We have a new addition to our family. Her name is Star and she's a German short haired pointer puppy. I knew there would be sleepless nights and lots of training but nobody could have predicted the profound distress which immediately followed her arrival.
Twenty-four hours after we picked her up, this eight-week old puppy was sick: lethargic, off her food and vomiting. Twelve hours later she was admitted to the ICU and placed in isolation. She had been diagnosed with parvovirus, which the vet explained was a serious disease in puppies and was deadly.
Compounding matters, it was my eight-year old's birthday and now someone needed to tell him and his sister them that their new puppy might be about to die, less than two days after she arrived.
The next four days were terrible. They were filled with stress, worry, lots of kid counselling and cleaning. My house smelled like a swimming pool because bleach is the only cleaning agent that kills this horrendous and devastating virus. The dog was put on a drip which filled her with medicine and food while we waited to see if the virus would take her life.
As all of this happened I was thinking, what's the lesson here? The obvious one was, don't buy heart-breakingly gorgeous baby animals which you cannot help falling in love in with instantly.
The less obvious one was, there will always be adversity. (This is another version of, sh*t happens. Often.)
It’s what we do in our daily routine for wellbeing that determines how we deal with it. If you skip breakfast, drink lots of coffee, hit the sugar, sleep less and are sedentary when you're under stress, you'll be less resilient, less able to manage your emotions, and ill-prepared for making good decisions when it matters most.
We went to visit Star late the following day and the test results had worsened, but her body was fighting it. At just eight weeks old, she was not going to let the virus have it all its own way. Her immune system was in battle mode.
Humans have sophisticated systems for managing stress. Between our adrenal glands and our nervous system we have evolved to deal with adversity. It is important to nurture and protect those systems by allowing them to go back to baseline and reset. Operating in a constant state of stress and depriving our bodies what they need means those systems get worn out and stop working properly over time.
Avoiding unnecessary stress is important. Being prepared for unexpected stress is just as important because as we know, sh*t happens.
Are there things you can do that build a buffer for the tough times? You bet. They include:
- Create time in your day and week to have recovery or down time. By doing so you help the nervous system swing back into rest and digest/parasympathetic mode
- Get enough sleep. Cutting back on sleep is a quick way to stress your system and to leave you without the padding you require to deal with adversity when it suddenly or not so suddenly turns up at your door step.
- Eat wholesome food. If you are not providing your body with the nutrients it needs to carry out bodily processes that keep us mentally and emotionally balanced we are going to roll into adversity feeling out of control, irrational and incapable of dealing with what is going on well.
- Maintain exercise. When you let movement slip to the wayside you also drop a stress coping strategy. Regular exercise helps us reduce stress and keep our mood balanced. Just what you need when you have a lot on your plate.
By implementing these important and positive habits you create a solid foundation for when stressful things come at you.
Adversity will always come and go but it never leaves us entirely. Jack Kornfield, an American psychologist, author and meditation teacher says “there are 10,000 joys and 10,000 sorrows” in this life. When we accept that the sorrows are a part of the life journey, when we can learn from them, we grow as people, even if it takes some time to overcome the hardship.
Here's a radical thought for you. By leaning into the hard times and accepting that it's all just a part of the journey, we are better able to deal with them. Yes, feel the emotions that come with it, but rather than being a victim to it, be the person who rises above it. Be stronger and better able to deal with the next thing, because there is always a next thing.
In Star's case, there was a next thing. A happy one.
By Sunday afternoon she was bouncing around the cage in the isolation room, eating her food again and her test results were improving. Then late on Monday she was sent home. She'd lost weight and was re-entering a strange new house with strange new people (ie, us), but she was alive.
Two weeks later, she's a happy, rambunctious puppy who's eating shoes, climbing on the furniture and play-biting everyone with her painfully sharp teeth. And yes, sh*t happens, often, and on the carpet.
We wouldn't have it any other way.