Losing a pet you grew up with is real grief. Nobody gets to tell you it was “just a dog.”

An animal you grew up with was part of the daily shape of your life, there for years of ordinary days nothing else witnessed. Losing that is a genuine bereavement, and the fact that others rank it below human loss has no bearing on how much it hurts. Grief is not scored by category. The size of it matches what was actually there.

Let it be as big as it is, for as long as it is, without defending it to anybody. If you want something to do, write down a few specific things you remember. The people who diminish it do not have to be the people you tell.