‘Say Goodbye in His Own Way’

A cat grieving the loss of his owner’s dog has found his own special way of saying goodbye to their four-legged friend.

The loss of a beloved family pet can be difficult to take. A survey of 2,000 U.S. pet owners conducted by OnePoll on behalf of ElleVet Sciences found that the mere thought of losing a pet keeps 31 percent of respondents up at night. That figure is more than those left sleepless at the thought of losing a family member (28 percent), being the victim of a crime (18 percent) or going through a divorce (14 percent) and highlights the high esteem many hold their furry friends in.

But it seems humans aren’t alone in feeling the impact following the death of a pet. It’s an experience that can leave other surviving pets in a similar state of shock.

Goose the cat is a prime example. In a video posted to TikTok by his owner under the handle WackDog, his owner explained how they are struggling after their dog Jessie “passed away suddenly.”

“Nobody got to say goodbye,” the pet owner wrote in an on-screen caption. That includes Goose, who had grown fond of his canine companion, as this video you can watch here shows.

The idea of a cat and dog forming a bond might go against the norm, but there’s ample scientific evidence to suggest the two species are more than capable of happily coexisting in the same household.

In a 2008 study published in Applied Animal Behavior Science, researchers observed and analyzed the interactions of cats and dogs living side by side in 25 households. They not only found that cats and dogs were able to “amicably” live together, but also that the two species were adept at reading each other’s signals and that dogs even made efforts to adapt and accommodate cats in the house.

Jessie certainly made an impact upon Goose, which might go some way to explaining his behavior on the 25-second video. In the clip, Goose can be seen cuddled up to a towel.

“Goose loved Jessie and found her towel with hair on it,” the caption explained.

According to the video, Goose has been acting strangely ever since Jessie passed. “Since her death, he’s been acting like he sees something,” the pet owner wrote.

Goose’s human companion shared a clip of the cat looking up at something on the ceiling. It’s not clear what he’s looking at though.

However, Goose’s owner has “no doubt he feels her” presence somehow by being on that towel. Proof comes seconds later in the video when Goose proceeds to start “making biscuits” on the towel, as if playing with Jessie one last time.

The pet owner doesn’t pretend to know what it is exactly that Goose is doing, but they clearly hope it is providing their feline with some sense of closure after Jessie’s sad death.

“I hope he was able to say goodbye in his own way,” they wrote along the video.

The heartbreaking footage drew an emotional reaction on TikTok, where it’s been watched over 263,000 times. “I’m sobbing,” one viewer wrote with another commenting: “They grieve…it’s so hard when no one gets to say goodbye.”

A third said: “Animals grieve and I think it’s especially difficult because they just don’t understand why they’re friend is gone,” while a fourth added: “I believe grief is the most intense emotion beings can feel, humans or not.”

Do you have funny and adorable videos or pictures of your pet you want to share? Send them to [email protected] with some details about your best friend, and they could appear in our Pet of the Week lineup.