I’m looking at him right now. He’s asleep at my feet, and the room is quiet except for that little whistling snore he does.

He is warm. He is breathing. He is right here.

And yet, my heart hurts. It’s a heavy, confusing ache that doesn’t make any sense because he isn’t gone yet.

Then, the guilt hits. It tells me to stop it. It tells me:

If you have felt that specific knot in your throat, I need you to take a breath. Let it out slowly. You aren’t crazy, and you aren’t ungrateful. There is a name for this. It’s called anticipatory grief, and it is the shadow that follows every senior pet owner.

Understanding Anticipatory Grief

Anticipatory grief is weird. It’s mourning a loss that hasn’t actually happened yet.

It hits you on a Tuesday morning when you grab the leash. You look at the long trail you used to hike together—the one he loved—and you look at his stiff hips. You realize you can’t go that way anymore. So you turn onto the flat pavement instead.

In that moment, you aren’t just walking a dog. You are grieving the dog he used to be.

You miss the chaos. The puppy who chewed your baseboards. The goofy adolescent who could jump into the trunk of the car without a ramp. The dog who pulled you down the street because he just had to sniff everything.

Grieving those changes doesn’t mean you don’t love him now. It just means you miss the old days. That isn’t a betrayal. It’s just love.

Overcoming the Guilt of Grieving

This is the hardest part. The inner critic.

You look at his grey face and you feel sad, and immediately you scold yourself. Stop crying, you think. He’s fine.

But here is the truth: You are allowed to be sad.

Let go of the guilt. It’s heavy, and it doesn’t help him. It is okay to miss the energy he used to have. Acknowledging the loss doesn’t diminish the love you have for the quiet, slow companion by your side. Your love story has many chapters. You are allowed to miss the earlier chapters while you are living in this one.

Stop Waiting, Start Sitting

The problem with anticipatory grief is that it keeps us in a state of waiting. We get hyper-focused on the end. We watch every stumble, every cough, every skipped meal, terrified that this is it.

We are so worried about losing them that we forget to be with them.

The only way to fix this is to stop comparing. Stop measuring today’s sleepy, slow dog against the memory of the tireless puppy. He isn’t a “broken” version of his younger self. He is a different version. A version that has earned his rest.

This is the dog who has perfected the art of the nap. The dog who leans against you with the full weight of his trust.

Love the dog in front of you. Not the ghost of who he was.