Chris & Claire's Reflections on Christmas & New Year

#120. Well, after our 'looking ahead to Christmas' episode, how did it go? Were our festive hearts filled with joy? Or were there tears?!

This is The Silent Why, a podcast on a mission to open up conversations around grief, to see if hope can be found in 101 different types of loss, and we're Chris & Claire Sandys, your childless hosts.

Every year, we dedicate an episode to sharing our thoughts and feelings about the Christmas season - before, and after, it happens. Now that the holiday buzz has settled and a new year has begun, we’re back to reflect on how Christmas 2024 unfolded, whether our intentional choices helped us enjoy it, and how we’re stepping into 2025.

Includes; Sherlock Holmes, cinnamon buns, advent calendars, and Chris' meat monologue explaining Meat Chicken!

And if you want some questions to reflect on as you enter a new year, here's the 10 we mention in the episode:

1. Personal high moment/experience for you individually this year.
2. Personal lowest moment of the year.
3. Joint best memory
4. Joint hardest memory.
5. Biggest personal dream you have for the future.
6. Biggest fear you have for the future.
7. Something you don't want to take into next year.
8. Something you really want to take into next year.
9. 3 things you want to achieve this year.
10. 3 things you want to stop/be better at/improve on.

To listen to our pre-Christmas episode, 'Chris and Claire's Chatty Christmas Catch-up', visit: https://www.thesilentwhy.com/podcast/episode/793f6bd9/chris-and-claires-chatty-christmas-catch-up

Transcript

Claire
00:02

Hello.

Chris
00:02

Here we are.

Claire
00:04

Welcome to the Silent Why Podcast

Chris
00:05

The first of 2020. Well, the first of us chatting of 2025.

Claire
00:10

Yes, it is. Yeah,

Chris
00:11

Which is nice.

Claire
00:12

I was going to say, I'm Claire.

Chris
00:13

Nice to meet you. And I'm Chris.

Claire
00:16

We have no script today. So the only thing I wanted to get freestyle was mention our names, mention the podcast. And what does the podcast do, Chris?

Chris
00:23

We explore as many types of permanent loss as we can find, although we have set a number on that 101 to see if hope can exist in every type of loss.

Claire
00:32

And so far what would be your conclusion

Chris
00:34

So far so good? Well, it's not good. It's difficult, it's challenging, it's traumatic. But yes, there is good that can be found. There is hope that can be found and good comes out of horrible situations.

Claire
00:46

We've been doing these sorts of episodes around Christmas and New Year since we started the podcast. So we do an episode just before Christmas to talk about how we're feeling about the season. Are we in a good place with it? Do we look forward to it? How we feeling about not having children and going into Christmas, all that kind of thing. So we did that a few weeks ago and then we like to do another episode after Christmas after New Year to see how it went and what it was like. And last year it was, I can't remember how we were going into Christmas. I think we felt okay about it and we were very excited about New Year. I like New Year, but we had a terrible new year. It went really badly and it was a bit of a mess really. So this year we are back again to see how did our Christmas and New Year go this year?

Chris
01:26

And I think I can say, Yes!

Claire
01:28

Yeah, I think it was a good one. I agree.

Chris
01:31

Yes, it was great. Really good.

Claire
01:33

Yeah, I think that's been, as I reflect on it, sort of the product of us kind of intentionally each year actually looking at Christmas and seeing how we feel about it on the podcast. So I think that's actually been really helpful. I felt this year I was going into it because of a lot of the stuff we'd done in the past intentional about what I like about it, knowing what to say yes to, what to say no to. It felt like the fruit of that has actually been quite helpful.

Chris
01:57

You could say you are learning.

Claire
01:59

Yes, who knew?

Chris
02:01

Which is great. Yeah, Christmas, really good New Year, really good. I think one of my points would be that we, similar to what you were just saying, we really thought about what we were going to do in advance. We put a lot of thinking into our planning rather than just doing what came up and we really considered what season we were in, what we needed. That was quite important. I think what we needed and we planned accordingly.

02:28
I think the two of us have are very different in our, let's say our social battery. I think that's something, the term that's used these days, my social battery is filled up by things that empty your social battery. So we have to think about compromise and how we achieve that. When things like New Year when many people gather on New Year's Eve and want to line the streets to watch fireworks, I'd go out with friends, I'd go into people's houses. We didn't do that, but we did go out. So our compromise on New Year's Eve for example, was that, well, let's go out during the day and treat ourselves to a nice lunch and do some people stuff walking and watching and enjoy ourselves and then come back for the evening. So I've sort of exercised my social battery and then we have a quieter evening,

Claire
03:14

Although interesting going back to Christmas. I think we had a couple of Christmases, just the two of us a few years back, and I remember after one of them you were particularly unhappy about the situation because you didn't like it. Just the two of us, it wasn't enough. It was too quiet and I'd liked it. I hadn't really done it much. So it was quite novel still and I enjoyed that This year we knew it was going to be the two of us, but that was sort of set out of our hands a little bit, really. I knew with the hormone treatments I was on, I might not be in a great place. So we thought let's not do anything big in social and family because we just don't know what that's going to look like. So it sort of decided it for us. So in some ways I wonder if it was good because that was dictated to us from the start. We knew it was going to be the two of us for something other than just let's make it the two of us. We decided that that was the best plan. So I think that helped because there was no expectation of having to do anything else or make any other decisions. But also you were more excited and enjoyed it more than I've ever seen with just the two of us, which is rest. Although you talk about the social battery this year, I think you were more kind of,

Chris
04:09

Actually

Claire
04:10

Let's do it quietly.

Chris
04:11

I'm a new man

Claire
04:12

And actually I would love the idea of doing something a bit bigger on New Year. Not at the moment, but I think one year. I love the idea of being in a room of people that are all celebrating a new year coming in. The only problem is whenever we've done it with friends and stuff, we've had some nice times in the past, but most people I know now are just very proud about the fact that go bed at 10. So I don't actually know who we'd hang out with if we even wanted to do that, it would be strangers I think in a bar

Chris
04:34

Or we'd be home by 10.

Claire
04:36

Oh yeah, yeah.

