Takeaways:

• December presents unique challenges for dog parents, leading to feelings of overwhelm and chaos.
• Your dog's behaviour during the holiday season is a normal reaction to increased stimulation and change.
• Creating a safe zone for your dog can significantly reduce anxiety and promote calmness during busy times.
• It is essential for dog parents to prioritise their own emotional regulation to better support their dog's needs.

Welcome to the Mindful Dog Parent, the podcast for overwhelmed and anxious dog owners who love their dogs deeply, but often feel like they're getting it all wrong.

I'm Sian Lawley Wood, ethical dog trainer and trauma informed coach.

And each week I'm here to help you understand your dog's behavior through a calm, gentle, science backed lens.

One that focuses on nervous system regulation, emotional well being and the real life challenges that make dog dog training feel so hard.

Here you're going to find compassionate support, simple tools, and honest conversations that help both you and your dog feel safer, calmer and more connected.

If you've ever felt guilty, triggered, exhausted or stuck, you're not failing.

You're just carrying too much on your own and you're not alone anymore.

Let's take a breath and get stuck in.

Let's be honest.

December looks magical in theory.

So there's cosy lights, there's warm drinks, there is family time, there's slowing down.

But if you're a dog parent, it can feel like absolute chaos.

Routines go out the window, your dog's overstimulated, your own nervous system's in overload and you're trying to keep everybody happy.

And that will be your dog, your family and yourself.

You've got to include yourself with this one as well.

And suddenly Christmas becomes the pressure cooker of expectations.

And maybe you're thinking, I should be enjoying this.

Why is everything feeling harder?

Why is my dog acting like they've never met a human before?

Have we lost all the progress that I thought we were making?

Or even the small amount of progress?

It might not even be the big things that you were seeing.

You were just starting to see like small, tiny shifts.

And you're thinking like that that progress that we were making has gone out the window as well.

If you felt that creeping overwhelm or even more than that, that sense of dread as Christmas approaches.

Because as of recording, we are approaching Christmas.

It's like two weeks away.

This episode is for you because nothing is wrong with your dog and nothing is wrong with you.

I really want you to hear both of those things.

Christmas places the maximum amount of pressure on two nervous systems that are trying their best.

Christmas is just like such a time of all the things.

And I'm going to go into a bit more detail about why December feels so destabilizing.

How to support your dog through the chaos of Christmas, and most importantly, how to stay calm when everything around you feels the complete opposite.

So the first thing that I want to talk about is why Christmas throws your dog off in the first place because it does disrupt every stability anchor that your dog relies on.

That is kind of the routine changes.

So lots of things are happening in December that don't normally happen at other times of the year.

So that means our routines start to kind of go out the window.

Visitors appear suddenly, so you kind of getting people coming to your door and bringing Christmas presents and.

And Christmas cards and like posting things through and all of that kind of stuff.

There's more deliveries happening, so there's lots of visitors appearing quite suddenly and unexpectedly.

Sometimes the house is going to get louder, the house is going to get smellier in a good way and it's going to get busier.

Generally.

There's going to be more things happening.

It's going to be more noise because there's more people in there potentially, and smellier because obviously you've got all the good stuff, all the good food is there, there around this time of year.

The chocolates and the mince pies and stuff are kind of left out a little bit more.

You're probably cooking for family more who are visiting from maybe, you know, miles away, that kind of stuff.

Walks then, as a result, are going to get shorter or they're going to get moved around.

So that's quite disruptive.

Your own stress is going to rise because you're already living life probably on the edge at the minute.

You know, the nervous system's triggering lots of safety signals and that kind of thing.

Anyway, you've got all these pressures of life generally, and then Christmas kind of get lump.

Gets lumped on top of it.

So your own stress is going to generally rise as well, and then predictability starts to disappear.

Dogs don't understand the festive season the way that we do.

So when things do start to change, they don't know why it's changing.

They just don't get it.

They're not going to know, oh, it's Christmas.

You know, we can't tell them it is either.

Like we can say to the words to them, Christmas is coming and it's really, you know, it.

Things are going to be different, but they won't understand it.

So they understand patterns, they understand safety, and they understand signals.

And December removes almost all of those things.

So think about the things that I've gone through already with the routines, the visitors, the sounds, the walks getting shorter, your own stress rising.

Like all of those things, the patterns, the safety and the signals are going to be removed pretty much altogether or changed even.

So they might not disappear, but they're just different.

Your dog's not going to be naughty or dramatic when they respond differently to those changes.

