Robyn Moscrop, 27, grew up with bull terriers, so three years ago she decided to adopt one and named him Bronson, Wales Online reports. He wasn’t the easiest puppy to raise but that didn’t stop him from being the apple of her eye.
“He was a crazy dog. He made such an impression on everyone because he had such a personality,” Good News Network reports. “He just kept me really busy and I’d see other people with their really well-behaved dogs and I’d be thinking ‘oh my god, why can my dog not be like that?’”
She spoiled her dog and would even rent out fields with other bull terrier owners and they would have massive 20-dog playdates. “He honestly had such an incredible life,” she recalls.
Sadly, Bronson unexpectedly passed away last July at the young age of 3. Moscrop was devastated.
The woman working at the crematorium told her she could have his ashes in a tattoo. She asked her boyfriend, George Ricketts, to give her a tattoo with Bronson’s ashes mixed into the ink. He was incredibly nervous that he’d mess up such an important piece, but he got to work.
It took him eight hours to get the tattoo right, but the final result looks perfect.
@robynmoscrop Portrait tattoo of Bronson process @heavyhandsgeorge Instagram for the artist. #tattoo #tattooartist #tattooexperience #tattoodog #dogtattoo #dogportrait #memorialtattoo
The tattoo has helped Moscrop get over the grief of losing Bronson because she feels like they’re always together.
“Sometimes I talk to [the tattoo] as though I talk to him,” she was quoted as saying in the New York Post. “It sounds silly, really, but sometimes when we’re at places, and say I’m just wearing a t-shirt, I just think, ‘Oh, he’s here with me seeing all this, too.’”
Moscrop’s tattoo may seem strange but people are doing a lot of creative things with ashes these days. You can have them pressed into vinyl records, turned into glass art, sent into space or make them part of a memorial fireworks display.
It’s all about giving the person a proper send-off and helping those who loved them heal.
u201cA devoted dog owner was so heartbroken when her beloved bull terrier passed away that she got his ashes inked permanently into her skin, so that heu2019s u2018always with her.u2019 Robyn Moscrop rescued her bull terrier Bronson back in 2019 who she u201cspoilt rottenu201d and https://t.co/3xt06BTmXdu201d— Answering365 (@Answering365)
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People approach grief in their own personal ways. Frank T. McAndrew, professor of psychology at Knox College, notes in The Conversation that the loss of a pet can be as painful as losing a human loved one. But the difference is that when we lose a pet “there’s little in our cultural playbook” to help us through the loss.
A tattoo of a pet with a piece of them included is a fantastic way to feel close to an animal one has lost.
Moscrop is feeling a lot better about losing Bronson after getting her tattoo and she recently added a new bull terrier to the family, 2-year-old Alabama.
“If I didn’t have my new dog, I’d find it really hard to speak about him,” she said. “But since I’ve got Alabama, she’s kind of filled that hole that he’s left and made it a lot easier to heal because it is awful losing your dog.”