Yes — it's completely normal to still miss your dog years after they're gone. Missing them daily, years later, isn't a sign you're stuck or grieving wrong. It's the ongoing shape of a big love. The missing is the connection — proof the bond is still alive in you — and it can ride along with a full, good life. I know because mine just came with me to Denmark.
Grief gets a passport
Oxmo, my golden retriever, passed on September 16, 2022. Almost four years ago now. And this summer I took a trip to Copenhagen — new city, new streets, a thousand distractions — and learned something I probably already knew:
You can't out-travel missing your dog.
He came with me. Not in the heavy way people might imagine — in the way that's woven into how I see everything now. These were the little thoughts that traveled with me:
- At a café with friends: man, Oxmo would have loved to hang here with us.
- Standing at the ocean: he would have LOVED to swim here. He was the best swimmer.
- In a museum, in front of a painting from 1847 — a man and his dog, unmistakably us: bro, this is literally me and Oxmo. We were boys in this lifetime, and apparently also in 1847. The bond transcends. I really believe that.
- Riding a bike through the city: he loved chasing me on bikes.
- Eating ramen — I don't eat pork, so the pork would have been his. That was just the arrangement.
- Eating pizza: if Oxmo was here, I would have gotten him his own. No debate.
- Walking through a cute Danish neighborhood: walking him here would have been a vibe. I wonder if he knows I think about him all the time.
- Eating a muffin with no one staring at me — honestly, the worst part of the trip. Nobody tells you that one of the things you'll miss most is being watched while you eat.
- A big open field: such a chill spot to hang and play fetch.
So I guess grief gets a passport too. It came with me to Denmark. The missing always rides along — and honestly? I wouldn't want it any other way.
Why the missing never fully leaves (and why that's not a problem)
Somewhere along the way, we absorbed the idea that grief is supposed to finish. That if you're still thinking about your dog every day, years later, something went wrong in your healing.
I want to push back on that as hard as I can, because I think the opposite is true.
The missing is proportionate to the love. Big love leaves a big space — that's just the math of it. Your dog was in your mornings, your meals, your walks, your worst days. Of course a bond that thorough doesn't dissolve on a schedule. It's not supposed to. What people call "still grieving" is often just still loving, with nowhere obvious to put it — so it shows up at cafés and oceans and in paintings from 1847.
And here's the reframe that changed everything for me: the missing IS the connection. Every "he would have loved this" is the relationship, continuing. It's you including them. Four years later, Oxmo still shapes how I see a field, a beach, a pizza. That's not being stuck in the past. That's him, present.
What this looks like as the years pass
If you're earlier in your grief, I want to be honest with you about how it changes — because it does change, just not the way people promise:
- The waves soften. The missing stays. The early grief that takes your legs out — that eases over months. (I wrote about that timeline here.) What settles in behind it is quieter: the daily thought, the reflex to share the moment with them. That part, in my experience, doesn't leave. It becomes a companion.
- The thoughts turn warm. "He would have loved this" used to arrive with a knife in it. Now it mostly arrives like he's being included. Same thought, different weight. Give it time.
- They keep showing up in new places. Places they never went. Foods they never tasted. A painting made 175 years before they were born. The bond doesn't stay in the past where it "belongs" — it comes along, and finds them everywhere.
If you never stop missing them, you're doing it right
So this is for everyone who still misses their dog every day — one year later, four years later, twenty years later. The people who see a beach and think of a swimmer who's been gone for years. Who still order like their dog is under the table.
You're not broken. You're not "holding on too tight." You're not grieving wrong.
You had big love. And the fact that you always miss them isn't the wound — it's the thread. It's the connection you still have to them, alive and traveling with you, everywhere you go, for as long as you go places.
I hope that brings a little light to your day if you're hurting. The missing rides along — and I wouldn't want it any other way.
(If you want more on living this way — honoring them instead of "moving on" — I wrote about that here. And if you're looking for a place to put the memories and the "he would have loved this" moments, The Dog Grief Guide is the journal I made for exactly that.)
For Oxmo. 9/16/22. Always.
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