Pet Loss Alchemy

23/01/2024

I am so excited to share the full video interview with you all.

It's not often that we are able to share about the vulnerable parts of ourselves, our upbringings, our losses and how they affect us and shape us. In this interview I share parts of my life that very few people know about.

Grief has been my guiding light in the work I'm doing in support of pet parents and their animals.

I would love if you would take the time to watch this interview. I'd love to hear your thoughts. What areas of my story do you relate to?

(Thank you to Randi Hall of Realness Rising and Getting Real With Grief for this beautiful interview. Randi is a LMFT in PA who is focused on love and loss, hosts her own grief circle communities and has conversations like mine with other grief support professionals. Feel free to connect with her, or join her pages.)

This video is an interview between Randi Hall and Cara DeLaRosa where Cara discusses how her childhood upbringing and significant losses have played a role i...

05/11/2023

Everyone

Hey friends, if you follow me on this page I encourage you to please follow:

my personal page : Cara Delarosa

my professional page: Cara Delarosa - Pet Loss Grief Coach

I have several FB pages and in an effort to consolidate, will mostly be posting to these 👆👆 two listed.

My Instagram: @ pet.loss.grief.coach

09/10/2023

When her first book came out I bought several copies to gift it to everyone I could. Dr. Nicole La Pera’s The Holistic Psychologist work is groundbreaking. She has a way of making psychology, family dynamics, generational patterns, attachment theory and nervous system disorders approachable and understandable to the average lay person.
I’ve followed her for years and talk about her work in my pet loss course. I highly recommend you give her a follow. ❤️

People I’ve worked with who have high anxiety and depression were always intense parent pleasers.

They chose careers, partners, and made choices based on getting that approval. Many were silently suffering. A few were actually living double lives— or at least hiding massive parts of who they were.

I’ve seen first hand where parent pleasing can lead. Don’t get me wrong, we all have a drive to please our parents. But when we’re betraying ourselves or when we’re denying our purpose and passions to fulfill their idea of who we are the end result will always be resentment.

The first time I really (and I mean really) disappointed my parents is when I published my first book . I told my story to the world. My true story that involved vulnerable things about me and my family. Anyone in a first generational Italian family understands that’s a big no. It’s seen as disrespect. After all, what happens behind closed doors should stay there. My dad asked me many times why I couldn’t use a fake story or a different example.

I spent time with myself. I knew my story could help people. I knew the belief of keeping secret, or sweeping things under the rug, or upholding appearances was why I was unwell. I knew it was why so many in my family were unwell, too. I know that the dark must be brought to life to heal it. I know that the silent shame cycle is something I would be the one to break.

So I published the book.

And I disappointed my parents in a big way.

But I knew why I shared. I knew what I was doing and who I could help. I knew that my parents were like almost all humans— good at heart and flawed. Just like me. I knew their stories could help many.

And 3 years later I’ve gotten tens of thousands of messages from people saying how that book has completely changed their life.

And 3 years later my dad is less hurt. He gets it. He breaks down in tears when someone comes up to me in public and thanks me. He gets the impact. He’s come around even if he doesn’t agree completely.

Have the courage to choose you— everyone in your life will come around. And if they don’t they weren’t meant to be there

11/08/2023

www.caradelarosa.com

Please support my small business by sharing my information with your friends.

I have worked in and around the veterinary community for 11+ years now. I also assist two local mobile vets as needed.

Here is what they have to say about my animal services:

" Cara has a gift for compassionately and knowledgeably helping people understand and navigate their pet's end of life. For over 7 years, I attest that her evaluations, recommendations and hospice care reflect veterinary assessments and prescribed treatments. Cara helps people cope emotionally prior to, during, and after euthanasia. When Cara assists with euthanasias, people always appreciate her, often with a hug. Cara truly is the perfect QOL liaison to help navigate your pet’s end of life journey. “
- Stephanie Friedman, DVM

“ I’ve worked with Cara for 6 years and have found her to be knowledgeable, caring, and very humane. ”
- Joe Graff, DVM

In addition to the services listed on my card and website, I am now offering human Reiki sessions in my Santa Rosa office space. 

