Is Your Good Dog Ready For A Fantastic Christmas?
And what if you are or they are not? Issue 51,2024
Hi Gang
It’s just over a week until the big man and his reindeer fly over the house, dropping presents down chimneys as he goes. But is your dog ready for Christmas? Are you?
Christmas can be a great time for dogs - Twyla LOVES ripping open her presents, and helping me with mine. She has a Christmas dinner and cheese and crackers in the evening too. She thinks Christmas is … well … like Christmas.
But not all dogs do.
Not all people do.
It’s ok not to be jolly
Contrary to popular belief, you do not have to have a Merry Christmas. So many people feel the pressure to maintain a level of festive spirit when inside they are crumbling. The smiling faces and singing children only serve to rub salt in the wounds. The elves on shelves can piss off too.
Christmas can be HARD. One name is missing from our Christmas cards this year, which deeply wounded me. I can’t imagine how hard it was for my Stepmum to write out those cards. Just when you think you are doing okay, bam, here come the tears again. Of course, the tears start falling for all the others you have lost too, and suddenly Christmas is not so much fun after all.
I regularly have a good weep on Christmas Eve, even when things are going well for my family. I think many anxious people do. At that point, the trigger stacking is immense, and you just have to release all that pent-up emotion. When better to have a breakdown than while watching the NORAD Santa tracker while telling your adult kids where Santa is, as if they were five?
Some people are alone for the festivities, or completely unaware that it is even that time of year again. Some people are cold and struggling with the bills, which never stop rising. Some people have no home, let alone a Christmas tree with presents under it.
I’ve always felt, as a skint single mother, that I never quite managed to match up to my kid's better-off friends and that I was a bit of a letdown, present-wise. Not that my oiks ever complained. I guess all parents sometimes feel guilty about all kinds of things, and for the most part, we do our best.
Not to mention, as a Pagan, I would rather be celebrating Yule, but no one else in my family does!
So, for me, Christmas is a mixed bag of emotions and has been for most of my life, and that’s okay.
But, Twyla’s joy when she realises that yes, she CAN have that thing she desperately wants to rip up (ripping things is her favourite) and that sweet mother of all joy, there are toys and treats inside it, is more than enough to make the effort for.
My partner and the oiks always spoil me, and I try my best to make the best Christmas Dinner they ever tasted each year too. To be fair, I’m a decent cook.
I may be a bit of a misery guts and an emotional wreck, but I am truly blessed to have my little gang around me, and the older I get, the more I realise that this is truly the most important gift of all.
If you are struggling with Christmas, please reach out. I might not be a counsellor or anyone who can do much at all, but I can listen and understand how it is not to be the twinkliest bauble on the tree.
Samaritans are a lovely bunch who will listen to you if you need a chat.
Twyla raised some money for them on her big walk in November. Sadly, we didn’t get to go to all the places we had hoped to because of what was going on in the family, but 50 miles is 50 miles, and she was more than glad to oblige!
Keeping your dog safe and happy through Christmas
Christmas can be a real worry for anxious dogs, and all the novel items, sounds, lights and smells can be really overwhelming for them.
Not to mention all the not-yourses on the tree, and on the dinner table.
Dogs can get into all kinds of scrapes and struggles at Christmas, so do check out our guide to keeping them safe and happy through the festivities here!
Spotted and sharing.
If heaven forbid, something ever happened to me and the family, and there was nobody left to look after Twyla, I would hope that someone would care enough to support a cause like this one.
This video is simply beautiful and if you don’t well up with tears immediately, you are some kind of monster.
My other posts - because I write about other stuff too!
Handy links.
I hope you have a peaceful Christmas and that you spend it doing something you love, with your dog.
See you on the other side,
Freya xx
Someone asked me this week, “Do you think ANYONE is genuinely happy on Christmas?” I almost said, “I am!” But actually Christmas is emotional and stressful and I love it but it makes me sad and guilty and it lights up my winter but also I feel like I’m in panic mode all month and I feel the heavy absence of the people I’ve lost….so yeah. It’s complicated. It does feel like the whole season is sort of a mass gaslighting experiment sometimes.
Yes, holidays are a hugely mixed bag of emotions. I never felt completely comfortable with them (that's for my memoir!). Whenever I read one of your posts, I want to adopt another dog, to give and get that unlimited love.