The complex choices migrant families face with their pets during relocation

28 May 2025

For South Africans planning to emigrate, deciding whether to take their pets with them is fraught with emotional turmoil. The depth of attachment to their animals and practical constraints make the process particularly challenging.

Author’s note: In this piece, I have predominantly used the term “pets” for ease of reading. However, “companion animals” is the more acceptable academic term in the context of human-animal studies.

Pets often hold a special place in our lives, becoming family members. Especially in today’s fast-paced world, where both parents may work and families are frequently on the move, companion animals can offer children a sense of security and companionship.

Our relationships with animals can be deeply significant. They offer us affection, loyalty and a sense of belonging.

As we navigate the complexities of modern life, our pets often help us feel grounded, reminding us of the profound but simple comfort of being unconditionally accepted and loved.

Mental health professionals are also beginning to include animals more intentionally in their work, recognising that pets play integral roles in families. Animal-assisted therapy has gained more recognition in recent years.

Pets do not just offer companionship — they can help people cope with stress, grief, and even major life disruptions. For example, families going through difficult experiences, such as financial hardship, relocation, or emotional trauma, may find the steady presence of a pet a source of emotional support.

Critical role

Many professionals also recognise pets’ critical role in a child’s development. Interacting with animals can help children develop empathy, build social connections, and reduce anxiety during times of change, such as moving to a new home or school.

Consequently, when families decide to emigrate to another country, difficult decisions may have to be made regarding the fate of their non-human companions.

For migrant families, bringing a pet can help create a sense of “home” in the destination country. However, this decision is rarely straightforward, and is not just related to financial considerations.

People must consider ethical and practical concerns about their pets’ wellbeing. In some cases, the heartbreak of leaving a pet behind may add to the already impending relational losses which form part of the psychological stresses linked to migration.

Moving animals across different countries has practical and financial ramifications that not all families can afford, however willing they may be. Some countries have stringent quarantine laws and legal requirements regulating the importing of companion animals, making the process lengthy and often traumatic for the animals and their guardians.

For example, until a few years ago, South Africans who wanted to take their pets abroad faced strict quarantine restrictions from some of the most popular emigration destinations, such as Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.

This forced emigrants to take on a significant financial burden or make painful decisions about leaving animals behind with other people through re-homing, leaving them at shelters, or euthanising them.

My research on families emigrating from South Africa in the past 20 years has highlighted the psychological impact of decisions related to one’s pets when considering migration. Several interviews with South African families about to leave the country revealed many factors related to decisions made regarding their pets.

Emotional complexity

The emotional complexity of deciding what to do with beloved pets during emigration emerged as a strong narrative amid all the other decisions related to the emigration.

For many, it was clear that companion animals were not just pets — they were considered family members, often seen as “the other kids”.

For South Africans planning emigration, deciding whether to take their pets with them is fraught with emotional turmoil. The depth of attachment to their animals and practical constraints make the process particularly challenging.

One family, for instance, had previously experienced the pain of leaving a dog behind during an earlier relocation. This had proven to be highly traumatic and they therefore went to extraordinary lengths to ensure their present dog accompanied them to the UK.

In other cases, the decisions were even more heartbreaking. One family, unable to find a new home for their two elderly dogs and deeply concerned about the trauma of prolonged quarantine in their country of destination, made the difficult choice to euthanise them — a decision they saw as an act of mercy given the dogs’ age and vulnerability.

Sometimes, the emotional needs of family members played a decisive role. One single mother had initially considered leaving her dog behind due to financial constraints, but her young son’s intense emotional response when she shared the news with him prompted a change of heart. She ultimately decided that the dog would be crucial in helping her son cope with the transition of migration and settling into the new country.

For some families, the idea of emigrating without their pets was unthinkable. These individuals considered their animals integral family members, and this conviction influenced their decision making. Leaving their pet behind was not simply a logistical or financial consideration — it was a profoundly personal and emotional issue that struck at the heart of what family meant to them.

Recurring story

A recurring story was the belief that bringing pets to a new country would help recreate a sense of home in an unfamiliar setting. Pets were seen as a stabilising presence that could ease the upheaval of emigration, offering emotional continuity and a sense of normalcy in an otherwise stressful process.

Nonetheless, significant financial and practical barriers often counterbalance the emotional pull. The costs associated with transporting animals across borders, and complex and sometimes lengthy quarantine requirements, posed substantial challenges.

For many, the potential stress their animals might endure during this process, especially for elderly or anxious pets, became a central factor in deciding whether to take them with them.

Those who ultimately chose to leave their animals behind — whether through re-homing or placing them in shelters — experienced a profound sense of guilt. This decision may symbolise the broader sense of loss associated with migration. It is not just about losing a beloved pet, but also the relationships and familiar comforts one leaves behind.

Ultimately, some families choose to take their pets with them despite the high costs and complicated logistics of transport and quarantine. Others, unable to manage the financial strain or concerned about the stress travelling and quarantine could cause their animals, decide to leave them behind with friends or family.

In the most challenging cases, pets are left at shelters such as the SPCA or even euthanised — decisions that are often intensely emotional and made only because families felt they had no other choice.

While these latter decisions are frequently met with significant criticism, it does not seem they are made because of a lack of love. Many of those I interviewed were visibly emotional when discussing the considerations related to the fate of their pets, highlighting just how painful these decisions can be.

For those who managed to move their pets with them, the ultimate decision was based on the fact that having their companion animals with them would help ease the transition to migration.

Young children

This was especially important for families with young children, who believed they would find comfort and stability through the presence of their pets in a new and unfamiliar environment, recreating a sense of “home” and making settling into a new country easier. They feared leaving their pets behind would create further stress and feelings of loss in their children.

Ultimately, these experiences underscore the emotional and ethical complexity of emigration. Companion animals are more than just pets — they become an integral part of the family, providing emotional support and stability.

How people handle these decisions reflects their longing to hold on to love and belonging during the challenging process of emigration from their country of birth.

The concerns shown about the fate of pets in this process highlight how meaningful the connection between humans and their non-human companions can be. DM

Professor Maria Marchetti-Mercer is Professor of Psychology at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) and Assistant Dean of Research for the Faculty of Humanities. She served as the Head of the School of Human and Community Development at Wits from 2012-2016. Prior to that, she was the head of the Psychology Department at the University of Pretoria from 2001-2011.

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South Africa

Critical role

Emotional complexity

Recurring story

Young children