It's not harder than losing family because they are family. I lost my boyfriend of 11 years in 2020, also to cancer. Devastating! I spent all my hours with him. He was with me every day. Work rest and play.It's harder than losing family. I lost my Lab in May 2022 from cancer. It took months for me to stop thinking about him dozens of times a day. After a time it became he having a great memory of him and a tear or two. In February I got an 8 week old Lab puppy. Boy is he a handful!