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Amy27

Amy27

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With a cat that is 15 who is blind and allergic to himself, another cat who is 10 and my two bunnies who both have bladder sludge. I kind of spent today spending time with all my animals. I have never really lost an animal before. As I looked at each one and spent time with each one, I hoped they knew how much they meant to me and I tried to tell them, but I know they don't understand. I guess I am just wondering, when your animal passes away, how do you make sure that animal knew how important they were to you? When they are alive you can show them, but do they really know, especially rabbits? I think after hearing both bunnies had sludge on Fiday, I am alittle sensitive to how much time I really have with each of my animals. When I look at each of my babies, I can't imagine life without them. How do you make sure your animals know you love them? I know this might be a strange question, but it has really been bothering me.
 
They know you love them and they love you so very much, trust me:). I was lucky to be able to get some information from Zaide (my dwarfed Persian mix kitten) who passed away...Peg had an animal communicator reach him for me. If you believe in animal communication, then I recommend it...even though I haven't yet had the money to pay for a session myself (usually $30 for 30 minutes). Just being able to hear from Zaide made me more at peace knowing he loved his life with me and that he will always love his mommy.
 
Amy27 wrote:
How do you make sure your animals know you love them? I know this might be a strange question, but it has really been bothering me.
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After working with an animal communicator several times - with several different rabbits - and having them tell her stuff that she had no way of knowing (stuff I hadn't posted on the forum or told others)...I am convinced that animals understand far more than we know - and that they understand more of what we say than we think they understand.

The animals she has worked with - when we talked about my feelings for them - they would not only tell her that they were loved - but they could share specific things about HOW THEY KNEW they were loved.

When Zeus ate mattress stuffing and was sick and I was trying to figure out how bad it was...he told her, "I ate something I shouldn't have and mommy is going to be mad at me so I can't talk to you."

She told him I already knew he ate stuff and I wanted to help him. He expressed regret over doing something he knew would make mama "mad" and when she told him I loved him anyway and would always love him and didn't want him to leave yet..he realized she was right and we were able to help him.

I know some may call it crazy...but when an animal can tell the communicator about a specific situation - down to the color of the blanket they were held in (and the way they were held for hours and decided to hold onto life cause Daddy asked them to)...

I now believe in animal communication - maybe not all animal communicators per se. But in animal communication - yes.


 
That is amazing you guys. I do believe in Psychics. So, this isn't far off. I find this amazing, and hard to believe, but, if it happened to me, I'd say what you guys are saying, ya know? I do believe it, but, at the same time, it's too cool to be true.

(further emots not opening...)
 
I am going to have to try the animal communicator. I think I have said that before lol but if I am really going to do it.

Peg do you mind sharing who you went through?
 
I use Arlene Thompson

Her email is:

[email protected]

Let her know you heard about her from me - I don't get anything from it - it just helps her know how people hear about her.
 
I haven't used an animal communicator (although I'd really like to), and I can tell you that they know.

I found with ill or old bunnies that making every day count and the best possible can really show you their happiness, and if they are happy and you are giving it to them, they know.

I would also say, in my experience, that when I have had animal's PTS, especially Cloud last week, he knew how much I loved him. When I held him, as the needle went in he rested his chin on me and waited to die. He was comfortable, and he knew I would be there to the end. He couldn't and wouldn't have known that had he not known I loved him. Same with Summer actually.

Flash died naturally and he only died once I told him it was ok to go, that he could go and I would be ok. He hung on and on until I told him that. Again, he must have known how important he was to me to keep holding on. He probably didn't know the words I said, but he would have known how I was feeling.

And Moon, on the day Moon died we knew she was going and we kept her here and didn't take her to the vets. I couldn't bear to hold her because it was too painful (very close to Flash, and also we'd lost another two the previous month), and the very last time I held her she licked all over me. She knew she was going and I knew she was, and she never licked in life at all (unless you ticked her). Those bunny kisses showed me she knew. My mum then took her and held her until and as she died.

I think they always know how much they are loved, but they show it most when it counts the most to them.
 