They're responding exactly how a nervous system responds.

When the safety cues just disappear and when they don't know what's happening, you can see how that's going to start to signal something in their nervous system as being not safe.

Because the predictability's gone, the patterns have gone.

The signals that they're getting are of stress and overstimulation potentially.

So their responses could be that they bark more.

So especially with people coming to the door with the delivery drivers as well and all of that kind of thing, that's going to increase their barking.

Potentially more people walking past the house.

If you live on a busy road, you know you're going to get more people passing because they're visiting family members or whatever it is, going out for walks and that kind of thing.

Over Christmas, more clinginess could happen because you're potentially going out of the house more often.

Or you know, they're just sensing some things that are different.

They could become more clingly as a result of that.

It could be more reactivity.

So if you are kind of seeing the signals of nervous system being in survival mode, if you've listened to previous episodes, you can kind of see some of the signals.

From what I've kind of talked about before, you're potentially going to see more reactivity as a result of that because they aren't feeling regulated in the same way as they had been.

So this is where I'm kind of saying those things that you were potentially making progress with before.

So if you've been working on the reactivity and you were seeing tiny shifts and tiny changes, if they aren't showing those shifts that you were seeing before, it could be that actually it's the time of year and the things that are different are just too different for them to be able to feel safe again.

So that's where that more reactivity comes from, that more hyper arousal, increased hyperarousal.

So they are getting more jumpy and their jumps are higher and they're potentially kind of mouthing more and doing the zoomies more often and not being able to settle as quickly.

And lots of little signals that they're giving off that they're more hyper aroused at this time of year because of all the things that are happening that then leads to more difficulty settling.

Because if they're in hyper arousal state, they're not going to be in a state to be able to relax and be calm.

So that difficulty in settling just means they're switched on more often and they're more alert to things around them in their environment.

They are going to be more difficult to settle as a result of that.

Because of all of the cortisol and the adrenaline and the lack of sleep and that kind of stuff.

It all just starts to kind of impact and then potentially more startle responses.

So they're going to be jumpier.

So jump, like jumpiness is a natural instinct of everybody.

It keeps us safe.

When something makes us jump, we startle as a way of going, oh, do I need to be aware of this?

And our body's switching on.

But there could be more of that happening because there may be more noises outside.

And all those things that I've mentioned, just with that overstimulation and not being able to switch off, they're going to be startled probably more often as a result of that.

That isn't regression and it isn't failure.

It's a normal nervous system response to an abnormal amount of stimulation.

So there is more stimulation, more things triggering those responses, and their nervous system is responding the way it should do.

And if your dog's feeling thrown off, you are probably feeling thrown off as well.

So if you think about all those things and start to kind of piece it together in more of a puzzle.

So you might just have like these puzzle pieces, but you can't see the bigger picture.

Just think about what I've said in the context of your situation and your dog right now and potentially what's going to be happening over the next couple of weeks in the lead up to Christmas and New Year.

So the next kind of month is potentially going to be really busy.

So think about how that could be impacting them and what could be happening right now and try to reframe it as your dog's not being naughty.

They are trying to cope in the situation that they're finding difficult because of all the things that are happening.

And it really starts to make things feel a little easier because it doesn't make you then feel like you're failing and it doesn't make you feel like you're doing things wrong or that they've regressed completely.

You know that this is maybe a blip in the system.

And if you need any additional support with it, if you need to kind of like, I'm going to give you some things to work on and guide you through.

But if you really find that it's a struggle, you know where I am because I'm here to help you and I've been through this myself.

I had so Maisie, my old dog, if you have listened to previous episodes.

I introduced her before and when we used to have visitors she got really stressed out.

So we had a barbecue once.

This is kind of not obviously at Christmas, but this is kind of growing back quite a few years.

When we moved into our old house and we had a barbecue, we had friends and family over as a like a welcome in to the new house, like a housewarming kind of barbecue.

And everyone was out in the garden so there was more space.

It wasn't everybody kind of packed into our house.

But she found it really stressful and if I'd have thought back and knew what I know now back then, I would have done some of the things that I am going to give you to kind of work on now for her back then.

But I didn't know what I didn't know.

I didn't know the things that I know now back then.

I mean, I'm going back probably, I want to say 10 years or something like that.

So quite a while ago.

And I could tell she was getting really stressed because she was pacing and she was panting.

Not because it was hot, because she was stressed.

A lot of the signals were telling me that she just didn't know how to cope in that situation.

And I would have done things differently had I have known what to do.

But if you need any additional support, you know where I am with it.