Chris
04:37

We'd go out, gather, party and then go home by 10.

Claire
04:41

Someone said it's a little meme this year, didn't they saying why don't we all celebrate New Year at 9:00 PM then suits everybody.

Chris
04:47

Oh, do you know what? They've got a memory coming back to me from New Year's Eve that we started, we planned a Sherlock Holmes murder mystery investigation. So this is something we've had for years, isn't it? It's like a board game, but it's not really a board game. It's a boxed game that you open and there are 10 challenges in there and you get sort of newspaper sheets and a booklet of phone director of people to visit and a booklet about what the investigation is that you're doing. And then the box says one to two hours you conclude who the, let's say the murderer is

Claire
05:24

And why. Then

Chris
05:24

Present that. And there's the back of the little booklet, there's scoring on how well you did compared to Sherlock Holmes. So one to two hours. So I thought, great, we'll do that. I crack open some really nice beers. We'll get that done before 10:11 PM and we'll enjoy that. Have some nice drinks, some nibbles and it'll be a bit different. Something we could do together. Keep the TV off, put some music on. Wonderful. It didn't quite go according to plan because I think we were still trying to complete it.

Claire
05:51

Wait, took one to two days.

Chris
05:53

Come on. It took longer than

Claire
05:54

It might've gone into the third day, but only because I was determined to actually crack it and you were just wanting to look up the answers. Another difference in us.

Chris
06:02

Hang on, hang on. No, let's look at the calendar. We finished it on Saturday,

Claire
06:08

But I wasn't doing it solidly for four days.

Chris
06:10

It was on my mind Saturday the fourth.

Claire
06:12

Yes, but we didn't touch it on Friday at all, so it was sort of one to three days.

Chris
06:16

It's still on my mind. It was still a talking point.

Claire
06:19

And the idea is you have all these leads and you can look up certain leads and however many leads you use to get to it, you get points and Sherlock Holmes uses about six leads to get to it. We use 37 leads.

Chris
06:30

I think we went way deep than

Claire
06:32

We should have done. I think we thought we were better than this. We watch a lot of crime detective e type things, which we really enjoy. I think we thought we were quite good at detecting stuff, but playing that game made me wonder if I'm really, really bad at it.

Chris
06:43

It's just a really interesting, I guess illustration example of our personality types. I was ready, I'm willing to give things a good go and as I've said a few times, the box said one to two hours after four hours I was all up for, okay, there were 10 of these challenges. This is the first one of the 10. Let's look up the answers. I'm sure we've gone way wrong in this. No, you were like, no, no,

Claire
07:05

No.

Chris
07:06

So four days later there

Claire
07:07

Must be a way to be fair, we did guess the correct person, but not why or any of the other details around it. And I spent literally three or four nights falling asleep thinking why haven't we got an alibi for dog ragland?

Chris
07:22

See, it took us four days. Why

Claire
07:23

Hasn't count Vaughn? Schulenberg got an alibi was just these names just round around my head.

Chris
07:28

That's a memory, the memory of mine from New Year's Eve. So that was probably the low point of New Year's Eve and it wasn't even a low,

Claire
07:36

No, I quite enjoyed it to be honest. I liked the challenge there. I would've liked there to be a very clear cut answer at the end. I just still don't fully understand who did it. So that was a bit frustrating, but at least we know how the game works now. So next time we'll be more ahead of it.

Chris
07:47

We're both always keen to stay up into the new year stay. I mean we're quite late birds anyway. We don't go to bed early generally.

Claire
07:52

I was going to say, someone said to me, why don't you go to bed early? But I think Chris suggested one new year she would go to bed and it was caught past 11 and I was like, we've come this far. There's no way. I think mostly we're in bed for between 11 and 12 most nights. So for us to stay up for midnight is not a big deal. It's not an extra stretch for us. So it feels extra sad to go to bed early on New Year's Eve just to miss it. So yeah, I always like to see the new year. I do seeing those fireworks on TV and in London and actually the fireworks, there's always some music in the background or some voices or some quotes from things that have happened in the year and there's a lot about hope this year. So that was very encouraging. I feel like I do have good feelings about 2025 and I feel like even when I say that a lot of people will run for cover and hide. I did say that about

Chris
08:37

2020, I was going to say remind you of 2020.

Claire
08:40

So I'm well aware that saying that for us personally, I feel like it's been a good start to the year. There's a lot of hope for this year as far as

08:48
Health treatments getting away and doing some other bits and bobs. Yeah, it feels hopeful. So we will see. But yeah, at the moment I'd say looking back, it was a good Christmas of New Year, but if you're new to the podcast and you haven't really heard us talking about this before, again, it is the fruit of three or four years of hard work of really trying to refine and find out what is it that we like, how can we make this something we can enjoy without getting caught up in the whole, not having a family being childless. And there's still moments. There's still moments of watching Christmas films and stuff and you look at it and think that would be nice. But on the whole I feel like I'm very intentional about enjoying the decorations around the house, the lights we put up, the tree, the food. We did some lovely cooking and baking. That's something we done New Year's Day. We cooked cinnamon buns for the first time and they were delicious.

Chris
09:36

Yes,

Claire
09:37

That was very

Chris
09:38

Good. We used to recipe found online and thought and I mean that was something that again, we'd planned like two weeks in advance. We said what should we do New year? It's a bit different except one year we'd tried the same thing with a trifle.

Claire
09:50

I thought you could say the pizza dough, but we did do trifle. Yes,

Chris
09:53

One year we said, what do we not normally do? I

Claire
09:56

Really fancied a trifle that year,

Chris
09:58

So let's make a trifle. And so we bought some nice ingredients and we tried to make a trifle. Why did it not turn out that wonderful?

Claire
10:08

No, I think it did turn out well. It's just that it was on the year when we had a really bad new year. So I think it just got dragged into that.

Chris
10:15

I don't think it set. I think it ended up serving it into bowls and it was just became like a soupy,

Claire
10:20

I don't remember,

Chris
10:20

Runny jammy, whatever. But yeah, we did. We made pizza dough, made our own pizzas one year.

