I had a dog I really loved, he was great company and he helped with everyday feelings related to abandonment. Dogs are naturally in the present moment. We had ten + years together.
I really felt I had failed him in that I couldn't get him a quicker dx and better treatment for his cancer and was very tormented about it, but I think that was a typical reversal... a mental trick I do when there is an abandonment trigger... find a way to blame myself and make it about me, so that I can pretend to have some kind of control, feels more self hating but less grief and bitter loss.
This trick fits in with alcoholic/dysfunctional family values: if I am suffering it is probably my fault. If my parents didn't pay attention to me, it's not because they were stressed to the max, reacting to their own lives and problems with no room for children to have problems too! It is because I didn't deserve attention.
Huh.