Because trying to do things on your own is difficult and with all the added pressures of all the things going on, it's even more difficult.

So I can relate.

I know where you're at if you do need any extra help with the things or even going further than this.

So this is like a starting point and it will help.

But you can also do more because if you're finding your dog is all those things that I've mentioned, the hyper aroused, not settling startling quickly, barking more reactive.

Like if that's happening generally, then you know where I am to be able to kind of work through these things with you on a deeper level.

But going back to the episode, I digress.

December places a massive emotional weight on dog parents.

You are trying to juggle gifts.

So you know, buying the gifts and delivering the gifts to.

To people, family expectations.

So the things that family members start to kind of say, you know, I've not seen you in a few months, I'm going to come over, I'm going to spend the weekend, what you know, that kind of thing.

So there's family expectations there on visiting, either visiting you or you visiting them.

So they expect you to go to them as well.

And it's harder than it kind of seems.

So you think, you know, you need to make time for these people.

But then there's so many potentially family members dotted around the country, like my family and my husband's family.

We are kind of, you know, all over the place.

So it's not an easy thing to be able to just say, yeah, I'm just going to pop around.

There's social pressure.

So what society is telling us that Christmas and December should feel like, you know, the Christmas films, I watch the Christmas films.

I am a Hallmark Christmas film lover and I'm not ashamed to say it, but it just sets these expectations in our head of Christmas should be perfect, Christmas should be this, Christmas should be that.

And this is where it all starts to feed our emotional weight.

So then there's money stress.

Obviously all those things are going to cost us money.

So the gifts and visiting, you know, the fuel that we put in our car to get to those places, like all the stuff going out for trips with our kids, you know, going and seeing Santa and having breakfast with Santa and then going to Santa's grotto and then going to see the Christmas light somewhere else.

Like, it starts to put pressure on our money situation.

So then your own energy starting to dip because you're doing more, more than you already do.

We've got dark mornings that's going to impact us because we're not going to wake up in the same way as we would if, you know, if the sun was out at 5am we're not going to be waking up in the same way.

Like this morning, it was really dark at half seven.

That's going to feel harder to wake up.

Naturally.

Physiologically, our bodies do find it more difficult to wake up when.

When it is darker.

So it's going to take more energy and more effort to do that, so our energy dips anyway.

And then the dark mornings, trying to wake up is going to be more difficult and then that leads to the busier evenings.

So when it goes dark at half four in the uk, it feels like we've got less time to get all the things in because it's getting dark, but it's still only half four.

But it feels like we've got to cram more things in to the daylight time.

So it's getting darker in the mornings and darker in the evening, so we feel just like there's less time to do all the Things.

So our evenings start to get, just get busier as a result of all of that as well as all of those other things that I've mentioned.

The holiday build up.

So all the things that we start to think we need to plan.

Are you cooking Christmas dinner?

Are you hosting Christmas dinner?

Are you going out with, with anybody on Christmas day for food?

Are you visiting somebody else?

Like what goes into the planning of all that stuff?

There's planning like in any scenario, there's planning needed for all of those situations.

And then you've got a dog that just suddenly feels harder to manage.

That is a lot.

Like I've listed all that stuff.

And it's a lot.

Your nervous system just becomes really stretched thin.

So you kind of just starting to stretch yourself really, really thin when you're trying to do all that stuff.

And all that expectation is on you.

And when your nervous system is stretched, even small behavior from your dog is going to feel big.

If you think about all that stuff, if you think about all the stress that you're potentially feeling because of all those things and how your body like doing that body scan and you think, oh, I feel really tense right now.

You know, my jaws tense, my legs feel tight.

You know all that stuff when all that's kind of feeling the way it feels.

And your dog starts to bark for the sixth time that day and normally you would have patience for that, but today it feels big because of all that pressure.

So that bark then starts to feel like personal failure.

A jump on visitors feels really embarrassing because you know, you've had visitors round and maybe you've got an elderly family member and they've jumped on, on them and you just getting really embarrassed about that.

A chaotic walk feels like we're going backwards because there's a lot going on.

But none of that is true.

You are at capacity.

That is what's happening.

You're at capacity.

December magnifies the things that you already carry and you could be carrying.

Guilt, comparison, perfectionism, fear of judgment, fear of letting people down.

Like all those things more potentially.

Those are just a few things.

And I felt this stuff myself in the past.

I feel like as a dog mum with a reactive dog in the past, that fear of judgment.

I don't want people to look at me and start judging me as, you know, oh, your dog's out of control and all that kind of stuff.