Chris
10:28

And that worked out well. Another year we said let's make RIF full, so this year what can we do? And weeks or months ago we said, oh, sometime we should make cinnamon buns and just try baking those. So we enjoy baking stuff.

Claire
10:40

They were absolutely amazing. But the amount of effort it takes to make them, it's not something I would do regularly just for during the week or something. It's a bit of a shame really, but they were good.

Chris
10:51

You've got to put the work in if you want something to turn out well as it

Claire
10:56

Can, which I get and I don't know, it depends on what the work is. You have to be in a certain mind and place to do something that takes an hour or an hour and a half to prove and then you've got to roll it out and then you've got to cut it up and put it in. That is a lot of time.

Chris
11:08

I don't mind the time stuff. So we enjoy making bread and that takes time to prove. But there was a lot more ingredients, there was a lot more sort of stages of the dough proving and then rolling the dough out and covering it in brown sugar mixed with cinnamon, rolling the whole thing up, chopping it into what looked like, like Swiss roll slices then

Claire
11:29

Had to prove again

Chris
11:30

You've done that lot of oilier, baking tins, proving it again. So it was quite messy. Lots of ingredients, very buttery and the time thing, I'm not bothered by the time, but it was quite

Claire
11:40

Messy, but it was good. And I'm going to give a shout out to where I get all my recipes from because it's the best website as far as I'm concerned for anything I bake and it's once upon a chef and it's a chef that has set it up and her recipes are amazing. I go there for everything and it was one of her recipes that we did for this as well. So that was great. I do think you need to be a little bit cautious about where you find these things, especially if you're going to spend that much time and effort on dough and proving time and ingredients, cinnamon and stuff.

Chris
12:04

But they lasted well. I was surprised how long they lasted with a bit of microwave

Claire
12:09

Got week out

Chris
12:09

To bring them back into life. Really good. So very impressed with them. But again, another example of planning of just giving some thought consideration into what do we need? What can we do that'll be a bit different? How can we create memories? That's really important for me I think. And something we like to do each year is just look back on what we were doing last year. What did we do at Christmas at New Year? What were our plans? We forget really quickly these things

Claire
12:34

Or if it's two of you, you don't actually take any photos of anything so you actually don't remember true.

Chris
12:38

But this year for the first time, we recorded just for our own private viewing a video, which is just us saying almost, we didn't but almost saying, hi Chris and Claire of 2026, this is what you did at Christmas New Year this year. And then just listing some of the things that we did to remind us next year. And then we can see how we've changed, what's changed, how we've grown new things. But I think yeah, we're quite intentional about doing things that create memories that we will look back on. So when say things like baking cinnamon buns is not just about putting some cake in a tin. It's about actually, oh yeah, last year we made cinnamon buns and that's the first time we'd ever done it, maybe the last time we ever did it, but it was something different, something new. We're very intentional about planning things to do that we'll remember in months to come.

Claire
13:23

You have to do that if you're on your own, I think because if you're in a big family gathering, there's a chance that maybe you will do a family photo or you might do a bit of video of what's happening and the kids opening this and that, or someone might be videoing you and it would be lovely to be in a setting where you're like, oh, someone videoed Chris and Claire doing this. No one ever videos us or takes photos of us really in that any kind of setting, not in those big group settings. So I think naturally you can look back or you can say to 'em, what did we do last year? And you can ask your family, they're like, oh, we did this, this and this. You're like, oh yeah, but when it's the two of you or if you're single and you spend it on your own, there's no record of that unless you make a record somehow of this is what we did, this is where we went, this is how we spent it.

14:00
And so if you like to look back and see and remember what you did, then you have to again be intentional. I think that's the word of the episode. You have to be intentional about putting things in place. And we do like to look back and say, what did we do last year? So we've created ways of doing that because I've had empty folders of 2022 and there's nothing there. And I don't remember what we did for Christmas. I don't remember what we did for New Year. So yeah, I think that's been really good as well. And I also want to mention that under no illusion that we've got this cracked and that next year will be fabulous because we've finally hit that mark where we know what we are doing. It will be different every year. Different things will be happening. Life changes. You don't know who's going to be here, who's going to be gone next year.

14:37
Different triggers might come up or something might happen that really affects you in the season. So I'm well aware that we haven't got this taped, but I do know the things that I need to put in place to enjoy and focus on. Because if you don't put things in place and you focus on all the, you don't have, you focus on all the other stuff that other people are doing and that instantly drags you down into a bad place. Whereas if you can find things that you enjoy, like this year I bought a couple of more Christmas things for around the house. I know next year when I unpack them, I'll get a lot of joy when I pull out my little brown stick with a Christmas hat on,

Chris
15:08

Literally about the size of a pen, a brown stick that someone's put a little Christmas hat on the top and a couple of eyes,

Claire
15:16

Eyes are eyes

Chris
15:18

And that's it. You get joy out of that much

Claire
15:21

Joy. I had such trouble choosing this stick. I went to past a Christmas market in Cheltham and there was a lady with a stall and she was selling lots of things like sticks and pine cones and things that she'd made into these creatures. So I bought a pine cone that had been made into a hedgehog with this really pointy face on it and then hanging at the top across the store. Were all these sticks and I'm not great at making decisions at the best of times when it comes to picking something that I want, but there was loads of them and they all had different faces, different noses, different arms, because all the sticks were different shapes. So I under a lot of pressure looking at all these faces, which one do I want? But I really want one of the sticks. So I did find a little stick. He's got a bit of a bit that comes out that's like a nose, they're all Christmas hat and I hung him on the bottom of the stairs and he will bring me a lot of joy next year when I get him out of the loft.

Chris
16:08

Let's hope it's not covered in damp mould or something else.

Claire
16:12

Yeah, I'm definitely hoping that won't be

Chris
16:13

The case, the year of storage.