24/07/2023

Dogs can suffer from heat stroke in the summer months. Know the signs of heat stroke in dogs and how to administer first aid treatment:

https://www.whole-dog-journal.com/health/heat-stroke-in-dogs-2/

28/09/2022

JOIN US!
We start Saturday, October 1st

https://youtu.be/Klw3PLl4qJw

I am Cara DeLaRosa, Certified Pet Loss Grief Coach with Pet Loss Alchemy.These are the details for the Foundational Pet Loss Support Course I have created fo...

18/09/2022

Hello Friends! I'm curious. What do you think about this statement?

I believe there is some truth in this for sure.

Our animals are exemplary teachers of unconditional love. They allow us to be our fully human, messy selves without judgement. They don't care what we look like, our personality quirks, our bad moods or our imperfections.

They love us unconditionally and we, in turn, get to experience and reciprocate that truly special kind of love.

This week one of my grief clients said to me "I just miss being loved without any expectations."

That is so valid.

Human-to-human relationships can be complicated...and painful at times...and downright disappointing.

However, I whole-heartedly believe in the potential of humankind. I believe in the capacity of humans to grow and to learn to love unconditionally.

If we have the ability to observe, experience and reciprocate unconditional love from our animals, we also have the capability to share that same love with the world.

The animals GIFTED us this lesson, so that we can integrate it and learn from it.

Loving other humans unconditionally is possible

It's a practice...a DAILY practice...sometimes it's minute by minute.

AND this practice starts with: SAFETY

• Feeling safe in our own bodies is the starting point.
• We cannot learn to trust others until we feel safe with ourselves first.
• Safety = trust = ability to open one's heart to others = unconditional love
• I teach safety through central nervous system exercises, which regulates our nervous systems that are activated due to loss, grief, trauma.

I do this work one-on-one, so that while you are learning to trust yourself, you are also learning to trust an open-hearted and non-judgemental human (me).

I also created an AWESOME self-paced, super affordable foundational course that covers this topic and so much more.

17/09/2022

Have you gone ahead with decisions that didn’t feel quite right for your animal companion because you thought maybe others knew more or better than you? 

Have you dismissed your own inner knowing or your soul’s whispers only to regret it later? 

No judgment here. It happens all the time. (I’ve done it too!) 

But when you do this, you’re taking your intuition—your own inner wisdom—out of the equation, and you’re giving all of your power away to others when it comes to caring for your animal companions.

And that’s a shame, because your intuition is worth listening to: It can be a powerful compass that points toward what’s aligned with your soul.

I’m not telling you to ignore the advice of vets or other animal care professionals. I’m a big fan of science, critical thinking, and getting support from others. AND I'm a big fan of using your intuition as a filter or a compass. It can all work together. 

For example, if your cat is sick, you can bring her to the vet and get all of the information you can about treatment options and then use your intuition to help you choose the one that feels right.

At the end of the day, it's about making more decisions that you feel good about for your animal companions—and yourself. 

If this feels like something you’d like to explore together, then I invite you to join my upcoming workshop, Trusting Your Intuition With Your Pets. 

It’s happening via Zoom this Sunday, Sept. 18, from 2-4:30 pm ET. Registration closes at noon ET on the day of the workshop. 

You can learn more in the usual spot.

08/08/2022

These are the kind of emails I’m sending out on Sundays. This one is a little longer than I’d like for future emails, but I think you’ll enjoy the content.

If you’d like to be added to my email list say “ME!” in the comments.
_____________________________________
Hello Friends!

This week I learned a new term : Endurism.

Endurism is the process of pushing down our own true needs and desires in order to endure a specific situation for longer than necessary. You can probably think of a situation in your life where you “hung in there” longer than you should have…be it a job or relationship or something else.

Endurism is a coping mechanism that stems from feeling helpless in our situation, so we resolve ourselves to “tough it out” and endure it. However, as we do this, we are quite literally sacrificing ourselves in an unhealthy way.

The choice to endure is not always fully conscious. Meaning, we are not always completely AWARE that we are doing this. However, by starting to pay attention to our inner voice around what feels good or bad, we can start to develop this awareness…then make choices around it.

Usually, our intuition, conscious mind and body starts sending signals when we know it’s time to move on from a situation. We are extremely adept at ignoring these signals!

Why do we ignore our own signals? Well, there are several reasons, but the main one is because we are programmed to avoid conflict and uncomfortable situations…it’s our ego keeping us safe.

Change can be very scary, even if it’s for our own best interest.

What eventually happens when we ignore these super important signs and feelings, is that they get louder and louder until the universe takes care of it for us. Sometimes, if we wait long enough, it can look like a catastrophic event or physical illness.