It just goes through your head even more when you feel that pressure.

It is so, so normal to feel like you're barely holding it together when all of that is going on in your mind and in your body.

You're not alone in that.

I've felt it before.

Other dog parents that I work with feel it too.

It just doesn't get talked about enough.

You're not failing.

You are overloaded, just like your dog is potentially feeling it as well.

So just kind of summarizing what we've done, so, like, what we've gone through so far, really try and think about the situation that you have coming up over the next two weeks.

Think about the things that potentially have been happening.

Think about how you've been feeling and do that.

Check in and do the body scan.

Think about all those things that I've just mentioned with kind of all those things going through your mind with comparison and perfectionism and that fear of judgment and all that kind of stuff.

And just try to reframe in your mind what is happening.

Your dog's behavior isn't changing because they're being naughty.

It's because they feel just as stretched as you do right now.

So I'm going to go through the next kind of section is going to be what your dog actually needs this month.

What does your dog need in December in order to feel safer and feel a little bit more regulated?

I'm going to go through what they don't need right now, because I think you need to hear it.

They don't need perfect behavior.

They don't need a strict plan.

They don't need intense training sessions, and they don't need getting it right all the time.

Those things are really difficult when nervous systems are dysregulated.

That would be really difficult for anybody.

Like, perfection is not a real thing.

It doesn't exist.

We can think that it does.

And people talk about perfect things like whatever it is in life all of the time, but it just doesn't exist.

It's not a thing.

So when we try and put that expectation onto our dog and we're putting that expectation onto ourself as well for the perfect Christmas and all that stuff, then you can see how it's going to just feel unattainable.

We're not going to be able to kind of hit that.

And when we're trying to kind of stick to a really strict plan, we're going to feel like a failure when we don't hit all the points of that plan.

So those intense training sessions that you're trying to do with all that other stuff is just too much.

They don't need that.

Or what they do need is safety.

What they need is predictability, because dogs thrive on patterns.

When they know something's happening, when they feel confident and comfortable with this pattern, they start to feel more regulated and they need your calm more than they need your cues more than they need you to tell them.

We're doing this, this training session now, and it's going to be for the next hour or however long.

So these three things are going to be real, like realistic, and they're going to be things that actually help.

So the first thing is, and this is what I would have done with Maisie in the barbecue scenario, is a holiday safe zone.

So creating a holiday safe zone for your dog, choosing one spot, one area, one place where your dog can decompress, genuinely decompress.

So that could look like a cozy bed, but not just in the same room as visitors are going to be or where all the things are happening.

So if you're in the kitchen and your kitchen's your, like, space to host, that won't work.

It's trying to think of the context that you're in and the situation in the house that you've got and the layout and the rooms, how it's going to work.

But a cozy bed, a crate with a blanket, a quiet spare room.

Somewhere that's low traffic.

So I did write down a corner of the hallway, but it depends what hallway it is, because if it's the hallway from the front door, that won't work, really, because there's a lot of still foot traffic going past and a lot of noise and potentially a lot of smells if the hallway leads to the kitchen and that kind of thing.

So whenever visitors arrive or the house starts to get loud, that area becomes the nervous system anchor for your dog.

So this isn't about shutting them away in a room and leaving the door shut and not, you know, them not feeling happy or safe or, or comfortable or confident or any of those things.

This is about creating a safe zone.

So I would be doing this beforehand, so I'd be prepping this kind of thinking in my mind, where can I set this up for my dog that they're going to feel nice and safe, nice and happy, nice and positive about being in this space when there are visitors and they can choose to go and go into that space if they want to, or.

Or if we start to see, because they're not going to know if they feel overstimulated, especially if they're a puppy or a teenage dog, they're not going to say, I need to go and switch off right now.

I'm Going to go lie down in the other, in the other room.

They're going to be like fomo fear of missing out.

They're going to be like all in on all of the things.

So we might need to, in I always say like enforced rest, but in a positive way.

So we just need to make that space as safe and comfortable and happy and positive as possible so they don't feel isolation, distress.

We aren't shutting them in the crate, leaving it short, letting them cry out if they feel distressed is not that at all.

It's the complete opposite to what that scenario.

We are giving them a space that is their own.

Visitors are not allowed to go to that space.

That's why that bed in the, in the, like in a lounge or in a family room won't work.

Or a crate because the family members are going to go, oh, I want to say, oh my God, all the things are going to be really exciting.

So having it so that, that is a space that your dog can retreat to and be there and, and have that rest.

