Latest / The Living Loss | Navigating Invisible Grief & Identity / 17 | Living with the Hidden Grief of Pet Loss with Adam Greenbaum
Transcript
- Cassandra: Hello friends, I'm Cassandra Harris-Towner and today I'm missing my dear friend and co-host Daiana Bernard. As licensed mental health counselors, we're unpacking the quiet complex griefs that don't come with a funeral because you can't heal what you don't acknowledge. Welcome to the Living Loss podcast. We're so glad you're joining our conversation as we name these losses and create a meaningful path forward together. Please subscribe and share this episode. It helps us grow this community and reach others who need to know that their grief is valid. So let's dive in. as we all know, ⁓ talk about quiet losses on this show. And with our guest today, we're looking at living with the loss of a dearly departed furry family member, along with the disenfranchised grief that accompanies the death of our cherished pets. Today, I'd like to introduce you to our guests so that you can join me in this conversation. It is our most sincere pleasure to welcome Adam Greenbaum to the show. Adam Greenbaum: Hello, everyone. Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to be here. Cassandra: Thank you for being here. Adam is a serial entrepreneur dedicated to building companies aligned with his values. He founded Whiskercloud, growing it from a concept to serving over 2,000 veterinary clinics worldwide without external funding and exited in 2022. He then became a founding member of Petvisor, serving as global CMO and leading the integration of five companies into a single global brands supported by over $100 million in funding. His most personal project began after a profound loss in October 2024. Adam and his wife Elizabeth lost their beloved dog Baxter. This experience revealed that pet parents often face such loss without meaningful support or recognition of the seriousness of their grief. In response, he founded Baxter, Love Baxter, in Baxter's honor. with a mission to address this gap. Adam is not a therapist, but a founder who understands both the business of pet care and the emotional experience of loving an animal as family. He lives with his wife, Elizabeth, their dogs, Sophie and Cosmo, and their cat, Nala. Again, so glad to have you here, Adam. Adam Greenbaum: Thank you for having me. And, uh, yeah, this is, uh, quite the topic. It's really important to me. And, know, Baxter has lost that moment at 11 31 AM on October 28, 2024 ignited something inside of me. So here I am. Cassandra: We're really grateful that you're here to share this story with us. this interview in particular deals a lot with disenfranchised grief. this is the grief that isn't always recognized or validated by others, and people might say things to you like, oh it's just a pet, and can make your grief feel like it's too much. And I think at the heart of it they just don't really understand. what that kind of loss is about. Adam Greenbaum: Yeah. Cassandra: I was wondering if you could give us like a little bit of insight to why you think pet loss grief gets minimized. ⁓ Adam Greenbaum: I think it's different now than even was maybe five, 10 years ago, but we know that 70 % of households in the U S have a pet. We know that 97 % of people consider that pet a member of the family. So we kind of know that there's a good chance. if you were walking through a mall, walking through a grocery store and you stopped a random person to have a pretty good odds that they'd have a pet and you'd have very good odds that they consider that pet a member of the family. And yet in the United States, 11 % of businesses offer pet bereavement leave. So we all work. We all live our lives. We go home to our families. If your mom dies, friend dies, family member dies, spouse dies, whatever it might be. You get flowers. You get this, you know, your spouse dies. No one says, when are you getting remarried? But when a pet dies, you're right. It's very common for someone to say, she get another dog. When are going to get another dog? The shelter's full of dogs that need help. Why don't you go rescue one right now? That'll make you feel better. And it's just odd. So you have this world where a human in your life dies and you go to work. People are like, I'm so sorry. How you doing? Mother or father passed away. Um, you know, we're going to send you flowers. Your company says, Hey, You we're going to give you three to five days paid time off. If you need to go to a funeral, the airline says, Hey, we're going to give you discounted rates. All of these people and all of these things are built in the infrastructure of our lives to be there for you when a human in your life dies. But for many people who have a pet, there are a lot of people who a pet is a service animal and as literally their connection to all things they do in life. Or you have veterans who are struggling with mental health issues after serving. And this particular animal is literally like the glue holding them together. Or in our case, there are really no external circumstances. had this dog that meant more than the world to us and brought so much life and joy to us. And then he was just gone. So there's just this disconnect between, you know, how how society handles death and this disconnect between humans and pets, you know, making it more of a, I, I never want to compare. don't want to say losing a dog is