Amy, I wonder/worry about that also ever since I lost Luna. Do they know how much ofour hearts they take when they leave us?

I guess I make it a point now to stop whatever I'm doing to pet and talk to my fur-kids when the seem to ask for the attention. I even tell the foster-kids how much they are loved because I don't ever want them to not know those words.

I especially go out of my way to tell Patrick how much I love him. He turned eight this year and is really starting toshow it. I think his hearing and vision are going. The last time I had him to the vet, the vet had said that his abdominal abscess is at least four-times bigger than when he first found it two years ago. It takes up most of the middle of Patrick's abdomen now so when he flops he really looks fat. The abscess could burst at any time, and that scares the heck out of me not knowing what to watch for because I don't want him to suffer. Anyhow, I stop whatever I'm doing, slow down, take the time to pet him, and vowed to tell him I love him everyday for the rest ofhis life.

I like the animal communicator idea. That would interest me for Patrick, my foster-girl Ellie, and my foster-boy Joe. I just want to know if they are happy and what I could do to make things better for them. Might have to hold aside thirty dollars sometime...

myheart
 
I have also used an animal communicator. I was skeptical but impressed with how much the communicator knew, though she's never met me or my bunnies. At the time, I was more concerned with trying to bond Tobi and Benjamin, so that was really my focus.
I have been thinking that I need to have another session.

I have been having issues dealing with Benjamin, especially, and how to let him know that I love him. After a year with me, he still won't tolerate being petted, he hides from me, and rarely comes out of his pen when it's his turn to run.
On Saturday, I actually caught him and brought him into the living room - he actually clicked his teeth the whole time I was holding him, but then promptly hid under the sofa. *sigh* It was only his third time being out of the rabbit room, as he's never come out on his own.

I've been struggling for awhile, I worry that something could happen to him, and he'd never know how much I love him.

With my other bunnies, I try very hard to be as affectionate as they will tolerate, as often as possible. I know where Nick and Amelia like to have their ears rubbed, and I never walk past their room without going in to talk to them and pet them. (They won't tolerate petting when they're out.) Even Tobi, I know she's not fond of me, but I still try to make an effort to spend time with her. She sometimes growls when I reach into her pen, I just move slowly and pet her on her forehead.
I sometimes sing to them when I get them up in the morning. I even tell them I love them whenever I leave the house.
 
Thanks Peg, I will let her know I got her info from you. I also think it may be beneficial to help with my animals illness. Which is why I looked into it before.

Flashy, reading your stories gave me chills. I am sorry to hear about Cloud. Thank you for sharing your stories. They helped me because I have never experienced an animal dying or being PTS. I have no idea what to expect. But your stories helped me. Thank you.

Janet, I know Luna knew you loved her. You did so much for her and fought every step of the way beside her. She felt that love that you had for her.

I am sorry to hear about Patrick. I am not sure if you have a thread on it or I missed it but I didn't realize he was sick. I can't imagine how stressful that is for you knowing it could burst at anytime. You are so strong and your animals are so lucky to have you. If you do the animal communicator let me know. There have been several threads on the forum about them and everyone has all had good things to say about it.

Beth, your Benjamin sounds like my Little Bunny. Sometimes she will let me pet her but I am not sure if she does it just to please me so I will leave her alone or if she really likes it. One thing I think has helped Little Bunny and I is that if she does let me pet her, I do it for like 20-30 seconds and then will just sit and talk to her. She will box me and grunt at me and I always try to end pets on a positive note. I sit and talk to her a lot. She is the one I worry about the most knowing how much I love her because she receives the least amount of affection so I understand why you feel that way about Benjamin. Though sometimes I think there are bunny's that may be don't need as much affection. For rabbits like that I hope they interept our love in other ways. Such as feeding them and giving them treats.

I wonder sometimes if it is harder with rabbits because they are prey animals that they are just so guarded. Look at how many people who turn in rabbits to rescues because they weren't the cuddly bunny they saw at the pet store. But sometimes I see pictures on here of peoples rabbits giving affection and interacting with their human so much that it makes me wonder if I have failed at bonding with mine. I also think it is easy to compare a rabbits affection with other pet animals. Like my cats are so loving. They both run to the door when I get home, sleep with me everynight, and give me kisses. If I tried to sleep with my rabbits they would be off that bed in 2 seconds lol.