You can pop a camera on them, you can check out, you know, make sure they are feeling comfortable and happy, building the time up over, you know, the next couple of weeks so that they can have, you know, especially if they're a puppy, they're going to still need 16 to 20 hours of sleep, depending on their age, over 24 hours.

And Christmas is no different to that.

So we want to make sure that they have that space to retreat to.

And people cannot go and disturb them in that space.

So I can't kind of highlight it enough that it needs to feel safe for them.

It needs to feel really, really nice and positive.

So they get, they get their chews in those spaces, they get their lick mats, they get their kongs, they filled kongs, they get all of the nice, calming, relaxing activities in that zone and that's where they have them in that space every single time.

So it's consistently the space they go to relax and enjoy and feel positive in and in a calm way.

So it would that doing that will reduce the barking, it will reduce the reactivity, it will reduce over arousal and overwhelm and it will reduce resource guarding.

So this is a biggie if your dog is a stealer of things, whatever those things are, especially shoes.

If you've got visitors coming to the house and they're taking their shoes off at the door, oh my gosh, that door is going to be like a little treasure trove of stuff for your puppy to kind of steal or your dog to steal and they're going to love it.

So we're thinking about kind of all of that.

We're thinking about.

If they have something and they feel the need to protect it because they feel threatened.

So if you've got visitors coming around and your dog's got a chew and somebody goes and approaches them with the chew and they're just in the room with them and they start to get protective of the thing, of the chew that they've got.

We don't want that to be something that they keep having feeling like they need to do.

This isn't like I wouldn't be correct in that they, they feel threatened.

In that moment, someone's approached them with something that they feel is valuable.

They don't feel safe.

They're protecting the thing that they've got.

This is where having that safe zone can really help because it's going to reduce the resource guarding.

If your dog finds something to steal, because it could be food especially, and then somebody tries to go and get it off them.

We don't want it to lead to your dog protecting the thing that they've stolen because they shouldn't have had it.

So it really, really, really helps having them separate, giving them their chew in that safe zone that nobody can disturb them, you can kind of see how it's really going to help.

It's really nice management for that.

It's one of the simplest, but one of the most powerful tools that you can use that safe zone for.

Lots of positive, calm stuff that you want to keep building on.

So it will really, really help.

So think about, like, where in your house could that be?

What room could it be in?

Does your dog have separation worries?

And if they do, how can we start to help them to feel really safe and comfortable over the next few weeks in a space that is their own, that may be in the same room as you at the minute because you know it's not going to be a super quick fix.

But even in the same room where they can start to feel safe and comfortable and you can start to build some distance, you know, really during the day, it's not about taking an hour again, it's not trying to build this up into big sessions, but something that they can do in their own space.

Now that was a big one because I really want to kind of hammer it home that it's not about shutting them off and them not being part of the family.

It is about them having a place to retreat if they need to, especially if they're an older dog.

As well they need some kind of decompression.

If they're a puppy, they won't or teenage dog, they won't know how to do any of that.

So we can start to build that up over the next couple of weeks.

So the second one is don't aim to train, aim to regulate.

So I like to try and get these little things that people remember.

So don't aim to train, aim to regulate.

Training during December should look like scatter feeding.

So putting one of their meals out in the grass, if the weather's nice like today, I'm recording and the, the sun's kind of out scattering one of their meals for the day in the grass, that's going to encourage their natural instincts to sniff and search and forage.

So that will be a really good one to help them regulate sniff walks.

So we're not thinking about I need to get three miles around the block, we're thinking about the quality of the walk.

So the sniff walks, if they want to stop and sniff, let them sniff.

Give them that time to be able to get that regulation through sniffing.

Gentle engagement with you.

So it could be that you do some nice.

Connection building exercises.

So a little hand touch, some nice little interactive pattern games and that kind of thing can really, really help.

So that engagement with you, eye contact and focus games and that kind of thing are really good slow routines.

So if you can slow it down for your dog in some way, if you are really busy and you can't get out doing something, what can you set up for your dog to have a nice slow routine in that 15, 20 minutes so they're not with you in that 15, 20 minutes, they're doing something that's their own thing independently of from you, that makes it slower and a bit more predictable for them.

Calming touch.

If your dog is into touch and it is a calming activity for them, they don't get overstimulated by it.

Some dogs do.

It's all individual very each to their own calming touch will really, really help.

So something that you can do that's going to be like a nice little massage for them, you know, massaging their ears and their little pressure points on their bodies just I do this with my two couple of minutes and they love it.

