The Deer in the Fence

Reflections from the last breath of 2025

This isn’t the happy heartwarming holiday message you’re probably expecting. And I’m sorry for that. In fact, I had an entirely different December newsletter ready to send. Something about my word for 2026 and my resolutions. But stick with me. I promise it’ll be worth it. (Maybe?)

It’s Christmas Eve, and if I’m honest, I’m not feeling especially merry. We didn’t even put up a tree this year. Grief sits in our house like a guest who won’t leave. Like the smell of last night’s fried fish. You all know this already. My mother-in-law passed away in the spring. My father died in October. The world feels cracked. Everything is curated and perfect online, and real life feels pretty broken. And messy. And hard. It’s impossible for me to celebrate Christmas as usual.

But something happened, and I can’t shake it. So I’m choosing to write about it and share it with you. Again, stick with me. Please.

Yesterday morning, we found a deer hanging upside down by its back leg, caught in our backyard fence. She’d likely been there all night: alone and terrified and suspended in pain. Her leg was wrapped around the metal in such a way that she couldn’t move, and she'd dug herself a trench with her front hooves trying to get free. All her weight hanging from a limb that wasn’t meant to hold it.

When my son saw her, he ran. No hesitation or fear. Just instinct. And when he couldn’t free her, the rest of us ran too. My family, plus an acquaintance who’d happened to stop by, lifted her together, gently, so my son could untangle her leg and lay her back down on the earth.

Then we sat with her. Comforting her. We gave her water, an apple. She didn’t move. She just lay there breathing. Barely.

Later, I learned about something called capture myopathy. It’s a panic response in deer so extreme that the adrenaline surge can shut down their organs. No reversing it. No fixing it. Nature proves once again that sometimes fear doesn’t save us. It consumes us. The wildlife rehab center told me that from the sounds of it, she was already moving into that phase. There wasn’t anything we could do.

And that… broke me.

I carried it with me all day; that helplessness of knowing you can do everything right, and still not be able to save something. The weight of being too late. The heartbreak of not knowing someone (or something) needed you, just on the other side of the fence.

By midday, I checked again. Her breathing was shallow. I called the sheriff, and by the time the officer arrived, she had passed. But not before I got to sit with her and stroke her fur. Not before I got to tell her how sorry I was. I don’t think I was as sorry for her passing. Death is part of life. But I was sorry for her fear. For the long night. And for the suffering.

And then, something unexpected happened.

Unsure about what to do next, I posted on Facebook. I don’t hunt, and I don’t much like venison. But I thought maybe someone else would know what to do. It’s silly, but I guess I thought maybe making her useful could honor her in a way.

A young woman messaged almost immediately. She and her father came to our home. They were kind and calm and saddened by this fluke happening too. She told me, “I went hunting this year and didn’t get a deer. But now… I have one. And I can feed my family.”

I don’t know their story. I don’t need to. But I do know this: something about that moment, the reverence with which we placed that doe on the sled, the way they thanked me, the way they saw her. It brought me to tears again. And, I don’t know, maybe I’m grasping at straws. Or maybe this was the lesson for me.

We are all the deer.

Hanging from fences we didn’t mean to cross. Exhausted from digging ourselves into deeper ditches. Afraid and flailing a little. Keeping a brave face, but terrified of the unknown. Convinced that asking for help is the most dangerous thing we can do. And sometimes, we’re the ones who run toward the fence. We’re the ones trying to save each other, comfort one another, and bear witness.

We talk a lot this time of year about joy. About magic. About merry everything.

But here’s what I’m thinking instead: Maybe the most radical thing we can do this season, or any season, is to show up for each other before the curated moment. Before the perfect tree. Before the healing has begun.

Maybe the sacred work is sitting with what we can’t fix. Being kind anyway. Loving anyway. Staying anyway.

This story doesn’t have a pretty ending. But it’s a meaningful one.

That deer was not wasted. Her life was not meaningless. She was witnessed. Held. Loved. And she will now feed a family. And maybe that’s what I want to leave you with as we close this hellscape of a year:

Let’s honor life. All of it.
The messy and mangled. The not-so-merry. The almost beautiful.

Let’s make room for imperfection.
No more pretending our lives look like our perfectly curated Instagram feeds. You don’t have to be perfect to be kind.

Let’s stop curating connection.
And start offering the real stuff. The stuff that hurts. The stuff that helps.

Let’s remember we’re part of something wild.
Something ancient and interconnected. Something that wants us to care more than we’re comfortable with.

So no, this isn’t the “festive” message you might have been expecting. But it is, I hope, the human one. And if nothing else, let it be a reminder: When the world feels unspeakably hard, your kindness still matters.

You can’t fix everything. But you can hold someone up. You can help them feel less alone in their most difficult moments.

And that, I think, is the kind of energy this world really needs.

And so I am wishing you a Merry-ish Christmas. A happy-ish holiday. A soft landing in the new year.

And wild, uncurated love to you and yours.

– Nancy

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What Comes Next

I’ve been sitting with something new — a project that’s been whispering at the edges of my work for a long time. It’s about courage. About showing up when things are uncertain. About daring, even when the world feels tender. The week of January 5th, I’ll finally be sharing it with you. It’s called Everdare. And I think you’ll feel what I mean when you see it. Be on the lookout!

This year asked a lot of all of us. These humans are the ones who kept me grounded, laughing, and moving forward anyway. As we turn the page, my wish for you is simple: may you have people who see you, hold you, and remind you who you are when the world gets loud. Thank you for reading, listening, and walking alongside me this year. See you on the other side of the calendar.

“Life changes fast. Life changes in the instant. You sit down to dinner and life as you know it ends.” ― Joan Didion

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