Claire
16:15

But anyway, aside from the sticks, putting things in place like that, having those things around the house brought me a lot of joy that I enjoyed individually in my own four walls. So if life outside of that is a bit different, a bit scary, a bit daunting, a bit triggering for some people, maybe you can have this place where you come to and you enjoy and it's like a safe space I guess, where you can do any self care or you can just relax or enjoy the season. And I've really enjoy creating that in our house and I do it as early as possible. So 1st of December we'll get our tree or as close to that as we can put it up. And then 6th of January, around that time we take it all down, have to say, haven't taken the Christmas lights down yet. I wanted to take them down when they were dry and it's been very wet, but I did turn them off last night. We were the only one in the whole road with any Christmas lights left on. I don't think I've ever been the last before. I did wonder about leaving them up all year and just being solid. Why don't we just have Christmas all year? But I don't think the neighbours would appreciate that.

Chris
17:10

I think things have shifted in that it felt like neighbours were more eager to get lights and decorations up earlier.

Claire
17:18

There was some good early ones,

Chris
17:19

But then as soon as Christmas is done, a bit like the supermarkets for the next day. As soon as it's done, it's like the next day, take it all day. I mean we have quite a few Easter eggs on sale now in our supermarkets. Easter's not till April. And it was only a few days after Christmas that I saw the first Easter chocolates appearing in the supermarkets. It's like, oh, come on. And technically within the Christian, the more religion, the traditional side of the Christian faith, Christmas goes on until

Claire
17:46

February does

Unselected speaker
17:47

It.

Chris
17:47

Christmas day is the start of the season of Christmas. It goes until epiphany, which is in February.

Claire
17:51

Maybe I'll leave my lights up then.

Chris
17:53

So there you go. Some will be observing Christmas, some are keeping their trees up. You may, if you're in Britain, have a cathedral or an abbey nearby that's got its tree up until February and that's why any elements of Christmas new Year that didn't work. I think one thing for me that you did, you treated us both to a cheap advent calendar. I dunno why I said it was cheap, an advent calendar. It

Claire
18:15

Was cheap

Chris
18:16

With little chocolates in each day, but both of us were rubbish. Actually I think I'd open about five days and then forget about it for five days. So it was like, I think that's something next year we could actually, we don't need to

Claire
18:28

Do that massive on Christmas Eve I sat down and open from day 11 onwards. So yeah, it didn't really work in the way I hoped. The thing is I'm not really a chocolate breakfast type person, so I would never eat it before the evening.

Chris
18:41

There are other times in the day and

Claire
18:42

Evening we have other stuff to eat, but I just never think about it. It's not something that's on my radar. Maybe we need to put them somewhere more obvious next year.

Chris
18:49

Again, that's something. A couple of years ago we recorded an episode about me and my loss of Christmas spirit. I can remember as a child the excitement of opening the daily advent calendar and when Advent candles were invented in inverted commas with chocolate in it was even more exciting. It looks like I couldn't wait to open the next day. And then that just increases that sort of intensity, the buildup towards the excitement of Christmas.

Claire
19:15

And that is the problem with living where we do and how far we've come in the West, it's offering you a small bit of chocolate that you've probably got in the cupboard anyway. Whereas back when we were kids, there weren't bars of chocolate hanging around really. So having a bit of chocolate every day leading up to Christmas was incredibly special. And like you said, it was new because you used to open advent candles and just get a small picture every day, which was enough for some kids. So yeah, it's all sort of, I have to be careful. I don't to, I feel like I sound like my grandparents already, but sort of sad and mournful about what we used to have and the small pleasures that used to be available and now it's not. And yeah, it's a shame really. But

Chris
19:54

You'd open the calendar window, you'd light your candle and go up the stairs to bed.

Claire
19:59

What?

Chris
19:59

Blowing

Claire
20:00

Up candle. Why your candle before you go to bed? There's That's very dangerous. Don't do that. People

Chris
20:05

No lights.

Claire
20:06

Are you taking it with you?

Chris
20:07

Good old days.

Claire
20:07

I thought you were lighting it and leaving it downstairs.

Chris
20:09

No, no. You just sound

Claire
20:10

Like wee willy. Winkle

Chris
20:13

Winky

Claire
20:14

Winky wee willy winky. It's not Winky.

Chris
20:16

It is. It's not Winkle. That's a shellfish isn't it? I'm

Claire
20:19

Going to Google

Chris
20:20

It.

Claire
20:21

We willy. Oh no, it's Winky. That just sounds wrong.

Chris
20:26

Yeah, we willy Winky.

Claire
20:27

It should be Winkle.

Chris
20:29

It's not.

Claire
20:31

Oh Winky.

Chris
20:33

Anything else?

Claire
20:33

You ruined my childhood.

Chris
20:35

That didn't work so well. At think calendars, Sherlock Holmes should have been a lot quicker.

Claire
20:41

I like that murder

Chris
20:42

Mystery. It's a good memory probably I enjoyed it, but I got a bit obsessive with what you coined meat chicken.

Claire
20:52

Yes you did. Yeah. I dunno how many people are familiar with yarn chicken or there's probably loads of different versions of it, but in the crocheting and knitting world, they call it yarn chicken. When you have a ball of wool and you're working towards the end of a project and you're not sure if you're going to run out or not. So instead of buying another ball, which is obviously very expensive for just to use a small amount, you don't buy one and you play yarn chicken to see if you can get to the end with what you've got. And I see a lot of people on Facebook in the groups I'm in that fail at yarn chicken and they're like eight stitches from the end and they've run out of wool, but it's a bit of a game. Anyway, Chris decided he was going to see if he could find meat for us to eat on Christmas day, on Christmas Eve. So as far as I was concerned, that was meat chicken.

Chris
21:31

There was a reason for doing that. I think this used to be more of a thing on Christmas Eve or New Year's Eve for example, because then the shops would be shot for a few days and now they barely closed do they for Christmas and New Year, so it's less of a whatever. So on my way home from work on Christmas Eve, the pressure was on that I wanted to find. I was really looking forward to cooking on Christmas day and I was thinking back in my mind I'd do two types of meat. I'd probably do something like a white meat and a pinky gammon sort of thing, go really well together. So yeah, on Christmas Eve, the fun started at lunchtime when I walked into a food store, wasn't really anything. There was a lot of stuff reduced probably a bit too. Like okay, this is too early, not anything that would tick the boxes that we wanted for Christmas day dinner. Finished work at overtime five. And then on my way home went to one supermarket, there was a goose that had been reduced but like 67 pounds down to 37 pounds. That's

Claire
22:33

Cheaper than turkeys because

Chris
22:35

The turkeys was so expensive. This was a goose. And I was like, Ooh, that's interesting. And I was like, I'm not spending 37 pounds on a goose. So moved on to another supermarket and thought, okay, this one will do some stuff reduced. I think they had a whole trout, no salmon, not trout. They had a whole salmon reduced, several of them all reduced, but again then reduced down about 20, 25 pounds. And I thought, no, that's not going to,

Claire
23:00

It's a good insight into your obsession with meat and fish.