I also tell my bunny's bye, I love you and I will see you when I get home from work or I will good night my loves, sleep tight. lol they probably wonder what the heck we are saying. That would be a cool thing to ask the animal communicator though. Do they understand some of the things I say to them. Can they tell you what I say when I feed them in the morning and leave for work.

ETA: I emailed Arlene and am going to do a session for each of my animals.
 
Arlene got back to me very quickly. I am going to do Chase first. I emailed her pictures back and am waiting to hear when she is available. I am very excited!
 
Do let us know what happens... what sort of vibes you get from her and the reading. I am so thinking about it for Patrick, Ellie, and Joe.
 
Do you have to tell her anything about the animal? Or just send name and picture as the info for her to go on?

I really wish I knew what was going on inside Kirby's head because he is my heart bunny. But I think actually, the most important one I need some confirmation on is Toby.

Toby seems to be a headcase. He has a lot of dwarfy attitude and he is very, very afraid of everything. I mean, everything. If it moves, smells, makes noises of any kind, he is afraid of it and he acts all nutty and frantic. I've mistaken his jumpiness for fearlessness and being wild but actually I've recently come to realize that he's actually extremely fearful. I don't know if it was ever something I did to scare him or if he was born just really fearful. I just wish I knew what I could do to make him happier. I feel like I've already done him wrong because I didn't know why he acted this way for a year. I don't want him to be mad at me or scared of me anymore. I just wish I could let him know somehow that he's safe here.
 
Amy27 wrote:
Arlene got back to me very quickly. I am going to do Chase first. I emailed her pictures back and am waiting to hear when she is available. I am very excited!
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I would really love to do this with my bunnies!..i think it would be very facinating..and i too believe that our pets understand far more than we will ever know.
 
I have never lost an animal either, and I dread the day it happens. I love them so much, and am not sure how I would cope without them. They are my whole world, and I am sure they know it. I also know they love me more than anything. I get up in the morning, and they both leap on me, licking me as though they hadn't seen me for years! It's like they try and get 20 licks in a second lol, so that I am sure just how much they love me. And I love it :).
Whenever they are scared, or we are at the vets especially, they'll cling to me, lean into me, scrabble into my jumper (sometimes up it lol!), and make sure i'm covering as much of them as possible- they know they are safe with me, and that is truly one of the best feelings in the world- my animals knowing I would protect them against anything.

I always tell my bunnies (and another animals) 'Night, I love you loads and loads' etc. and goodnight kisses. And then....oh dear god I can't actually believe I am admitting this....I blow them kisses through the french windows as I go to bed. LOL! They look at me as I do it, and sometimes periscope in my direction. I honestly believe that they understand all of this. Not really the words themselves, but the way you say it, and the energy you give to them.

I think animals understand much more than they let on ;)

Jen
 
I think it is hard for us to imagine the workings of another animal's mind. Even if we share cognitive similarities, all of our thoughts and behaviors are impacted by our world view - and an animal's world view is very different than a human's. Humans seem to feel a very powerful need to feel loved and know that they matter to others. I don't know that animals necessarily share this since studies to date would suggest that their mental world is less introspective than ours.

This does not mean, however, that animals do not enjoy and benefit from social bonds, affection, compassion, and love from a human caregiver. I firmly believe that the human/animal bond is something extremely special and that both humans and animals can benefit immeasurably from it.

While I doubt that say, my rabbit Brindam has the cognitive ability to reflect on how much she means to me - and I further doubt it matters much to a rabbit's world view - I do believe that our bond has a certain inherent value to her, and that she ultimately knows that I am a comrade rather than a foe.

Brindam is not very affectionate towards me as she carries a certain wariness towards humans, but when she is frightened or out of her element, she always comes to me. I'll never forget the time she escaped in the front yard because the neighbor's kids opened the fence. There was a loose dog, screaming kids, my mom chasing with a net, traffic roaring by on the road... I really thought she'd bolt and we'd lose her. But when I went outside and called to her, she ran right over and buried her face in my lap. For a rabbit that doesn't even like me to pet her, this spoke volumes about the nature of our bond.
 
