This is not yet the philosophising post I have I have been 'rehearsing' and threatened or promised here a few times recently so you are spared for now! 
(by rehearsing I mean working through in my head , pondering over in those wakeful hours before dawn. I sometimes seem to see things clearer then even though the thoughts may be sad)
This is a post just reflecting on the comfort animals can give us, as Carolyn and Dave have written about so clearly. Yes, and they can help us connect.
Their motives can hardly be misinterpreted, and that in itself can be a comfort in times of stress and distress.They find a place in the heart.
As children my sister and I longed to have a dog or cat but this was not to be at that time.
When my husband and I moved into the country we had hoped for a family but no children came along.
The first winter we collected a bouncy young rescue border collie cross from the rescue pound.
Max soon settled wonderfully well but he had obviously been terribly abused, and had been found tied to a post and left.He always had separation anxiety. Early scars do leave their mark.
A few years later our son entered our lives aged four.He had little speech and even more distressingly did not know how to respond to his normal body sensations. (They would have served no good purpose in his early life as his needs would not have been met, so would have to have been suppressed. Probably he was a baby that learned not to cry)The enormity of this even at this distance of time feels to me overwhelming as I write this.
He had to learn , we had to teach,that it was OK, indeed very important (be given 'permission')just to say 'I am hungry' for example, having first recognised what the physical sensation felt like.
I remember realising very soon that Max could be a good tool in this instuction,learning by example.
We certainly all knew when he was hungry! And then of course he would be fed and his animal pleasure was obvious.Bouncing and wagging tail.
No complication for Max in responding to calls of nature, when he needed to , he would first recognise the fact in doggie fashion,then use his nose to select a very appropriate tree trunk for the purpose, which was not always the first he came to! So dog walks became very valuable indirect instruction as well as fun.The message clearly was: All natural body processes to which no hang ups should be attached!
Our dogs have been too simple to have 'hang ups' although I have heard some breeds can have their idiosyncracies!
I could go on but this is already overlong. I shall end by fast tracking on to when Max was elderly. Our son used to get great comfort and take him to his bed, no doubt confiding with him his unsharable (to us) suffering and turmoil of the bad or sad times of his early teens........Early traumas and scars do indeed leave their mark...