Chris
23:02

All of this took time and then on my way home went to another supermarket and did find some stuff, but I went up and down the aisles way too much. It became like this is a problem now I need to leave the store. So I did four different food shopping places and it worked out well in the end. But yeah, I went to an unhealthy place.

Claire
23:23

Did it work out well? I dunno if you were excited when you came home then you bought

Chris
23:26

No, I think I was excited. I had got some good stuff but nothing that was like, look at this massive Turkey cost 12 pence. Yeah, there's a level isn't of moderation. And I went past that level and just became a bit obsessive and then it affected my mood.

Claire
23:43

Yeah, it's all pretty boring. It's meat.

Chris
23:47

I mean you do think when you cook like that and I have to remind myself that when I'm buying something like an expensive piece of meat, it's not just going to last you for one meal. This thing, what we cooked for Christmas day was just the most amazing beautiful roast dinner with Turkey and with it was Turkey. Yeah, Turkey and ham in the end. So I did get what I was looking

Claire
24:09

For. You've got on those little Turkey

Chris
24:10

And we did all the bits and trimmings and things, different types of stuffing pigs in blankets made all of them, but we were eating what I cooked then in different ways. I think I got four meals out of Christmas day dinner

Claire
24:24

At least,

Chris
24:24

Which is brilliant. So when you reflect back on the fact that that one meal was quite expensive, actually divide it by four because did you for four meals?

Claire
24:32

Yeah. It wasn't that expensive was it?

Chris
24:33

No, no, no. It wasn't that

Claire
24:34

Expensive. No, I was going to say it wasn't that big a meal,

Chris
24:36

But it does last. I always think spending less, if you spend 10 pounds on a joint of meat, that feels like quite expensive when you could buy a prepared processed cut of meat in some source for three pounds. But actually no, that 10 pound meat will last you a long time anyway. We're not here to talk about the, I

Claire
24:56

Feel like we turn into the meat podcast

Chris
24:59

Poultry.

Claire
25:01

So yeah, that was most of Christmas Eve discussion and Chris's aim

Chris
25:06

Was too many. I won't do that again. I won't leave it till last minute actually. See, I'm learning if we are cooking at home for next Christmas, I won't leave it till the last minute thinking we'll play meat

Claire
25:15

Chicken. Good plan.

Chris
25:16

What I was really pleased about and what helped no end was being, well, I think we talked on the last episode about being unwell and shouting missile toe out. I was getting over,

Claire
25:28

Oh yes, you were still with covering.

Chris
25:30

So that all lifted and cleared in time for Christmas, which was wonderful for me. So I was back to full health and just rhyming my stomach and with anything I could eat and drink and whatever else. So that was really good.

Claire
25:42

If you couldn't have had a roast or any beers, I think that would've made it very different. I had

Chris
25:46

Some great beers, some really good beers, but again, intentional planning, thinking in advance, it pays off.

Claire
25:53

And one of the things I wanted to do with New Year, which I like to do, I do like new year to have some sort of moment of reflection. So we've never done resolutions. I don't think I've ever had resolutions. I just think it's a big thing to set something in January and try and keep Twitter for a long time and so few people do. But I do like to reflect on stuff and try and think ahead a little bit and look behind. So I kind of just made up 10 different questions that we could do together and have individual answers for just to see where we were and to think about going forward. The first one was a personal high moment or experience for us individually that we'd had in the past year. The second one was to name a personal low moment of the year.

26:36
Then we had to find a joint best memory. So our best experience and memory that we have that involves the two of us. And then the joint hardest memory, the thing we've been through that was the most difficult. Then there was the biggest personal dream that you have for the future. That one I put in specifically for Chris, who's sort of another episode probably lost his ability to dream a little bit. So he's got very practical with life and reality and I think your ability to just open up and dream for the future has been a bit curtailed. So I wanted to try and open that up a bit and think, well, what are our dreams for the future? The sixth one was the biggest fear that we have for the future. The seventh one was something that you don't want to take into next year. What do we not want to take into 2025 from 2024? The eighth one was something you really do want to take into next year, something you've been doing well that's been going well that you want to keep with you.

Chris
27:22

Christmas stick.

Claire
27:23

The Christmas stick.

Chris
27:24

Sorry, I should say that clearly.

Claire
27:25

It didn't sound like you said Christmas stick. Very different. Yes, the Christmas stick number nine was three things you want to achieve this year and number 10 was three things you want to stop or be better at or improve on this year. So we went through those together. We didn't come up with answers for all of them. Why? I said three things sometimes we had two. I don't think we've gone back and put a third in yet. But yeah, overall I think that's sort of helped me think a bit more about this year and what I want and

Chris
27:53

Why do you like that kind of thing? Because there's plenty of people that would just be no chance do I want to sit down with my partner and chat about stuff like that.

Claire
28:02

I think it helps me to see where we are and what we're aligned. I think doing something like that, if you can do it honestly together, could really highlight areas where you are differing. I think it's good at all sort of stages of marriage and relationships, but I do think it's important to do it at different stages for different reasons. I think when you are newly married and together it's important to do. I think that's where things can come out. If someone said this year or let's say my biggest thing for the future is I want to have three kids and then your partner's like I actually never wanted kids. If you haven't had that conversation, it could highlight something massive like that. But later on I think it just also helps you just see where are we? What are the dreams you have? If one person's dream is to go and work in Africa for 10 years and the other person had, hang on, I didn't know that.