worse than losing a parent or spouse. It's not the case, but the point is you don't know the relationship with that person. can tell you that I, you know, having don't not having parents and grandparents in my life, Baxter outside of my wife was the most important relationship of my entire life. So losing him. I could lose 20 other humans in my life. wouldn't hit me the same way as losing this being that spent every waking moment with me. Cassandra: This being that you were responsible for, this being that was helped set your schedule, that was always a consistent companion. Adam Greenbaum: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that was probably, I think for me, my wife and I had different relationships with Baxter. Baxter was around for me, starting companies, building my company. It was hard. and, and it was long hours. And when the rest of the house would be upstairs eating dinner, when the rest of the house would be going to bed because I was working these crazy hours, the only constant I had in life was that I would be in this office that I'm sitting in right now. And Baxter would be next to me. didn't matter if it was four AM. 10 a.m. midnight, 2 a.m. It didn't matter. He had to be touching me when he was sleeping. And if I woke up, wake up in the middle of the night, you have to pee. He would follow me over there just like, I'm just going to make sure you're OK. I mean, there's just not another being in your life that's there for every like little random thing. But he was. So when you lose that, it is different than, you know, your. 95 year old mother or grandmother that you had, you know, that you see twice a year, not saying it's harder or worse, but I would say even for me losing Baxter was the worst thing that's ever happened to me. Losing my routine with him is probably second to that. Not having him for, know, he and I used to go for these really long walks in the morning before the rest of the house was awake. And I would just talk to him. We would just walk and talk and, to non-pep people, might say, okay, you're nuts, but it's not the case. mean, we spoke all day, every day. I promise you, we, communicated ⁓ and, ⁓ lose was just hard. It's hard. Cassandra: And to have it minimized by society, by people that you know, by those that love you and care about you, I can't imagine what that must have been like. Adam Greenbaum: at the time I was an executive ⁓ at a company that was a founder of. They did a great job as a whole, an amazing job. ⁓ were individuals on our team who didn't ask me how I was doing just fine. don't need to be asked by everyone how they're doing. I had close friends, you know, the first question is, you're to get another dog. I just think that's an odd question. I, I know that's a very offensive question to ask and it can be very triggering for a lot of people. I wouldn't say it was triggering for me. ⁓ But it also like that person has a forever mental note, like, ⁓ that's the type of person you are that you could even ask that question. I had someone a couple of months later say to me, ⁓ you're still on about this. So you're just going to make it your entire personality. ⁓ Yeah, actually might. So that's, that's what he meant to me. ⁓ I might make it my entire personal. mean, I'm talking to you all my, my girl, Sophie turns 16, eight days from the day we're recording this and here she is on my hat. You know, and she's my world ⁓ relationship with Sophie is very different than my relationship with Baxter. Not better, not worse. we're lucky enough to in this position with her where we have the ability to plan. but even when I tell people about us sort of planning for Sophie's death, they think we're absolutely insane. And I say, what's the alternative. sitting at a veterinary ER at one in the morning on a Saturday, like half of people deal with at the end of their pets life. So it's interesting that like our world and our healthcare systems and our infrastructure has all of these ⁓ things in place for a human dies. If you go to the emergency room and someone passes away, the hospital has ⁓ a checklist of stuff you. But if you go to the vet, And it's not your vet. You're just in a random emergency of that. You're very much at the mercy of the situation and pretty much every, every decision you would like to make about the end of your pet's life is taken out of your hands at that moment. So I think that the grief is disenfranchised because, you know, not everyone is a pet person. A lot of businesses don't treat it as a real thing and there's no infrastructure built around it. And it just, and that gives it the appearance of less than. And it's not less than it's, it's, it's a very hard situation. Cassandra: I think you hit the nail on the head earlier when you said you can't compare grief. person's doesn't ⁓ make yours more or less, it doesn't make it any different. A loss is a loss regardless of how you look at it. Adam Greenbaum: I mean, someone, someone messaged in to love Baxter and said, it was, it was really hard to read. said, lost my guinea pig and I know it was just, ⁓ it was just a small pets and it doesn't mean anything, but he was the centerpiece of my tiny little world. And I was like, damn, that is a really beautiful way to put that about a guinea pig. And most people, you know, it's like, I remember when I was growing up. We'd have hamsters and Guinea pigs in the classrooms and they die and it's like, ⁓ we got another one. This is Guinea pig too. This is Guinea pig six. But for some people that Guinea pig really means a lot to them. So you're right. Like we can't compare it. only ⁓ way I compare it is that we ⁓ somewhat of infrastructure when a human loss and we just haven't found that world for pet loss. And it's frustrating because billions of dollars are being Cassandra: Mm-hmm. Adam Greenbaum: funneled into the pet industry. selling pets, food and treats and insurance and all this stuff, but we're not, you know, we're not setting people up for their senior years and the end of their life. And that's why when you lose a pet happens suddenly, it happens harshly. ⁓ it's ⁓ not a fulfilling experience for many people, whereas, if you're saying goodbye to a person and they're in hospice care a, get to say goodbye. ⁓ So Yeah, it's just an infrastructure thing to me. Cassandra: Well, while we're talking about the infrastructure, could you give us maybe a little bit of an idea of how Love Baxter came to be and what that story looks like? Adam Greenbaum: Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. I, I had, ⁓ over 12,000 veterinary clinics use my software globally. And what was interesting about Baxter's case was he was really sick. we go to the best veterinarian there is. ⁓ know veterinarian on earth. I can call and send, I can send blood work. can send test results. And we were referred to an incredible specialty clinic, probably the nicest Vanity House I've ever been in my life. It's in Laguna beach, California. and it was just the best of the best, which I said to them, he's my son and I'll do whatever it takes. ⁓ pause there for ⁓ minute, just to say one other thing too. When I think when we talk about like disenfranchised grief versus, ⁓ know, and sort of what I'm talking about for infrastructure around love Baxter, if you need mental health as a human, Most health insurance companies will cover it and they will cover a lot of stuff. They will cover the end of a human's life. They will cover hospice care. When your pet is dying, there's not really pet insurance. It's covering a lot of that stuff. It doesn't cover the euthanasia. And for many people that work with us on Love Baxter who focus only on pet loss grief, the insurance companies don't cover that. So That's just kind of leading into my love Baxter stuff, but you know, so Baxter was at this emergency clinic and we spent somewhere in the 35 to $40,000 range out of pocket in the final five months of his life. I was talking to the smartest vets on earth about his care and he died and he was a happy, healthy 12 and a half year old dog. The official diagnosis, which Anyway, the official diagnosis was a severe inflammatory bowel disease. There were other symptoms that don't necessarily super fit with that, but he did have a lot of symptoms of it. I think there was something else point being we spent all this money and the, really short version of this story is he was doing good. He had lost, lost a lot of weight. gained weight back. He was looking good. He was active and we go in on a Wednesday and He got blood work and our vet who's one of the smartest veterinarians I've ever met. She looked me in the eyes and said, Hidlark work is perfect. We beat this. Perfect. We beat this. I mean, if you're out there listening to this, maybe you've lost someone to cancer. Imagine your oncologist says that about the person you lost a couple of days before they were gone. Perfect. His blood works not perfect. He's 12 and a half years old. We didn't beat it. Something wasn't, and at that moment we didn't know what we would beaten. We went home and celebrated like it was our wedding night. We danced around the house. We had a great night. He collapsed the next day and then we had 72 hours of health. Cassandra: Yeah. you Adam Greenbaum: He was being blood. He was unable to walk or eat. And this was, this was within 20 hours of us being told he was perfect and we beat this. So the whiplash of that to go from feeling the weight of the world. ⁓ We did it. He's okay. He's, he's only 12 or other dogs 14. I knew we'd get through this. That was a fight. We did it as a family. And then the next day it's he collapses. I rushed him down there. And then we had 72 hours of chaos and we said goodbye on Monday. It was really hard. So I found myself in the next couple of days. I'd never felt anything like that. I, I'm not a religious person, but I found myself looking for religious things that had to do with pet end of life. Where do pet spirits go? I don't believe in heaven and hell. And yet I found myself searching for proof of pet afterlife. found myself looking for experts. I was searching YouTube. was searching Google. I was talking to chat. GPT. I just said, where's the best place to go? And it would send me places that didn't have much information. I found myself on the Reddit pet loss forum, reading thousands of posts from the last couple of weeks of people who had lost a pet and just reading what they were going through. And it was really hard to read, but it also made me realize like, okay, I'm not alone in this. ⁓ but then I realized something. I know every vet on earth. Why don't they talk about this? So I went back to work like a week and a half later and we have a software company. When you sign up, there's a survey. What services do you offer? I looked at the last thousand surveys. You know how many vet businesses