HIS NAME IS HOPPER

Sadness is a difficult part of life that we deal with often as a society. The loss. The helplessness. The despair. But when it affects your children, it can be especially difficult to explain to them the unexplainable reasons which caused the sadness and to help them deal with that feeling.

Sage thought his older sister Saffron was joking when she sent him the text this evening. She was not. Their sister’s rabbit had died tonight in their father’s arms as he was feeding him.

Cinnamon had wanted a rabbit for a long time. In December 2016, she texted me that she got a bunny as a Christmas present, writing ‘…his name is hopper’. She decided to keep that name for him. Quite fitting for a bunny. He was mostly white with black markings. Hopper made my daughter very happy that Christmas day and for many days and years afterwards.

She would feed him raspberries and Romaine lettuce, in addition to the other bunny foods he would eat. She bought him bunny toys and cared for him the best she could. She loved Hopper very much. In the past few months, Hopper got very sick and couldn’t move one of his front legs. Cinnamon thought he had broken his leg, but it turned out he suffered from arthritis. As a result, he was unable to move much. Cinnamon decided to help Hopper and so she sewed a pillow for him in art class so that he could rest his arthritic leg on it.

When we love someone, whether a person or a pet, we do everything we can to make them comfortable and feel loved. Even though sadness is something we all deal with at some point of our lives, it’s quite difficult to see your children be sad when their family pet dies. A pet who becomes a part of the family. Being taken care of as everyone else. Coping with the loss is never easy. But knowing you did everything you could to care for someone brings a sense of comfort.