28:48
Is that something you seriously want to put in place? It just raises conversations and thoughts and you can think, are we aligned with those? Did I know that they had that dream? Did I know they didn't want to do that? Sometimes it involves sharing stuff that you might not have talked about much. You're like, actually I would really like this to happen, but I've never actually said it out loud. So I'm a bit nervous about it and I just think it's a really good exercise to do. I think it's good to do individually, but so much of what I do and what I want to achieve is something I want to do with you. So for me, it makes sense to do these things together, which is why I put in questions like what isn't a personal high individually, which is very different. I think if you can think of a moment this year, you're like, when did I on my own individually?

29:26
Just have a moment. You might have been with other people, but that just really fed your soul and you're like, that was amazing. But also when was the best memory with other people or with you when the joint was, I think it's important to separate them out. So you've got a bit of both. I feel like it grounds to think that we're still together on things or if we're not, it's a good talking point and there were some good talking points that came out of it that's already stuff we need to think about or maybe talk about more. Yeah, I think they're sort of helpful things to go through and recognise. Sometimes you look back on a year and you think, wow, I'm really struggling to find any moment this year that I enjoyed. And that might make you try and be more proactive about that for next year.

Sometimes you'll look back and think, there are so many hard memories. I dunno where to start, which was the hardest, maybe the hardest was something you didn't expect. Sometimes you've had a really good year, so the hardest moment is hard to find. But actually you're like, actually, my hardest moment this year was when so-and-so cancelled this or something. It's something quite small almost, and you're like, oh, that must've been a good year. That was my worst point. Or something that happened that was really bad, and you're like, oh, at the time it was all consuming. But you look back now nine months later and you can't even remember. It gives you a bit of perspective on what you've been through. So I just think it's helpful for stuff like that. 

Chris

It is hard to remember if you suddenly put on the spot with a question about what's been the lowest moment of the last year, me and my personality type, when I hear a question like that, I think, well, I've got to find the lowest moment. I can't just name a low moment. It's like, oh, crumbs, I've got to find the lowest moment of this last year. It's like, well, there was that, but I dunno if that was the lowest moment, lowest. Sometimes it can be quite hard to remember. In fact, it makes me think, because I see more and more now, some of my younger colleagues using social media, particularly Instagram, every month, they'll dump some photos on from that month. Here's six of my, there's probably a trend, I dunno, like six pictures of the month that just cause you to remember, here's the things that you did or enjoyed this month. So that can be helpful. I did look back across my Instagram feed to remind myself before we had this conversation while we were driving on a long journey. So it was helpful to be in the car. 

Claire

And you weren't looking through Instagram while you were driving? 

Chris

I was not, no. Beforehand, I had intentionally planned, prepared for this conversation to remind myself of some of the things, and that was quite good actually, because it was like, oh yeah, of course we did that and then we went there. 

Claire

But can you find the lows on that though? How many people actually record the lows on social 

Chris

Media? No, of course not. No, no. You don't share the lows too. 

Claire

But that's also some of the things that we find the hardest about social media is that people just post the highs, and that is what makes social media such a nightmare to be on when you're going through something hard. It's a very fine line. 

Chris

Sometimes I remind myself that WhatsApp is social media. You can be in groups, conversation groups, when again, the good stuff is shared. Not always the real stuff, not always the challenges. So yeah, WhatsApp groups can be difficult places to be and it is a social media. So now having completed those questions, well, even if we hadn't, has that helped you now prepare for 2026, has that 

Claire

For six, I'm not that prepared. 

Chris

2025. Did doing that help change or shift anything in terms of your perspective, your expectations for the year to come? 

Claire

It reminded me that potentially this could be a really good year. There's a lot of good things that could come out of it, and I'm hopeful about it, which is nice because some years you think, oh, it's been a really hard year and actually most of that's going to carry into this year because in two months time I've got this, or I've got an anniversary of this happening for the first time. Or you can have things in your year ahead that it's going to be a hard year and this isn't one of those years. So that's why I find that quite helpful to look forward because I think, oh, actually I've got some good things in this year and at the moment, there's nothing bad in the year that I know about. Last year when we look back, I think, well, there were some lows, but they weren't horrific lows personally. 


They might have felt like that at times, but they weren't in the greater scheme of things. So that's good. Been nice to come out of a year like that. So yeah, I think overall it just helps me reassess. And if it had been a really hard year last year, I think it would've been a good moment to recognise that and say, actually, that was a really difficult year, but I'm here. I've come through it, I've done it, and I'm going into another one and I've got a new blank page. Let's see what this one holds. So yeah, it really depends. So yeah, for me, for this year specifically, I feel like only good things potentially ahead. Obviously we all know that every year is going to contain bad things, but for the moment all I can see is stuff to be hopeful about. So that's nice. 

Chris

Yeah. How 

Claire

About you? 

Chris

Yeah, great. Similar for sure. I think I have got some work to do on myself still in terms of hope and expectation. I think I've realised that I'm starting to, or I have in the last year been starving myself of being hopeful because I'm letting the, almost like the realistic glass half empty view take over at times, which has been quite fun because I've been going into some things with very low expectations, hoping that you'll come out of it. Let's say, give an example. Let's say you're going to see a film at the cinema or you're going to see a show at the theatre. Then quite often in the past, our most enjoyable times when we've done that is when we didn't know what to expect and became having really enjoyed it. But when you go in with high expectations thinking, I can't wait to see this, there's the potential there for coming out, disappointed if it doesn't match your expectations. 


And I think I've spent too much time going into that and therefore lowering my expectations in numbers of different things, whether it's work related or home related or relationship related, where I'm like, actually, I'm just going to expect this to be pretty rubbish, which has been interesting experiments, but I think it can be dangerous if you then start realising, actually I'm not hoping for very much. I'm just expecting bad, and it can get a little bit depressing and a little bit sad. So I've got a bit of work to do in that regard, still thinking actually I need to adjust this and get this balance a bit more healthy. And it's okay to hope for improvement, hope for good things, better things. Even if they don't happen, it's not your fault that you are hoping for it. It's okay to be disappointed if it doesn't happen, stop trying to protect yourself from disappointment. 