wrote that they handle senior pet care and pet aftercare, pet euthanasia? Zero. None. And then the light, I, you know, I had my light bulb moment. Okay. I was part of this problem in the pet space. We had helped all these vet clinics. So, so that's where love Baxter is love Baxter has thousands of resources. It's a free place. You can go, you can search anything. You can search for cremation. can search about afterlife. Do pets have souls? How do you get signs from pets? How to help a child who's lost a pet, how to help a veteran who's lost a pet. What happens if you lose two pets in a short period? And, and pretty much we started with like our first 300 articles and then Cassandra: you Adam Greenbaum: We would get messages, you know, at the beginning we'd get a dozen or two a day. Now we get 500 to a thousand a day. ⁓ and based on the things people comment on our social media comments on posts or email us, we then build out more content around it. So it's, it's really cool. We have a Memorial store when Baxter died. I wanted to have Memorial stuff. just that was worthy of him and I couldn't find anything. So I went and found awesome brands who are like, family owned, you know, small businesses. So we have them on our store and we have a directory of, of professionals from pet loss, grief counselors, in home euthanasia, veterinarians, pet crematories, death doulas, anything you can need. And that's what this place is. This place is when your pet dies and you're hurt and you're not getting the help you need anywhere else. I don't want you to have to go to 20 websites. I just want you to come here, whether you have a dog that's almost 16 and you're spend every day. terrified you're going to lose her and you want to plan for that or you're three days out from losing them and you're losing your mind and you just can't make sense of anything like I was at. That's exactly how I would describe myself. Like I felt like my mind was like cracking and I just needed something to hold it together. So that's why I Love Baxter and that was my very long answer. I'm sorry. Cassandra: No, no, no, that was beautiful. Thank you. And just for the people listening, is it, I know that we found you on Instagram, it lovebaxter.com where... Adam Greenbaum: Lovebaxter.com. Yep. And our Instagram is just at love Baxter Co. And, and honestly, we, we post quotes and poems and stuff. Every post and quote and everything we do is inspired by someone who's messaged us. ⁓ and, these posts get 10,000, one got 50,000 engagements on it. It's all inspired by, you know, the people we hear from. And that's pretty much what I spend my days doing. I spend my days. reading what people are saying and thinking and feeling. So I know how to shape the website better. And we get a ton of feedback every day and I spend my days just adding that feedback and rebuilding it to make it better. Cassandra: Thank you. Thank you for having the service that nobody else has done because you're not wrong. I've lost a number of pets and there's never any preparation for it. There's just one day we're here, the next day we're trying to figure out what to do next. Adam Greenbaum: now. Yep. And I've got half a dozen veterinary advisors who work with me on live Baxter. And, know, like I said, I've been in the vet space a long time and veterinary medicine is, is not helping pet parents right now. And I'm working with a lot of vets to change that because we have to prepare people more. When you get a pet, you know, I think about it. It's really interesting. It's like, we know our parents are going to die. And we know they're probably going to pass away before us. Unless something catastrophic happens. know our grandparents are going to die. I think when we have kids and I don't have human kids, but when we have kids, think. We obviously, if they, they die before us, something, something bad happened, but we still put together a will, we get life insurance. We still think about the fact they will die and we need to be ready for that. Or I'm sorry, we will die and we need to. care for them and, you know, make sure things are good. But when we have a pet, we don't plan for anything. You know, the euthanasia day, if you want their ashes back, it's between four and $750 on the low end. but we don't plan for that. And if God forbid they're fighting cancer or fighting something else, fighting for their life, I understand the position I was in to spend so much money out of pocket. maybe someone should have sat us down halfway through and said, You spent $25,000. We're three months into this fight. We're going to keep going as long as you want to keep going. But on that topic, let's talk about what could happen here. Let's talk about where he's at, what we're doing, the tests we've run and what the next three months could realistically look like. But that was never done. It was like, Hey, we think it could be this it's it's $4,500 for the test. Do it next day. Nope. Not that. We need to do a blood work, but we did blood work last week. Well, we want to do it again. Cause now we're looking at something different. How much is it? 1200 bucks. Do it like it was just whatever it takes to save him. it's just an odd thing. It's odd and ⁓ we need more infrastructure it. Cassandra: Mm-hmm. I've been thinking about that since the first time you and I spoke up to this point ⁓ I remember having these moments of grief when my dog was young. The dog