RandomWiktor wrote:
I think it is hard for us to imagine the workings of another animal's mind. Even if we share cognitive similarities, all of our thoughts and behaviors are impacted by our world view - and an animal's world view is very different than a human's. Humans seem to feel a very powerful need to feel loved and know that they matter to others. I don't know that animals necessarily share this since studies to date would suggest that their mental world is less introspective than ours.

This does not mean, however, that animals do not enjoy and benefit from social bonds, affection, compassion, and love from a human caregiver. I firmly believe that the human/animal bond is something extremely special and that both humans and animals can benefit immeasurably from it.

While I doubt that say, my rabbit Brindam has the cognitive ability to reflect on how much she means to me - and I further doubt it matters much to a rabbit's world view - I do believe that our bond has a certain inherent value to her, and that she ultimately knows that I am a comrade rather than a foe.

Brindam is not very affectionate towards me as she carries a certain wariness towards humans, but when she is frightened or out of her element, she always comes to me. I'll never forget the time she escaped in the front yard because the neighbor's kids opened the fence. There was a loose dog, screaming kids, my mom chasing with a net, traffic roaring by on the road... I really thought she'd bolt and we'd lose her. But when I went outside and called to her, she ran right over and buried her face in my lap. For a rabbit that doesn't even like me to pet her, this spoke volumes about the nature of our bond.
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While I do agree with what you are saying, so many recent studies have shown some amazing 'feelings' in animals that we wouldn't have thought possible.
eg. 'Languages' are being found in certain apes and monkeys. The real beginning of a specific language. Specific howls and sounds meaning 'Leapoard near', and 'snake', and 'eagle'. If one monkey makes the 'snake' sound, the other monkeys around them will look around the ground. If a monkey makes the leapoard sound, the others will rush up into a tree and go to the furthmost/outmost branches (where the leopard can't get to), and likewise with the 'eagle' except the monkey goes straight to the middle, most dense part of the tree. This suggests extreme intelligence and a more complex mental understanding that humans believe are only unique to us. Before this, we thought we were the only ones 'intelligent' enough to produce a 'language'.
Elephants which haven't seen each other for a year, and meet again at the watering hole etc. greet one another, and wrap trunks and 'hug' for even minutes on end. This suggests an incredibly close bond, and feelings/emotions towards the other.

Watch this:

http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/video/video.php?v=410861091927&ref=nf


And tell me there wasn't a hugely strong bond between this elephant and dog- a bond that I don't think any of us would have imagined for two of the same species, let alone two animals of completely different species. The elephant completely disregards her own health/safety/life just to be near this dog- that is love at it's most deepest, I believe :).

Jen
 
Oh I'm extremely aware of that - cognitive ethology and the study of animal emotion, culture, language, etc. is very interesting to me. I have entire textbooks just on things like the evolution of play behavior in animals. Heck, I just gave a seminar about the importance of social learning to the behavior, survival, and wellbeing of fish.

However, I think we often mistakenly, and sometimes with serious consequences, assume that the fact that animals share much in common with us means that they are "just like us." Considering that animals have different modalities for gathering information about the world around us, different social structures than us, different priorities than us, etc. it stands to reason that the way they view and interpret input from the world around them is different as well. I don't think, for example, a bat thinks and feels the same way as a cockroach, as a tiger, as a human.

Even across cultures, humans do not view and interpret the world the same way; the importance of "self," for example, is an EXTREMELY Western concept. If humans can vary so dramatically in world view, isn't reasonable to suggest that animals might have completely unique ways of interpreting the world that are relevant to their own species, rather than assuming they think exactly as we do? It's easy to cast our own values, beliefs, and interpretations onto them, but it doesn't necessarily mean it is accurate.