Claire

Yeah, I think that played in a little bit to the dreaming thing that I mentioned as well. I think when you have a lot of disappointment over the years when things you thought would happen don't happen, and then you want other things to happen or you pray for things to happen and it doesn't, and things just seem to get worse, it curbs that ability to dream and think things could be amazing because you're just trying to protect yourself from the disappointment of it not happening. So I think that's all can be mixed in with the hope as well. The idea of actually I'm not going to dream too big because if it doesn't happen, I just get disappointed. And that's really sad. And I think that's probably something that's quite common with people who've been through things like childlessness because you just spend so long looking to the future, hoping for this, hoping for that ness, Muhammad that moment, and then it doesn't, and you just get to the point of like, well, I'm not going to bother because what's the point? It just ends up in disappointment. So I think, yeah, there's still some things in there to sort of unlock and work on, but 

Chris

There is for 

Claire

Are all good things to acknowledge, 

Chris

All good things, all good things, all good things. What are you hoping for with the podcast for this year? 

Claire

Well, we're well over halfway now, so obviously just keeping on with the 101 and find some really different and unusual types of loss to talk about. I want to do more of different episodes again as well. It all depends on when my health is in a better place and I'm mentally in a better place, then I want to do a lot more the extra stuff like the blogs. I haven't done many blogs for a while, which I kind of missed doing and the graveyard musings going out and doing stuff like that. So I'm really hopeful this year that there'll be a good year for health and then I can really enjoy doing some extra stuff and some extra things and just keep trying to encourage people really. I've just done a lovely interview that will go out later on in probably February or March with a lady, and it was just really nice talking about the things we can do to help ourselves before grief happens, how to prepare yourself, how to get through it when you're in it, very practical things. 


And it was just a really encouraging conversation. And we concluded at one point that life is what it is as a whole and grief is part of that life for everybody. So once we live our life and we just think, oh, if grief comes along and we'll deal with it, and it sort of appears and we're not expecting it or it's tagged onto our life, but actually we just have a whole life as a whole and grief is part of that and it takes us up and it takes us down. It's not just all down and you just have to kind of live all that as a bit of an adventure really. And that just gives me hope. Hearing people talk about things in different ways like that, it's not easy for sure, but there's a lot of stuff we can do and we can choose to to help ourselves in it. 


And sometimes it's very easy to get caught up with the downside of grief and how awful it is and how sad it is and how life destroying it is, which is all true, but there are things you can do within it as you start to come out of those worst stages to make life better again and to find yourself again to refind your identity. And we're exploring all of that stuff. So that's just really encouraging and having conversations like this with people just encourages me. It prepares me for things in the future. I know I have friends that really worry about losing a partner or someone dying that they're very close to and it's going to happen. We don't know when, but it's going to happen at some point. And I think you can worry about those kinds of things and spend your life kind of nervous of when it happens, but ruin the life that you're actually living. 


You've got this ability to live right now. So many people would give anything to have that back again, and you're spending it worrying about stuff that's not happening. So I think I really want the podcast to encourage people to say, yes, this stuff happens to people and it might happen to you. No one can sit there and say, it won't happen, but you can get through it. You can survive it. Here are things that can come through it. And for me, I know if I gave something bad, I will have so many voices in the back of my mind from the podcast that will be helping me through this. Even if it's awful. There'll be those little voices at the back saying, you can do this because you've seen so-and-so do it because spoken to all these people on the podcast that have done it, that gives me hope that I would also be able to get through it at some point. 


So yeah, I just want more people to learn about that really, and be encouraged by that. And it's not easy reaching people with this podcast. It's not something that everyone wants to engage with, and I totally understand that. But if you are listening now, then you can actually help by sharing it with somebody else, by telling other people about it, by helping people to try and face these conversations. So yeah, I'm hopeful the word will get out and it will just spread even further so we can affect more people, just so many people in the world and we reach so few of them for something that every single person will go through. So 

Chris

Yeah, absolutely. I love how aware it makes me when I'm meeting people, talking to people, and they'll just drop into conversation. Something that connects with this podcast in a way or the heart of this podcast where they've lost something. Even at the moment, the TV's full, the news is full of the wildfires in LA and we're just, neither of us watch that without thinking of what has this person lost in terms of their possessions, 

Belongings. It just makes us think. Conversations I have with colleagues speaking to somebody yesterday during the conversation, he said, yeah, I lost my sister and my dad last year. And that just made me think, right, there's something to ask about here. There's something to inquire, be interested in, empathise with rather than just moving on to the next work topic. I love how aware it makes me of just listening, being sensitive to individuals, sharing something that they've lost because I know that there's work that's happened there or work that needs to happen with them, and maybe I can just help them along the way a little bit, which is a real privilege to do, 

Claire

Really important to help with conversations. One of the podcast listeners that we've got locally around here said to me a while back that she's very conscious now of how she asks people about who they live with or what their family set up is. I've spoken to a few people who've said, I've changed how I ask people questions because I know that that could be hard for them to answer. And this girl I was talking to had asked a colleague recently, a new colleague had arrived and she'd asked her if she lives, I can't remember how she phrased it, but it was something like, do you live with anybody? Or something like that. Just taking it down to the basic level of what people live at. And she didn't, she lived alone with, I think she had a cat or a dog or something. But that's such a kinder question than asking, are you married? 

Do you have children? And throwing somebody into that immediate like, oh, I've got to answer those questions. Start with if you're not sure what to start with, maybe assume that they're single and they're on their own, because anyone with more than that is going to be happy to share. So yeah, just people talking differently in conversations. I think it's helpful and recognising it's still not easy. I've still sat in front of people who have said stuff like that to me, and I've not been in a great place or something, and my mind has blanked and I'm thinking, oh, my word. I interview people about this all the time. I can't think of a single question. So we all still get those moments, but being aware just makes you more conscious and 

Chris

You've got to remove the pressure though of saying the wrong thing. We will say the wrong thing, it's just say something. 

Claire

Yeah. But I mean, there's lots of things I know that I shouldn't say straight off. Do you have kids and those sorts of things. So the 

Chris

Stuff you should I get one of those Last week, by the way, meeting someone for the first time. 