that was the closest to me, passed away a few years back. ⁓ And she was young, I remember having this moment of, I'm going to outlive her. ⁓ And was that sort of like anticipatory grief that I wasn't prepared for. had no idea. Nobody really tells you when you get a pet that one day you're probably going to outlive this pet. Adam Greenbaum: Yeah. Cassandra: and you're not wrong, that is something that should be spoken about. this anticipatory grief, it's that grief that happens before the loss. It can happen when your pet is ill or your pet is aging. It's like kind of dread about what's coming. How do you work with that? How do you support others with that? Adam Greenbaum: I you know what's crazy about that too. It's it's odd. We have a whole section if you go to lovebaxter.com under on the main menu under resources under topics, you can find we have a whole section on the anticipatory group. What's interesting about it is so many people email us and say, thank you for giving it a name. Like I didn't know what I was feeling. So Sophie, my dog who was two years older than Baxter, who is still with me a year and a half after he's been gone, which is just unbelievable to me. That girl is just won't leave my side, thankfully. And she was so sick in 2023. It was weird. End of 2023, she was under the bed in the guest room every day. Didn't want to eat and want to come near us. Didn't want to go for walks. She just was basically telling us, no, I'm ready to die. Let me die. And, you know, after pushing and pushing and pushing and making every call we could, we got in with one of the best internal specialty veterinarians in Southern California. she diagnosed her perfectly and got her the right medication and food. And my girl's still here, you know, almost three years later, but I've also spent three years like waiting for her to be gone. And if you would have told me even in June of 2024 in the middle of the fight with Baxter, that he would have been gone before Sophie, I wouldn't have believed it because She's older by two years. She was sick. She's on a lot of medication. She has hypothyroidism, Cushing's disease. ⁓ she has an intestinal thing and yet she's still here and she's thriving since Baxter died. I've traveled twice once because I was a keynote speaker at the London vet show three weeks after he died, which was truly a nightmare, but I, owed it to them to not flake out. So I, I went and Cassandra: Mm-hmm. Adam Greenbaum: talked about Baxter on stage and made about hundreds of veterinarians cry. And then last year, you know, through my research for love Baxter, I went to a pet after care and cremation conference for one night. Outside of that, I have not left the house. I mean, we go walk, we go out to dinner and stuff, but I haven't, I haven't traveled. my wife and I love going to sporting events. We haven't gone because I am so worried about leaving Sophie and something happening. ⁓ and I that my wife and I do such a good job of taking care of her. is debilitating. we just did a post and we put it out on our social media about the relief you feel when a pet dies and how it's okay to feel that relief. You can, you can feel sad and you can feel regret and also feel a little relieved. and I say this to my wife a lot. I love Sophie more than anything. I had her two years before Baxter and I have had her a year and a half after she was here before my wife, before Baxter, before I moved to Denver. before I started my company, before I figured out who I was in life. This dog has been there. My relationship with Baxter was so strong and so cosmic almost. But Sophie has been the constant in my life. I truly don't know how to live without Sophie as an adult. So the thought of losing her ⁓ is hard. On the flip side of that, I have, I've come to terms ⁓ that She's almost 16. You know, it's like, did it. You know what I'm saying? Like Baxter, it felt like, Hey man, you know, a couple more years, we would have been at the finish line. We would have done it. We would have watched you age gracefully. Sophie, we cook for her every day. We take her on her walks. We deal with her neurotic stuff. She's lost her hearing. I swear she's like learned sign language with us. even still. Even though I know she's at the age where she probably has a couple of months left, which by the way, I've been saying for two years, so who knows? I still feel that anticipatory grief ⁓ so in my stomach every single morning, every night before bed. I talked to her for like five or 10 minutes and just tell her how much I love her and tell her everything I want to tell her no matter what. And then every morning I walked downstairs cause she sleeps on our couch. I walked downstairs and I go like, look at her and I, and I wait to make sure her stomach goes up. ⁓ and that's, and that's really hard, but the amount of people who message love Baxter and talk about the pain they feel waiting for their pet to die is hard. And I'm sorry, you had to go through that. Cassandra: Thank you. Thank you for that. And I think there's a lot of value in sitting in that pain, like you said, embracing it in a way and know that ⁓ great love comes great loss. Because ⁓ can't really have one without the other. Adam Greenbaum: This is the deal we make the day we bring them home. You know, and I, and I was saying this about Baxter and it really hit me. I made the call. did in home euthanasia and it was like, I remember saying