Micro reset.

Pauses so those things that I've mentioned in previous episodes in the past that you can do to help your dog to have that reset moment.

So the little pattern games, the little sniffy moments, you know all the things that I've mentioned, if you listen to previous episodes, you'll hear some of those tips and I'll put links in the show notes to some of the episodes where you can get some tips on those things your dog can learn.

Can't learn anything when they are stressed.

Just like with us, if we're really stressed and we're trying to learn, it won't go in.

It's the same thing.

But they learn beautifully when they're regulated just like we do.

This is why I always teach calm first and then behaviour follows and it's never the other way around.

I don't try and teach the behavior and the training cues to anyone until I know that their dog feels calmer and is starting to show signs of feeling more emotionally safe and regulated as a result.

So then the third one is predictability beats perfection.

Choose one predictable touch point every day for your dogs.

Now, again, this is really simple morning sniffs.

So can you just take them out for five minutes of sniffy time just out of the front of your house or just on a patch of grass opposite your house, wherever you are.

Or out in the garden, if you've got a nice big garden, can they just go out for some morning sniffs for.

For 15 minutes?

Having the same bedtime routine.

So try and make.

Even if you guys are doing something, can you make your dog's bedtime routine the same really simple little things that you can do to keep that predictability for them, the same walk pattern.

So I wouldn't make it so that you go on the same route every single day because that can become a little bit boring if it's not super busy, you know, not.

Not if your area doesn't have very many sniffs in that little spot or the street, that can be like less stimulating for them, but in a boring way.

So I'd say, like, create the same patterns with your walk.

So how you set that walk up.

And the things that you do on your walks stay the same, but it might change location and five minutes.

A simple connection.

So things that you can do to connect with your dog in a really nice way and they don't need intensity with any of that.

They need that one stable thing to rely on.

So it's not about doing all of those things, it's just choosing one of those things and trying to make it that predictable anchor for them.

And I've talked about these predictable anchors in the past, so it can really help, really help to just regulate them and start to tell them that, oh, this is what I do in this situation.

And there's a bit more consistency for Them you can do one of those things even in December.

So again, it's not about just doing more, more, more.

So just think about those three things.

Those are the things that I would have done with Maisie if I'd have known with that family barbecue.

I would have aimed to create that safe zone for her to go to.

I would have aimed to regulate, so I would have done much more enrichment based things, less pressure, all that kind of stuff.

I would have slowed things down for her beforehand and I would have built predictability into her routine more if I'd have known what I know now back then in that scenario.

So those are three things that you can do for your dog.

Now I want to go on to the things that you can do for yourself.

So supporting your own nervous system through Christmas, because there's something that most dog parents tend to forget, and that is that your calm is the training, so your nervous system is the environment.

When you regulate yourself, your dog receives that signal instantly because they can sense that you feel calm.

So here are my top tips for things that you can do for yourself to help you regulate and bring some calm back into your own kind of Christmas routine.

Even if it's not every day, even if you still feel dysregulated for a few hours on a particular day, or, you know, for the day or a couple of days, these are things that you can go back to and kind of anchor yourself with.

So the first one is to lower the bar.

You do not need an Instagram Christmas.

This is where that perfectionism thing starts to kick in.

So we think our dog has to be perfect, we think our Christmas has to be perfect.

We base it on those Hallmark films where we think, you know, oh my gosh, everybody's so happy and so joyful and we need to appreciate and be grateful for every single minute.

That's just not realistic.

That Instagram Christmas is one tiny snippet of a much bigger picture.

And that day for someone could have been rubbish.

They could have had a really rubbish morning.

And then they've shown you like a 20 second clip of some amazing thing.

That they've done for Christmas or seen, and you think, oh my gosh, their Christmas is amazing.

I need mine to look like that.

So that's not the case.

You don't need a perfect home.

You don't need to make your home perfect.

Like, you know, we have the.

We have to make our house smell of Christmas.

So the cinnamon and the gingerbread and all that kind of stuff, the candles and the incense and all that kind of thing.

We have to have the poinsettia plants, we have to have panettone like out on the side.

And everything has to be super clean.

And the chocolates are there.

Like all that stuff.

You don't need a perfectly behaved dog.

You need enough.

Enough is good.

Enough energy, enough patience, enough time and enough space.

December isn't the month for high expectations.

But.

But it's what society tells us should happen.

It tells us the opposite.

December's the month where the most expectations come in because of the pressure of everything being as it should be on a Christmas film or as it should be based on this 30 second clip of some random person we've seen on Instagram.

