Creating Hope Through A Crisis And Beyond

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184 – The Annual, 2023-24

By Sandy Weaver

Crisis happens. It could be a bad accident on the way to the show, loss of life of participants during a show weekend, or a tornado touching down in the middle of the showgrounds, wreaking widespread, devastating havoc. No matter what the trauma is, it touches people and changes lives, even those who weren’t directly involved.

The dog show family is, in many ways, like a biological family: connected, caring, and occasionally cantankerous. It’s the caring connectedness that causes the pain of a crisis to be felt by others in the family who were tens, hundreds, and even thousands of miles away from the actual event. Because every person involved in dog sports can picture themselves going through the crisis, they can take an emotional hit. The pain is real for every person, whether they were at the scene or not, and the lingering effects are real, too. Read on for ways to help others and yourself in a crisis and in the wake of the crisis.

The sudden change that happens in an emergency is extremely unsettling. That’s very human–once plans have been made, the human brain expects that the plans will be carried out, so when crisis strikes and plans are suddenly changed, humans generally don’t handle it well. People don’t understand things as well as they would under normal circumstances, and their actions may not seem to make sense. Some people blindly do what everyone else is doing, some rely on old habits or coping mechanisms, and some people just freeze. Initially, most people experience fear, anxiety, and dread, followed later by feelings of hopelessness and helplessness.

The bigger the event, the deeper the pain that is felt both by those directly involved and those who simply learn about the crisis.

There are some things to think about before the next crisis occurs. Walking through it in your mind prepares you to deal with it if it happens near you, no matter what “it” is. Here are the first seven steps to take in an emergency:

Click here to read the complete article
184 – The Annual, 2023-24

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Posted by AnthonyA on Jan 11 2024. Filed under Current Articles, Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.