to my wife, I just called to schedule his death. ⁓ have the power pick the exact day and time that his life ends ⁓ for us humans. We don't know. yet I made decision for him. And I, and I struggled with that. for a while. And then I think I finally got to a point where was like, no, I, he was in pain. He wasn't doing well and I needed to do it for him. And I think that's a, that's a hard thing for a lot of people to have to get there. And you know, it's, it's taken me a lot of reflection time to understand that like, no, this is what I have to do. Like as I'm sitting here talking to you all right now, there is a six ⁓ or four 15 month old puppy sitting next to me in his bed right now. And he is 15 months old and that 15 months just flew by and there will be a day where Cosmo will die. And, I will be making that phone call again and I'll be making it for Sophie. And we have a senior cat named Nala and my wife and I will be making these calls, scheduling their deaths and ⁓ them in our arms when they take their final breath. ⁓ that's a lot of stuff. And I just wish the vets. ⁓ The groomers, the people selling you insurance and food just made you aware of that. Of, all these awesome things. Everyone says you're protecting your pet with this insurance. You're feeding your pet natural ingredients with this food. These supplements are doing this. You're extending their life. You're doing this and this and this and this, but also you're planning for the end of their life. So they're not excruciating. So you're not saying goodbye at an emergency room at one in the morning on a Saturday. So you get to do it on your terms. And I just think that's really important. Cassandra: There's something that I'm interested in touching on real quick, grief related, and it goes along with the fact that you've brought up Sophie a number of times, and I know what happened when we lost my dog Sabrina about three months ago. Her partner, her best friend in the entire world, my other dog Mason, lost his mind. He was not okay. And pet grief is not something that we can fix for them, but... What is your experience around that, And have you gotten any feedback about that? Adam Greenbaum: Yeah, a lot. it's, it's interesting how many people have said to me that they had a second pet pass away shortly thereafter. mean, I remember at my darkest moment, maybe two, three weeks after Baxter was gone. Again, I'm not a religious person. And I remember in my head, Sophie having a bad day and saying, I don't remember if it was in my head or out loud, like, all right, God, you, you, took Baxter. Just take her to. Don't, don't drag this out. I know you're going to do it. She seems down. She doesn't seem healthy. Just do it. Just get it over with so I can just deal with all this pain. remember thinking that, and you know, that was 16, 17 months ago. at our Sophie's got some dementia but it was interesting because ⁓ Nala or cat and Baxter were close. They used to lay together on the bed all day, every day they played. checked in with each other. When we'd go out for walks, Nala would be waiting at the door and like would sniff Baxter. ⁓ I think Nala took it hard. and my wife and Sophie and Nala got into a nice group. It was hard. lost them October 28th and no, we were getting through Thanksgiving without him and the holidays without him. was tough. And it was like December, January. We really started noticing Sophie was kind of like. We'd go for walks and she used to run and she'd be like running next to Baxter and like looking over at him and she was doing that, but she was looking at no one. So that was hard. ⁓ you know, so we had an opportunity to bring a couple dogs home wife and I rescued a cat, ⁓ but that we found while we were out, it didn't work and all. wouldn't want a cat. We had friends bring dogs over. Sophie was unhappy. And then, we said, okay, you know, we're, rescue people, but I didn't want Sophie to die alone. But she's also, she was going through something and she's older. I didn't want to bring in another dog and just have her say, Nope, I hate this. This is not how I want to do it. So that's why we brought Cosmo home. And it was interesting. Like, so if he wouldn't admit it, if she could talk, but she has like light in her life again. And, know, anecdotally, I think she's still here because of the life that Cosmo brings the life that Cosmo brought to Nala and to us. This house was dark. ⁓ and it was not just us humans who are mourning, ⁓ Nala was outwardly and Sophie was ⁓ showing us that she was mourning. So I feel like did the right thing, but every day people message us and talk about how, their dog or cats or whomever's best friend passed away and that they lost a second pet pretty quickly after just because they couldn't bear the loss. and I do absolutely think that's a real thing. I think. Animals experience grief just like we do. Maybe not just like we do, but you know, in a similar fashion. I think we definitely experienced that at home. I always tell people this because a lot of people message us and say, my dog died or my cat died. have two other cats, two other dogs, and I'm trying to be there for them, but I just, I'm too much of a mess. And, ⁓ know, we typically tell it's okay. You can be a mess. You don't, you don't have to be perfect. ⁓ Your animals don't expect to be perfect. Just. As long as you can take care of them, make sure they're getting what they need going to the