It just seems dubious to me that a rabbit sits there and has deep introspective thoughts about what their worth is to a human being when we really have no evidence to suggest that this is anything that would be of value to a rabbit. On the other hand, there are very tangible elements of the human animal bond that DO logically have value to a rabbit: the offering of social interaction, affection, protection, resources, etc. A rabbit's understanding of a bond in these terms seems more likely - to me at least - then a rabbit contemplating his worth when worthiness in the eyes of others is very much a construct of human society.

Just my two cents. I look at animal behavior through a very scientific lens. I firmly believe that they are intelligent, emotional, complex beings. I just believe that all species, not just humans, have unique thoughts, emotions, and world views. And I think embracing, accepting, and respectingthose differencesfor what they are and as equally valuableis more important to the human/animal bond then some an assumption that similar means identical. I've seen far too many cases of people ignoring the needs of their animal as its own species or misinterpreting its behavior by making anthropocentric assumptions about their behaviors, thoughts, and motives.
 
RandomWiktor wrote:
However, I think we often mistakenly, and sometimes with serious consequences, assume that the fact that animals share much in common with us means that they are "just like us."

I don't believe that they are 'just like us' but I do believe that my animals know how much I love them. I do believe that they are complex, and have an understanding of my feelings. They know exactly when they are naughty lol- so anticipate my feelings towards their actions (dogs give u the guilty eyes and roll over, before you even know they have peed on the curtain)- that is pretty complex when you think about it- anticipation and preparation for an emotion of another species to your own actions.
I also believe that we will never know what actually goes on inside their minds. This question can never actually be answered, so it's all down to speculation, based on different pieces of 'evidence'.

Even across cultures, humans do not view and interpret the world the same way; the importance of "self," for example, is an EXTREMELY Western concept. If humans can vary so dramatically in world view, isn't reasonable to suggest that animals might have completely unique ways of interpreting the world that are relevant to their own species, rather than assuming they think exactly as we do? It's easy to cast our own values, beliefs, and interpretations onto them, but it doesn't necessarily mean it is accurate.

I don't believe that anyone can know how an animal views or interprets the world. It's not really my concern how my bun interprets the world, but the feelings and bond between us, and how I can interact with them- that's what I really care about :)

It just seems dubious to me that a rabbit sits there and has deep introspective thoughts about what their worth is to a human being when we really have no evidence to suggest that this is anything that would be of value to a rabbit.

I don't think anyone truly believes that a rabbit would sit there and have "deep introspective" thoughts about its worth to a human being, but I do believe that a rabbit, like any animal, can feel loved, protected and feel trust towards a human. I believe there can be a bond that is strong, perhaps never to be broken, between animals eg. a dog giving its life for its owner, which has happened on many occasions, or a dog that risks its life to save its owner from a burning building.
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I don't believe that any species can fully understand another species, and how they think and feel.
I do firmly believe that my rabbits know my feelings for them, and how much they mean to me- perhaps not in as many words, and not in such an analytical way, but I believe on some level they just 'know'. They know I would protect them, and love them always, and I know they would love me always too, and trust me :)

That is an incredibly interesting topic though- I am currently choosing my modules for my second year, and Animal Behaviour and Cognition was my absolute priority choice, because I find it absolutely fascinating how intelligent and complex they really are, and many species just do not get enough credit. When I finish my Bsc in Zoology, I intend to do a masters surrounding animal behaviour and cognition, and hopefully progress into a career using it :)


Jen
 
Just because I'm not sure I'm making my point clear and I can't go back and edit:
I'm not arguing that animals don't feel or comprehend the love of their caregiver. I just don't believe that all species have the same thoughts, values, mental representations, etc. of love as we do, since "love" in and of itself is something we largely define based on our cultural perspective & personal ideals. Humans can't nail down one universal definition of what love is, how love is expressed, what love means to others, and what it means to be loved. So I just kindof doubt that a rabbit - a species with a very different perspective of the world than us - has introspective thoughts to the tune of "my owner loves me and I know I am important to him/her because of a, b, c, and d." I would suspect it is a more general sense of having an emotional bond to that person seated in affection, trust, and benefit. It doesn't make another animal's experience of love any less valuable, just like another culture's perspective of love is no less valuable. Perhaps that makes more sense?
 
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