Memorialize a Pet
Memorializing
A funeral, memorial service, burial, or placement of the ashes encourages healthy closure to the loss process. There are many ways pet owners can memorialize their pets. For example, some collect their memories in photo albums, frame favorite pictures, or write poems or letters to their pets. Others record their feelings, thoughts and memories into a journal, while still others plant trees or flowers in their yards.
Memorial Art Workshops
Sponsored by Dignified Pet Services
One of the best ways to navigate your grief when you lose a pet is memorializing them through art. Research shows that art and healing come from the same source. In fact, it is now known that when a person is creating art or is healing, he or she emits the same brain wave patterns. Art and healing is so powerful that hospitals are incorporating art into patient care.
Here are some important facts about the healing elements of art.
- Participation in artistic activities can have measurable physiological results such as reducing stress, improving the immune system, and easing pain
- Creating art gives a voice and language to unknown emotions, feelings and behaviors
- Tapping into our creative energy can help a person feel more alive, gain inner wisdom, and stay more completely in the present moment
- Creating art uses the emotional and intuitive aspects of a person
Our Pet Loss Support Director, art therapist and certified grief counselor Enid Traisman, MSW facilitates a series of memorial art workshops. Each month offers a new opportunity to create something unique and take it home with you! This is a free community event. Click here for more information >
The DoveLewis Memorial Tree was designed by Gunnar Adamovics and dedicated in 1988 by the Portland Veterinary Medical Association as a permanent site for memorializing beloved pets.
“In dedication to those we serve this gift shall be used to establish and promote public educational programs to reach out to those who need the comfort of a pet and to aid those who have lost a loved companion.”
- Portland Veterinary Medical Association, 1988
You may make a memorial gift for a leaf, dove, or branch for this tree and have it inscribed in memory of your pet or the pet of another bereaved owner. Your pet will live on in memoriam and the donations collected from this tree are used towards new medical equipment and community
service projects.
The choices for the tree are:
Silver-colored leaf $50 (maximum 30 letter inscription)
Gold-colored leaf $100 (maximum 30 letter inscription)
Dove $500 (maximum 100 letter inscription)
Branch $1000 (maximum 500 letter inscription)
For a minimum donation of $5 per card, DoveLewis will hand-sign and mail a sympathy card for you to a bereaved pet owner, stating that a donation has been made in their pet’s name to DoveLewis.
The inside left of the card reads: Beloved friends never leave us…they just run ahead to wait for us in a happier place. May beautiful memories be your strength in these difficult times.
The inside right reads: IN LOVING MEMORY OF _________________ a donation to the DoveLewis Pet Loss Support Program was made by ________________________. The back of the card lists the days and times the free Pet Loss Support groups meet.
Donations are tax deductible in the extent they exceed the purchase price of $5.
To make a memorial gift, please complete the secure order form.
“My Personal Pet Remembrance Journal “ by Enid S. Traisman, MSW is available online or by visiting DoveLewis.
The bond between pets and people represent some of the most important relationships in a person’s life. Because they touched our lives so deeply, they are deserving of our grief when they pass on.
You may purchase My Personal Pet Remembrance Journal by Enid Traisman, M.S.W. for only $9.95.
Pick up a copy at DoveLewis’ main facility located at 1945 NW Pettygrove Street in Portland.
About Pet Loss Support Program Director, Enid Samuel Traisman, M.S.W., C.T, C.F.S.
Enid received her B.A. Degree from the University of Kansas in 1980. In 1986 Enid completed her Masters in Social Work from Portland State University, specializing in grief counseling.
In 1989 Enid became an active member of ADEC, the Association for Death Education and Counseling. She is now a Certified Thanatologist and Compassion Fatigue Specialist.
Enid is the author of five published books. Four are for human loss published by the Centering Corporation in Omaha, Nebraska. Enid’s fifth book is a Remembrance Journal especially designed for bereaved pet owners.
In October of 1986 Enid founded the DoveLewis Pet Loss Support Group. She wrote the pet loss brochure and facilitates the support groups four times each month. Enid is available for telephone support 7 days a week for people who have suffered the death of a pet or are anticipating the death of an aged or terminally ill pet.
In addition to her unique talent as a therapist, Enid is also an accomplished artist; her medium of choice is glass. The world-renowned Bullseye Glass Company here in Portland recently featured Enid and her work in their “Glass For Life” ad campaign.
Enid is a devoted mother to her human children Noah and Maya and to her menagerie of critter children who surround her with their buoyant spirits and unconditional love.
Links
Dignified Pet Services >
The Pet’s Grief Support Page and Candle Ceremony >
Lightning Strike Pet-Loss Support Page >
Tufts’ Pet Loss Support Hotline >