bathroom, eating. That's okay. But also I think like leaning into your other pets can really help. you know, Sophie was, is very independent. She was very independent at the point of loss. Backstreet is not independent. He was like, no, I need to be next to you right now. So if he's like, I'm to go upstairs. I'll see in three hours. Do not come up and bug me. So if he's like the kid where you're like, drop me off at the movie theater, but drop me off three blocks away. I don't want people to, you know, so, ⁓ but yeah, I was. Cassandra: You Adam Greenbaum: Nala took it really hard. I think even beyond dogs, I cats, I think people see cats as like less emotional than dogs. So that's even worse. Cassandra: Especially if there's that bond there, because like if there's a bond, there's grief when the bond is broken. And cats, cats are funny too. But that's a whole different podcast. So what do you think the best way is to support someone who's growing through this sort of profound life-changing loss? It could be as a family member, as a friend, as a colleague, as an employee, like any of those. What do you think the best way to... Adam Greenbaum: Yeah. Cassandra: support someone would be. Adam Greenbaum: I I would put it like this. I started a company that was based on pet health. helped veterinarians and my life revolves around my animals and people know that about us. And I was actually, I don't really hold against it. I was shocked by how few people actually reached out and just took it one step above leaving a comment on Facebook. It was like, I'm so sorry for your loss, but the people who did reach out. I had people send me photos. Hey, you probably haven't seen this photo. I took this picture of Baxter three years ago when we were all out together. ⁓ man, that like changed my life. I have since I now have from photos and videos from everyone, my wife included my in-laws, friends, family. Like I have thousands of photos of Baxter that I didn't have just because I started asking people, Hey, remember I went to the dog beach. Did you take any pictures that day? ⁓ so, but I would just say like literally And this is for so many things in life, but I'll say if you're like supporting someone who lost a pet, I think like checking in once puts you in a stratosphere like the other people are in. If you check in two or three times, you don't have to send a gift. You don't have to do a million things. Just check in. if you're an employer and your employee lost someone, I would hope you have a pet lost bereavement, ⁓ something in your, your handbook. 11 % of companies offer pet loss bereavement in the U S which is off and frustrating. Uh, if 89 % don't yet 70 % of households have a pet, 97 % of pet owners see them as family. then 89 % of them don't. The thing I would say is you want to be a really good manager. Just tell them, go take the time you need. I got you. Let's not turn this into a big thing. I'm not telling you to go break HR roles and lose your job, but just Cassandra: That means 89 % don't. Adam Greenbaum: Do what you can send them lunch. say the pet's name. I think that's really important. And I've, and I've had that conversation with a lot of people saying, I'm sorry, you lost your dog versus I'm so sorry. You lost Baxter. There's a profound difference in that you're acknowledging animal. You're acknowledging them ⁓ their, ⁓ know, who they are, not just, Hey, I lost your dog. ⁓ have a, we have a post on the side, like things to not say, don't say, Hey, At least they lived a long life. That does not matter. Don't say when you're getting another cat, dog, fish, bird, horse. Don't say that. you don't need to minimize it. You don't need to say things like how they lived a long life or, they how much you love them. Like you don't have to do that. All you have to say is, man, I am so sorry. Baxter was so great. He was so funny. I remember that day we had with them. I, you know, I would tell people the last thing that I would say is really important is don't say, what can I do to help? Just help. Just, Hey, I'm thinking of you. Hey, I'm bringing lunch over. I'm dropping by and bringing you dinner. I'm doing this. I'm sending you some photos. the grief we feel after losing a pet is very intense. as Cassandra said, grief is grief. we're not here to, ⁓ compare it. So what would you do if someone lost their mom? What would you do if someone lost her spouse? Just do that. It doesn't mean you think that losing a dog is as important or more important or less important than losing a spouse. It just means what would you do if someone lost someone in their life that they're going through a lot of pain? Just do that. So, you know, that's what I would say is just don't minimize it. Don't say at least blank. There's no, at least there's no, least that could bring Baxter back. There's no, at least blank. least Baxter lived a good life. At least he fought till the end. At least you got to say goodbye on your terms. None of that changes what happened. There's no at least about it. So that's what I would say. Cassandra: Thank you. Thank you for that. Because you're not wrong, the at least will absolutely minimize everything that comes after that and everything that you felt before that. That's a really hard place to be, especially with people that you care about. Adam Greenbaum: Yeah. I agree, yeah. Cassandra: So I think we are going to move into our favorite part of the entire