Family dog is dying - What to tell a 2 year old?

[davester]

I think it's important to teach kids at a fairly early age that birth and death, as well as the bit between those events are all just inevitable parts of the cycle of life that we all are part of. Has your son had any short-lived pets yet (goldfish, crickets, etc) that can help him understand this? Perhaps a timeline showing the life cycle of people (do you have a family tree?) would be helpful. I'd bet dollars to donuts that there are books on exactly this topic at your local kid's bookstore or library. It's especially helpful for kids to already have this perspective when people they know and love (e.g. their grandparents) pass away. I'm painfully aware of the unhealthy and horrendous fear my wife's mother had of death...I felt that she had never been given any perspective on this at a young age so fear of death and avoidance of any mention of it or preparation for it (i.e. making out wills, etc) haunted her for the last couple of decades of her life.