Claire

Oh, did you? 

Chris

And they were like, have you got kids? And I was like, no, no. I've got the joy of infertility. And then their response straight away, this was the guy. This was the guy. So it was man-to-man chat. Oh yeah, good holidays. It's almost like you want to go ding. Yeah, you've won. It's like the top three answers to a childless man. Yeah, we have good holidays. 

Claire

That's the problem. I introduced myself recently in a talk I did, and I said, I'm Claire. I don't have any children. We're childless after infertility. And you feel like it's immediately tmi. It's like, this is way too much information. I feel like I'm sharing something very vulnerable. Yet if someone else stood up there and say, hi, I'm Claire. I've got three kids, you wouldn't think twice about it. So it's awkward because I never quite know. I want them to know my situation. But at the same time, you see people's faces glaze over because you've mentioned something like infertility, which seems like a very private medical situation that you've shared. So yeah, I find that really difficult. But I do try and not just say no and just add a bit more information, but inevitably the response is either immediate, they feel bad, and they're like, oh my God, so, so sorry. I asked. And that really annoys me. I just think now I have to comfort you. I say, no, no, that's fine. Don't worry. I don't mind talking about it. Okay. It's a mind fit. It's okay. 

Chris

Yeah, I think there's a danger to come back to the happy New Year, happy Christmas. For me, it's not, I've got to remind myself because investing in the podcast and spending time chatting about this, for me, I think my conclusion is it's not about not saying that because it is just a pleasantry. It is a greeting, like you'd say, happy birthday to someone when they might not be happy. So it's not, don't say it, but what I've been saying at work is I go, oh yeah, because when you greet a colleague, oh hi, happy new Year. Happy new Year. Was it Happy New Year. 

Claire

Yeah. Nice. 

Chris

So I'll just follow up with a question. I found myself saying, oh no, I better not say Happy New Year, because it might. But no, it's okay to say those pleasant. They are just traditional greetings. Again, happy birthday, happy Christmas, happy new Year. But just follow up with, was it a happy new year? Then they might say, no, not really. I did have that. 

Claire

I've 

Chris

Had that this new year, last new year with colleagues. No, not really. It was quite tough looking after XY doing this. It was exhausting. Oh, okay. Let's talk about that. 

Claire

Yeah, nice. Makes people feel a bit more seen. It does. It's something nice about being able to share that when normally you go into an office and you wouldn't share any of that. It would just be hundreds of happy New Years. 

Chris

Yeah, it's not wrong to say those things. 

Chris

Think about how to follow it up and how to follow us up. Social media, website 

Claire

Followers. There's lots of ways you can share the podcast with other people. Social media, we're on pretty much all of them. So we're on LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter threads, 

Chris

Facebook. Facebook. And we have a website  

Social media. It's always @thesilentwhypod 

Claire

And you can find us on any podcast platform. I always post the links on social media to the website. It's just the easiest place for people to go and find out lots of places to listen and other information. But you can find it on Spotify, apple Podcasts, good pods, podcasts, podcasts, pocket casts, cast boxes. There's loads of different apps. Listen to podcasts on. So just search the silent Y on any of those, and you'll find us pop up. 

Chris
Single place to visit is the silent y.com. That's our website. And that will have links to a lot of the stuff that Claire's talking about, including how to listen to a podcast if it's a new thing. 

Claire

Yeah, if you've got people in your life that aren't really sure how to listen to a podcast or what even they are, I've done a page on how to do that. Whether they're listening on a smart speaker on an Apple phone, Android phone, pc, there's lots of instructions and lots of lists of apps that they can listen on as well. So if you've got a parent that's bugging you on, how do I listen to podcasts, then yeah, just find that page and send it to them. And it's got some steps there on how to do that. So I know there's still a lot of people that don't listen to podcasts amazingly, 

Chris

And we'd really appreciate, if you're familiar with your podcast platform and it offers a way to review or rate the podcast, the silent why or an episode, then please engage with that. It makes such a difference with the algorithms of the different apps. So if you can rate review, the podcast would really appreciate that. Please. 

Claire

Definitely takes two seconds. And it really helps us in things like especially Apple Podcasts to have more reviews and more starred reviews. Brilliant. And we don't have that many, so I know a lot of you haven't done that, but it would be helpful and you can do it even if you haven't got an Apple phone, so that's not an excuse. There are other ways. Or you can just borrow a friend's phone. Loads of people got Apple phones in the uk. I don't think for American listeners, that's more like everyone's got an Apple, but over here it's a little bit more 50 50 with the Android. So yeah, you can borrow friends to do it. But yeah, it's really important. And annoyingly, it doesn't tell me when someone leaves a review, so I never know if there are more reviews being left or not. So if you do leave a lovely one and I don't get in touch to say thank you or anything, I probably don't know that it's been done, but I do look every now and then to see if there's any new ones. So please leave a review. 

Chris

And engaging with social media posts is really helpful as well. Sharing, liking, commenting that again, just takes the content, puts it in front of new people, which is mega helpful. Great. And Hermans, any updates with Hermans for this year or just direct people to 

Claire

Continuing as normal? The herman company.com. If you know someone who needs a Herman who's alone, struggling, grieving, going through hospital treatments, just lost their job, any reason that you think somebody just feels a bit out of themselves and just needs a bit of a smile, then yeah, send them a Herman. They're way better than flowers. They last a lot longer, and I think they're better than candles and chocolates as well. So yeah, you can get them on the herman company.com website. And I also do commissions for different colours as well. I've done a few of those. I haven't advertised that yet, but I think this year I will do more of that. So if you look at Herman and somebody who loves a particular colour and you'd like on a specific colour, then you can always message me and I can look into doing that as well. 

Chris

Brilliant. Okay. Well, we can end in the same way that we ended the last chat and just apply it to 2025 rather than Christmas. 

Claire

Yep. Because we're not always about happy. We're more about hopey

Chris

Yes. So we need to work on this, don't we? What we really do, doing things together 

Claire

Only happens once a year! 

Chris

Eye contact! 

Claire

Okay. 

Chris & Claire

Hopey New Year! [laughs]