December isn't the month for high expectations because of the pressure that we feel and all of that other stuff that we have to deal with.

So enough is good enough.

And that is.

That isn't leaving your house to look like a tip.

It's just I will tidy up a few things and make things look presentable for visitors arriving.

But it doesn't have to look like a show home.

That's what I'm talking about with it and your dog's behavior.

Yes, I'd like them to be well behaved, but I know in this situation, so fill in the blank.

Whatever the situation is, they potentially will struggle.

Therefore, I'm gonna do some management, pop them into their safe zone with a lick mat just before visitors arrive.

And they're just gonna stay in there for 15 minutes to decompress and start to regulate more while everybody comes in, everybody settles down and then we're gonna do the intros.

That's what I'm talking about.

That and they might still get really excited, but it's not going to be the same as if you open that door, your dog is at the door with you, you're holding on to them going, hello.

Everybody's going, hello.

They're coming in, they're taking their coats off, they're taking their shoes off.

Everybody's going, oh, I've not seen you for so long.

Oh my gosh.

The dog is going to be like way up.

So we can set them up in their safe zone before the visitors arrive.

If you put, if you're expecting them for.

They can stay in there for the first 15 minutes with that thing that's going to help them just to distract them and help them just to decompress a little bit.

Everybody's going to come in and they.

All the, all the hellos and all of the high pitched, you know, the Hugs and all that kind of stuff are going to be out the way.

Presents are going to be handed over.

And everyone's going to be sat down when your dog comes in.

And it's just going to be a much calmer environment.

So that's what I'm talking about.

There's still excitement.

There might still be some jumping, but we're not expecting perfection here.

We're just setting them up for success and enough is good enough.

So the second thing is preparing something to tell visitors so it can help prevent embarrassment, it can help prevent pressure, it can help prevent dysregulation.

So a few things that I wrote down as suggestions of things that you can say to your visitors.

So he takes a minute to settle when people arrive.

So that is when you've taken them into that safe zone.

Someone's going to say, oh, where's Monty?

I want to come and say.

I want to say hello to him.

You can just say, take some minutes to settle when people arrive.

So I'm just going to get you guys in, we'll settle you down, and then we'll bring him in in a minute.

That really helps.

It could be she's feeling really overwhelmed today.

So you've noticed that your dog's been triggered.

They've been barking more and you know, visitors are coming.

She's been a bit overwhelmed today, so we're going to give her some space.

So again, that's setting expectations in people's minds and they'll go, oh, I really want to go and say hello to her.

And it's like she's just feeling overwhelmed.

I'm just going to give her some time and just really be strict on it.

Because people can push your boundaries.

It is a gentle boundary that you're setting that you're well.

Within your rights to set with friends and family.

I would be protecting my dog's.

Nervous system in that situation by saying something like that.

And I can also say, he's doing his best.

Thanks for being patient.

So, again, you're setting that expectation in someone's mind.

He is doing his best right now.

Thanks for the patience that you're showing with him.

So those sentences that I've kind of come up with are just three examples that you can kind of use.

But it's whatever you're use whatever wording and language and the way and tone and the way that you would say it in, in that way.

But you're setting those boundaries and you're protecting yourself with that one.

And it protects you just as much as your dog.

So you are setting yourself and them up for success in that situation.

So one little thing that you can tell your visitors, and that is a nice little boundary and a nice little thing that you can kind of set yourself up with.

And then the third one is giving yourself micro pauses.

So I mentioned giving your dog one, but you are giving yourself one as well.

So you're thinking about those slow exhales.

You're thinking about stepping into another room if you need to take a minute, if you don't feel comfortable just to say, I'm just going to take a minute.

Because you might, like, someone might worry.

I've got family members who would worry about me just saying, I'm just going to take a minute because they'll think I'm ill or something's going on.

Say you're going to pop to the loo.

That's not something anybody's going to be worried about.

So you can just step into another room and give yourself that micro pause as well.

You can put your hand on your chest or your heart.

You can start to just have that 10 seconds of stillness or minute.

If you say you've gone to the loo, you can give yourself a little bit longer, just that, that time, just to breathe and regulate yourself.

And those tiny resets will help your whole system and your dogs.

So those pauses that I mentioned, that you can give your dog, and for you, you might be in separate rooms, but you're both going to have felt the benefits of it.

And because calm is contagious.

So if you're calm when you're bringing your dog out after They've had that 15 minutes with their lick mat, you're feeling calmer because you've done that micro reset for yourself, they're going to feel it as well.

