so is the love left behind.” — Anonymous
“One day all the cats we’ve ever loved will all come running towards us and that day will be a good day.” — Anonymous
[More pet loss advice, insights, and resources: Life After Loss: 5 Signs It’s Time for a New Pet, Pet Loss Condolences: What to Say and How to Say It, and 8 Books on Pet Loss and Grief.]]
Pet Loss Quotes about All Pets:
“Sometimes losing a pet is more painful than losing a human because in the case of the pet, you were not pretending to love [them].” — Amy Sedaris
“A pet is never truly forgotten until it is no longer remembered.” — Lacie Petitto
“If there is a heaven, it’s certain our animals are to be there. Their lives become so interwoven with our own; it would take more than an archangel to detangle them.” — Pam Brown
“I believe all animals were created by God to help keep man alive.” — Iowa Fujita
“If having a soul means being able to feel love and loyalty and gratitude, then animals are better off than a lot of humans.” — James Herriot
“Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.” – Anatole France
“All animals, except man, know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it.”— Samuel Butler
“Your favourite chair is empty now, where you would lie and sleep. But the memory of our happy times is mine to always keep.” — Anonymous
“If having a soul means being able to feel love and loyalty and gratitude, then animals are better off than a lot of humans.” – James Herriot
“Heartbreak is life educating us.” – George Bernard Shaw
“We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals.” — Immanual Kant