Christmas is just over a week away and preparations are in full swing. Many of us are busy with last minute shopping and gift wrapping, as well as attending and giving parties all while trying in vain to stick to our diets! Some families have the added stress of picking out a puppy and keeping it a secret until Christmas morning.

Here’s how it starts, and later I’ll tell you how it often ends. The children have been asking for a puppy to call their own for months! They’ve turned begging into a science and have already begun to pick out names for the new pup they just know Santa will bring them on Christmas morning. As a result of daily “hounding” the parents talk it over and figure having a dog might not be a bad idea. Finding a puppy and keeping it a secret is a challenging task, but after all, little Susie and Johnny have been pretty good this year. True, they don’t keep their rooms picked up and are not always great at doing their chores, but surely a puppy would teach responsibility and caring. Besides, what could be cuter on Christmas than a lovable puppy with a big read bow around his neck? Get the video cameras ready!

What joy and glee Christmas morning brings when the kids wake up to see that Santa has granted their wish. Mom and Dad are exhausted from playing Santa until the wee hours of the morning and sigh in relief that the surprise has worked. The kids drag the startled puppy around all day until he is finally allowed to fall asleep among all the wrapping paper, which he will later shred. In fact, Mom has already cleaned up several yellow stains and one brown mound off the white carpet, but it’s Christmas day so she lets it ride.

The first few days the kids fight over who gets to feed the puppy, who takes him outside and most important, whose bed he sleeps on. Then eerily, things begin to slowly change. Johnny doesn’t want to leave his video game to feed the puppy. Susie is playing with a friend and neglects to give the puppy water. More and more accidents appear on the white carpet and Mom and Dad have to clean them up because the kids think it’s “gross and smelly.” As the weeks go by the puppy grows and is not as cute and cuddly any more. And disturbingly, he's begun to chew anything and everything. The puppy is put out in the yard more and more often for hours on end and becomes lonely, bored and more destructive than ever. He starts digging and even gets out of the yard occasionally to wander around the neighborhood, especially on trash day where he chews holes in the neighbor’s trash bags to get at the left over chicken legs.

I could go on forever, but I think you get the idea of where this is all heading. So many times, that cute puppy that the parents worked so hard to get in time for Christmas ends up at their local animal shelter, stunned and bewildered as to how it got there. As humans, especially around Christmas, we are guilty of not looking at the bigger picture because the short term anticipation of the surprise and glee on our children’s face has captured our imagination. So all I’m asking is that you thoroughly think through the decision to bring a puppy into the house at Christmas time. Yes, it can work well and be a forever memory, but sadly, statistics show that it often does not. You may consider giving your children the promise of a puppy sometime in the New Year. After all, the animal shelters will be full of them, and often they are a pure breed. This will give you time to really talk over the responsibility of owning a dog with your kids, prepare the home and pick out the right dog for your lifestyle together as a family. A child’s first dog will determine how he approaches owning the pet for the rest of his life. Get them started off on the right foot; know that it’s a lot of work, but well worth it to have a cute little puppy grow into being a beautiful and beloved family member for life.