I’ll share a personal example. I graduated college with a BFA in graphic design and after two colleges and 5 years of dedicated study, I spent 10 additional years designing professionally. During the final 3 years of my design career I worked my way to “award-winning senior designer” status.

While I should have felt very proud of my accomplishments and the facts that 1. I was using the degree I had gone to school for and 2. this was my first salaried position, I was miserable at this job.

I wasn't miserable at first! It was so exciting the first few years! However, it was a tiny company that relied heavily on me. My boss did not understand the demands of being a full-time working single mom, with a child with a compromised immune system. Nor did they have the capacity to offer me the PTO and support that I really needed.

As the main designer, I was expected to produce, produce, produce and create under tight client deadlines.

This worked for a while. Then, eventually, it stopped working.

If I had taken the time to slow down and listen to how I really felt about producing at this rate, I would have heard and felt my body saying "NO!".

But “I couldn’t” take the time to stop and listen and feel and hear…I was too busy pushing and enduring. I was an anxious all the time, super “type-A”, perfectionist, “high-strung”, “buttoned up”, achiever.

You see, I believed I HAD to produce in order to be of value…to the company and to myself. I had planned to continue enduring this job, even though I knew I had already hit the salary ceiling there and did not feel supported by the owners. I complained to my friends all the time, yet I endured.

…and then the creative block came…and panic ensued.

I suddenly couldn’t come up with any fresh, exciting designs. I was taking too long to “produce”. My boss started giving the cool jobs to the junior designer I had trained. I felt like I was suddenly under a magnifying glass…they were tracking every hour I sat staring at the computer screen or sketching concepts by hand.

Then they moved me to cold calls and sales…which, honestly, I sucked at.

They started warning me that I had better start making some sales…I was frozen. Terrified. I could see the train barreling towards me and could do nothing to stop it.

Then they fired me. I really wish I could illustrate the complete range of emotions I experienced and how devastated I was. I dedicated and poured so much of myself into that job and in the end, they did not give one crap about me. I was simply a producer to them. They didn’t care how much of myself (or my child’s wellbeing) that I had sacrificed for them.

In the end it didn’t matter. I had ENDURED for NOTHING.

Why did I endure? In hindsight, I now realize I had limiting beliefs that had tethered me to this job. I told myself it would be too hard to start over or find another job. In fact, at the time, I couldn’t even imagine what a next step would look like. Where would I go? How would I support my kid?

Endurism. It’s tricky because there are often limiting beliefs that keep us bound to it. One has to be mindful enough to SLOW down and tune in to one’s own authentic needs, without letting any outside influences in.

Limiting beliefs can hold us hostage to endurism.

Limiting beliefs sound like…
- I can’t…
- I don’t know how…
- I wish I could, but I can’t right now because…
- Someday I will have or do (fill in the blank), but I have to wait because…

Figuring these pieces out for yourself really require a self-care practice. It requires befriending yourself. It requires loving yourself enough to really listen...and that can be really hard to navigate without support and guidance.

In my case, I knew I was unhappy, but I was too scared to face change. I believe that the universe stepped in on my behalf, when I was not able to do it for myself.

When they let me go, I was LIVID! I felt so wronged! It was so unfair!
…and it took me a few years to be able to see what a blessing it actually was!

Getting fired created the space I needed in order to start listening.

I was finally free. Free to start over. Free to take steps towards creating a life and career that worked for me in a different way.

Looking back, I wish I would have known how to listen. I would have transitioned out of that job much more gracefully.

How does endurism show up in your life? Have you experienced something like me? Are you witness to other’s suffering through endurism? I’d love to hear from you!

I think it’s important to mention in relation to GRIEF, that many folks spend so much time enduring internal pain and guilt over the loss of their loved ones. This is also a form of endurism.

We are not meant to suffer. We are meant to find happiness and joy in life. We are meant to make connections, learn from one another, laugh, share the burden of hardships and THRIVE.

We are meant to be our awesome, authentic, unique selves.

We are meant to be free from suffering.

If you’ve been enduring in any way, please book a free 30 minute consult with me.
https://calendly.com/cara_delarosa/30min_consult

PS - This is an extremely intense time astrologically, where the things that have been bothering you will start to rise to the surface in order to be resolved and fully healed. Do not ignore this calling.