podcast, which is living loss lessons. So as we wrap up today's conversation, we're gonna talk about the living loss lessons, which is where we bridge everything we've talked about with tangible takeaways you can use right now. These lessons aren't about fixing the pain, but about finding a way to carry it. And sometimes it's a tool to practice. Other times it's reflecting on the meaning you've built from a loss you never asked for. It's the strength you gain even in the midst of the hard stuff. So Adam, before we go, is there one or two living loss lessons that you've learned from this journey that our listeners could hold onto this week? Adam Greenbaum: Yeah, I would say. ⁓ lost as part of this life we live. and ⁓ think instead of feeling like the anticipatory grief and the sphere of death that's coming, I think if I learned anything from Baxter, it was, ⁓ had so many regrets on so many things. I didn't do this or that. and it's funny, our dogs love the best life. ⁓ Our revolves around them. And yet ⁓ we've a commitment every day since then. Every day is going to be Sophie's best day. Every day is going to be Nala's best day. So here we had a cat Nala who lives this amazing life. We spoil her. uh, we got her a stroller and we take her on walks now because it was like, you know what? Nala has one life just like Baxter did, just like I have. Why should she not get to experience more than just this house in my in-laws house? Why should she not get to hear the ocean? Why should she not get to, you know, the smells when the dogs come home and we go to the park and she says, What is that? Where were you? Now she knows now she's been there. That was really important to us. You know, the things we do with our puppy, the things we do. So in the things my wife and I do with each other, I think if we learned anything, it was, you know, it's really easy to get into a rut and sort of just say like, ⁓ I'll do that tomorrow. I'll do that tomorrow. Tomorrow is not guaranteed for any of us. And I think there's I think the number one thing I've seen since I've been in this space is the regret. people feel I wish I would have done X. wish I would have done why we should have done this more. I should have put down my phone. You can do that today. Whether you're, whether your grandparents are 75 or whether they're 95, whether your pets are six years old, two years old or 16 years old, you have the ability to go live the life you want to live and make memories and make experiences and not have regrets. If something horrible happens tomorrow. And I just think that's, you know, backstroke in my eyes to that. And, and Sophie opens my eyes that every day. It'd be very easy for us to say, ah, she's 16. It's Sunday. We're just going to relax. Like she had such a long week. She's tired. It's really easy to, to like put that on her. And instead we say, Nope, sorry, sorry, old girl. You might be tired, but we're going to go have an experience today. Cause you're going to be smiling and you're going to be happy and we're going to create memories. So that would probably be my biggest thing I've learned is just like. take the steps to go make the memories, go visit your grandparents, go have dinner with your parents, make the phone calls, go check in with people, and just be more in the present. Cassandra: Thank you. Thank you for that. Wow. That hit me in the feelings. I got a little choked up on that one. Adam Greenbaum: It's, it's, it's hard. we do these like long drawn out walks every night. Now with Sophie, we take her for a long walk. There's an area by her house that she loves ⁓ and we let her off-lation. walks for 40 minutes. We call it like mozy time and ⁓ her puppy brother goes with Nala goes with. And I think to myself, why didn't we do this with Baxter every night? He would have loved this. ⁓ Why did we just let out back to pee and then we'd go to bed? he went on many walks and he lived this great life, but like now we do all those same walks ⁓ and we go this night thing. There's no people around. There's no noise. ⁓ So if he gets to sniff, we don't rush her. It's smell what you want. Take in the sense. Just go live your life. Act like you're ⁓ a millennial at Target. As we joke, like this is your target. You just get to look, go down up and down every aisle, ⁓ do what you Baxter didn't get to do that. And we didn't do that for him. And ⁓ He didn't know the difference, but it's just a, it's a little thing we've done for Sophie since it's been really cool. Cassandra: a great way to honor him by making sure that we learn a little something from every single situation and experience that we have. Thank you for sharing that with us because it's a very deep touching. way to embrace the world and embrace the loss. So thank you so much for being here with us today, Adam. Adam Greenbaum: Thank you for having me. Cassandra: And thank you to our listeners for being part of our circle today. Remember, by sharing this episode, you're helping us reach someone else who is carrying their loss in silence. Subscribe, follow, share, and know that your story matters. And just as a reminder, this podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes. While we are therapists, we're not your therapists. ⁓ So this does not professional mental health care. If you'd like to... ⁓ find help, please reach out to someone near you. And thank you again so much. Adam Greenbaum: Thank you for what you're doing.