And they're potentially going to come in from a place of feeling calmer, too.

Now, this is a really important thing that I want you to know.

Your dog isn't regressing when this stuff is happening.

You're not going backwards.

December is simply a month of dysregulation.

It is a month where dysregulation really does kick in.

So your real progress is still there.

If you've made any progress with any of the things that you've been working on, it is still there underneath all the noise of the season.

Once the routines start to settle again, your dog will too.

And if it doesn't show that that's happening when things do start to settle, if your dog isn't starting to settle as well, that can just be a little signal to say that maybe they need a bit more support and you need a bit more support with that.

So that's something to kind of consider and think about.

But generally, once the routine settle and you go back to that pattern of this is what we do in the morning and the, and the afternoon and the evening, your dog's going to start to see that and settle as well.

So this month does not define your journey.

This isn't a raising all the work that you've put in.

And it doesn't mean that you failed in any way.

It simply means that you're human.

Living a human December with all those expectations and all the pressures and all the things that I've mentioned and you're doing it with a, with a sensitive, beautiful dog who is doing their best right alongside you as well.

And that is enough.

That is enough.

So take away that pressure that you're putting on yourself and what society's putting on you.

Enjoy those Hallmark films, but don't start to say I need my Christmas to look that way is what I'm saying.

So if this episode has helped you to breathe a little easier today, I really would love it if you shared it with another dog parent who you think might need to hear it or they might be starting to show or tell you that they're feeling overwhelmed this Christmas.

So every episode drops on Tuesday mornings at 6am and if you want deeper support to help you and your dog to feel calmer, feel more connected, feel less overwhelmed, do take a look at the website for all the ways that you can work with me.

I work with clients locally to where I live, but I also work with clients remotely.

So all over the world, wherever you are, I can support you remotely with all the things I have, a setup and something.

I'm going to give you a tiny.

I wasn't going to mention this, but I'm going to give you a little tiny teaser that in the new year I have.

So I've got some new things going on.

If you watch my Instagram Live last week, you'll know already.

I'm not going to go into that level of detail, but there is something that I didn't mention and it is something that will help anyone with a reactive dog.

So if you have a dog who is not just like a little bit grumbly with another dog on a walk or telling another dog just to leave them alone if they're approaching, like that's really normal communication.

That would just be like what we would do if someone comes to bother us and we don't want them to do it.

We would say, oh, you know, we'd set a boundary and that's what your dog's doing in that situation.

But if you've got a reactive dog who gets really overwhelmed, really overstimulated or fearful when other dogs or people or a trigger is close and you're out on your walks and you're really struggling, got something in the new year that is really going to help you.

I'm going to put a wait list link in the show notes.

I need to set that up.

But it's coming in February.

It is a group program.

I'm not going to tell you much more than that.

I feel like I'm going to give you too much information and I'm just building it all at the minute.

But it's a group program so that you're in it together.

It's not something that you are going to find your dog gets flooded and overwhelmed, but it's going to help reactive dog parents to make the progress that you might feel that you're struggling with at the minute.

That's all I'm going to say.

If you're interested in finding out more, I will put the waitlist link in the show notes.

Go and join the waitlist because you will be the first to hear all about what this new thing is going to look like.

No matter where in the world that you are, you can join this program.

It's a group program.

It is something that you are going to be able to join no matter where you are.

So if you live, you know, 50 miles away from Burton on Trent, you can still join it.

If you live in Kent, if you live in Scotland, if you live in Ireland, you can still join it.

So go join the wait list and you'll find out more about it.

That's all I'm going to say.

And I want you to remember that you are doing better than you think you are.

Your dog feels safer than you realize and you will start to see the benefits.

If you implement these steps that I've given you today, you will start to see the benefit.

So I will see you all next time on the Mindful Dog Parent.

Thank you so much for listening today.

If this episode helped you feel a little calmer, a little less alone, make sure you're following the show.

A new episode comes out every Tuesday and if you follow the show, you will be told automatically every time a new episode drops.

If you want more gentle support with calm dog training, nervous system regulation and navigating the hard moments of dog parenting, you'll find a few related episodes linked in the show notes.

They're there to hold you when you need it.

So every time I record an episode that I think has a really good link to something previously, you can find it in the show notes.

And if you know someone who's feeling overwhelmed with their dog right now, please do share this with them.

It means more than you know to know that I'm supporting more and more dog parents out there.

You and your dog are doing better than you think.

Take a breath and I'll see you next week.