Sending you so much love and support,

Cara DeLaRosa
Certified Pet Loss Grief Coach
(707) 331-4841
PetLossAlchemy.com

Confidentiality notice. This e-mail transmission may contain legally privileged and/or confidential information. Please do not read it if you are not the intended recipient(s). Any use, distribution, reproduction or disclosure by any other person is strictly prohibited. If you have received this email in error, please notify the sender and destroy the original transmission and its attachments without reading or saving it in any manner.
Amenti Animal Services, LLC parent company to Pet Loss Alchemy, Santa Rosa, CA

This is a safe place where we transform grief into joy. Helping pet parents heal pet loss, release guilt, and take steps forward again!

20/07/2022

Any friends here want to be added to my business email list? I’ll be launching new offerings soooon and sending out JUICY introspective prompts for healing.

19/07/2022

Hello friends! 🤚 It’s been a while since I’ve posted here and I wanted to share what I’m/we are currently up to.

I am always expanding my business and personal skill sets. I’m currently enrolled in a business summer camp program that is helping me re-emerge from a bit of hiding…

You see, I am actually a very shy person, who often feels like what I have to say won’t be heard or doesn’t matter.

I have the tendency to be “all in” with something, post with vulnerability and passion, then like a horse, get spooked and run away! (Actually I retreat down, down into my cool, dark cave until I feel safe enough to emerge again.)

This comes from childhood wounding, feeling rejected, pushed out, abandoned, unwanted, talked over and scapegoated.

We all carry this stuff. We all have these core wounds of not feeling seen, heard or wanted. I’m embracing these parts of myself. I love that sensitive little Cara. She’s so sweet and open hearted and brave for sharing her heart with others.

So here is today’s practice: sharing my heart with you!

The prompt was to replace the typical “business statement that starts with “I help…” with “I profoundly fu***ng care that…”

My statement was: “I empower grieving pet parents to transform their grief into joy through a multidisciplinary and spiritual approach”.

You can feel the difference in this…

I profoundly fu***ng care that:

- The Animals are honored in life and death: physically, emotionally and spiritually.

- The Animals have an advocate to communicate their needs on their deathbed and that those needs are honored.

- The Animals do not suffer because their human parents cannot embrace the dying process or face their pain of letting go, or be euthanized too soon because the human cannot bear the emotional expansion that comes with caretaking a senior or ailing animal.

- The Animal’s body is sacred and deserves to be honored with care after death.

- The Pet Parents learn to integrate the loss and reconnect with their beloved animals in energy form.

- The Pet Parents are not left to suffer and spiral into a black hole of depression after their loss.

- The Pet Parents recognize the profound spiritual gifts their animals taught them and are able to move forward in the world with joy, as they honor these gifts. ❤️

I am a pet loss grief coach. But that’s not all. I help pet parents determine when the time is right to let go, offer supportive in-person and remote end of life care (animal hospice) and grief support. I am trauma informed and teach CNS (central nervous system) skills for coping with grief and help pet parents forge continuing bonds with their animals who have passed.

…oh and I almost forgot…because I hide the shy parts of my soul…🙈…I’m also an artist who creates channelled pet portraits of babies who have passed over. 😻

If you like my vibe, care about the same things, love animals and would like to connect or know someone who would, I encourage you to share this post, follow my on Instagram , like my other FB pages (Cara Delarosa - Pet Loss Grief Coach or my personal ), or visit my website to join my news and events email list (www.petlossalchemy.com), or simply DM me!

17/07/2022

24/01/2022

This is for each of you...
The ones who have fought some difficult battles.
The ones who are currently navigating grief and loss.
The ones who are healing.
The ones who have healed.
The ones who feel alone.
The ones who help those who are alone.
The ones who are scared.
The ones who share their truth no matter how hard it might be.
The ones who love unconditionally.
The ones who are trying to do better.
The ones who do the work.
The ones who are growing and evolving every day.
The ones who help others because someone helped you.
The ones who can't stop crying.
The ones who extend a hand to others.
The ones who accept the extended hand.

You are brave, you are stronger than you know... and please know... you are not alone. We are all in this together and I whisper to each of you, "you got this."

xoxox
Gabby

Please note: The artist of this drawing is Charlie Mackesy, who is the author of: The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse.
This book resonates so deeply for me.
His artwork is powerful and beautiful...
❤

22/01/2022

22/01/2022

22/01/2022

22/01/2022