Buddylio's existing grief guides deal with dogs whose person has died. This is the other case, and it is more common: two dogs in a house, one of them dies, and the survivor is not themselves.
What is actually reported
Owner survey research published in Scientific Reports documented behavior changes in surviving dogs after the death of a companion dog, with reduced play, reduced activity, changes in eating and sleeping, and increased attention seeking among those most frequently described.
It is worth being precise about what that evidence is and is not. It records what owners observed. It does not establish what the dog understands about death, and no study can. A surviving dog may be responding to a lost companion, to a household that has become quiet and disordered, to people who are themselves distressed, or to all three at once.
The changes owners describe most
- Eating less, or eating more slowly
- Sleeping in different places, or sleeping more
- Searching: checking rooms, waiting by doors, returning to the other dog's bed
- More vocalizing, particularly at times the two dogs used to do something together
- Following people from room to room, or withdrawing
The part that needs a veterinarian
Every item on that list is also an early sign of illness. Older dogs frequently live in pairs, which means the survivor is often elderly and the timing is coincidental more often than people expect.
Call your practice if the dog is not eating at all for more than a day, is drinking noticeably more or less, is vomiting or has diarrhoea, is losing weight, or seems unwell rather than subdued. Grief is a reasonable explanation, but it should be the one left standing after a check, not the one assumed first.
What tends to help
Keep the structure of the day the same. Feeding times, walk times and bedtime are what a dog can hold onto when everything else has changed, and they are also the first things a grieving household lets slide.
Do not rush to change the environment. There is no need to remove the other dog's bed immediately, and no reason to keep it forever either. Do what is bearable for the people in the house.
On getting another dog
A new dog is frequently suggested and sometimes helps. It is not a treatment. A survivor who is unwell, elderly, or still unsettled may find a new arrival stressful rather than comforting, and it is difficult to undo.
If you are considering it, wait until the survivor has been checked over and has settled into a routine, and make the decision on whether your household wants another dog rather than on whether it might fix this one.