A lot of grief writing is set in winter. Snow on the windowpane, fireplace, hot soup, slow afternoons in soft jumpers.
That isn't our December.
In New Zealand, grief lands in the middle of the busiest, brightest, most-social stretch of the year. The neighbourhood is gathering for BBQs. The kids are off school. Christmas Day is at the bach with everyone you've ever met. Boxing Day is at the beach. The dog should be there.
The dog is not there.
This is a guide to carrying that, gently, through a Kiwi summer — and into Matariki when the new year stars rise.
The first hard thing: nobody around you is in the same emotional weather
Pet loss in summer collides with everyone else's holiday. Your inbox is full of party invitations. Your friends are at the beach. The supermarket is playing Mariah Carey. You feel like the only one carrying something heavy.
That feeling is real. It is also worth knowing that most people would meet you with kindness if you told them. Almost every adult you know has lost a pet. Many are quietly waiting for permission to mention it.
You don't have to perform "fine."
Practical things that help across the summer
Decide what you actually want from each event. Not from all of summer — that's too big. Just the next event. Are you going? For how long? Who do you want next to you? What's your exit?
Have a phrase ready for "How was your Christmas?" Something like "It's been a hard one — we lost [pet's name] in November" gives the other person an opening to be kind. If they're not the right person, "Quiet — needed to be" is a complete answer.
Bring something tangible to family events if you want to. A small paw-print frame on the kitchen bench. A photo on your phone you let yourself look at when you need to. The collar in your pocket. A little anchor.
Take real breaks. A 15-minute walk away from the noise. The bedroom for ten minutes. The bach has a back step. Permission to step outside is permission to come back.
Don't drink the grief. It feels like it helps for an hour. It doesn't help across the night.
The empty places
Some moments are sharper than others. They're worth naming so they don't surprise you.
- Christmas morning. No one running circles around the tree.
- The first beach trip. Tide line walks with a missing nose.
- Long drives to the bach. The space in the back where they used to be.
- Walking home from the dairy in summer evenings, no clatter of nails behind you.
You will think you're fine, and then you'll be undone by the dog of a stranger at the shops. That is grief, working as it should.
Children at summer events
Children may grieve in waves through the summer too — fine all afternoon, falling apart in the evening. Predictable, unchanged routines help.
If a child asks at the dinner table whether [Pet name] is in heaven / on a cloud / a star, the kindest answer is the truthful one for your family, said simply. They are not being weird. They are checking the story is the same one you told them last week.
If you'd like more on this, see our guide to helping tamariki grieve a pet.
Marking the loss in summer
Some quiet things that have worked for our families:
A "memory walk" on the beach. Walk a stretch the dog loved. Out and back. Out is for what you're letting go of. Back is for what you keep. No need to talk if you don't want to.
A candle in the evenings of the first week. Not a vigil. Just a small light, on the kitchen bench, lit while dinner cooks. A gentle naming.
A native tree planted late summer. Pohutukawa, kowhai, kahikatea — a Trees That Count dedication, or one in your own garden. Summer is a good planting season in much of NZ.
An empty chair, deliberately. At the dinner table, at the bach, at the beach. The cushion, the lead, the favourite ball — not as a shrine, just as a quiet inclusion. Some families find this anchoring; others find it too much. Try it for one meal.
Matariki
In NZ we now have a winter ritual designed exactly for this — a national time to remember those who have died in the year past.
Many families have begun including their pets in their Matariki remembering. Light a candle in the early morning. Step outside if it's clear. Name them aloud, alongside the others you've lost. Let their name go up with the rising stars.
If Matariki feels too small a moment after a hard year, scale it up. Plant a tree in their name that week. Cook a meal of foods that carry memory — for them and for the others. Invite the people who knew them.
The gift of Matariki is that it gives a structured, communal time for what would otherwise be a private, sometimes lonely act of remembering. Use it.
When the second summer is coming
If you're reading this in May or June, the first hard summer might be behind you and a softer second one ahead. That second summer is often the one when you can speak their name without breaking. Let it.
Grief in a Kiwi summer is its own kind of grief. Bright, social, often lonely in the middle of a crowd. Carry your pet through it gently. They were yours; the love you walked them to the beach with does not stop because the beach is still there and they are not.
If you'd like more support, see our pet loss resource guide. PetAftercare partners with NZ vet clinics to provide complete end-of-life care, keepsakes and grief support for families.