Right. Still here.
Turns out I did get sick on Thursday (that’d be the 5th for those playing along at home) and spent the day on the couch. I’m still not really better per se, but it was nice to get the day of rest in, and that along with the 3-day weekend means I’ve made it through the following week relatively unscathed.
I’m still not sleeping well though.
I think that has less to do with me, and more to do with the fact that we’ve decided to start crating the dog at night.
I am going to be a horrible parent. I should reserve my spot on Nanny 911 now
Our issue with the animal is that she’s decided that she’d prefer to eat twice a day – once at 10:00pm and once at 2:00am. And she is a NOISY eater. Then, after crunching and slobbering her way through 4 cups of dry kibble, she needs to slurp at a gallon of water.
If she’s not eating her kibble at 2am, she’s either rummaging through the bathroom garbage, or trying to take up the lion’s share of the space on our bed. It’s got to stop.
So now, instead of random disturbance destruction in the middle of the night, we’re treated to scuttling and whining. The damn dog doesn’t like to be alone in the dark (remember, she’s afraid of EVERYTHING).
Logically I know she’s just being a giant pain and doing what she can to be let out to roam free (which she does during the day, except she uses the time to sleep on the couch instead of eating or drinking or being any sort of destructive). But my poor black little heart, it gets ALL EFFING TORN UP when I hear her pitiful cries because all she wants is to snuggle with her mommy and maybe just one night won’t hurt and maybe she’ll be good tomorrow and OH GOD WHAT HAVE I BECOME?
So yah.
Not blogging, not sleeping.
I would feel guilty about the not blogging thing, but as you can see, all my guilt is currently being used up at the moment because I’m a horrible mother.
Have you considered not having the food in the bedroom, or if it’s not in the bedroom, closing the door to your room so she can’t get out to it?
We did try that. With the door closed it gets ungodly hot in our bedroom. Same deal with not leaving bathroom door open. But that still doesn’t stop the “bed hog” thing (because frankly sometimes we just don’t wake up when she stealths her way on to the covers).
It’s all part of the “tough love” campaign we’ve got going on with her right now.
I share your pain. I have 2 cats and if they’re not hogging the entire bed and all the covers they’re scratching in the litter tray (according to our cats it takes 10 minutes to bury something good and proper) or leaving ungodly smells that are guaranteed to wake us up. Spike has recently become a feline alarm clock with a meow that is worse than fingernails on a blackboard. This is great when I sleep in on a work day but on weekends I would rather chew tinfoil than wake up to that! Gonk is quieter but when he decides he wants to play fetch in the middle of the night guess whose hand the mouse is pressed into….Aargh!
don’t know what to tell you about the bed hog…it seems they always like to hog “your” space no matter if its a king size bed.
as for the feeding, do you leave the food down all day/night?
get her on “your” schedule, not her’s (10 pm & 2 a.m.) don’t leave the food down either so that she can graze all day long or night.
don’t feed her for a day and then feed her at the times YOU choose….you are the alpha dog, not her! get her used to your schedule, not her’s!!!!
Do yourselves a favour, and read the Monks of New Skete’s “The Art of Raising a Puppy” or “How to be your dog’s best friend”. Then stick to your guns, it just takes time and patience.
Joann: We have a free feeder out. I’m going to further admit that we’re terrible, and say that the ONLY consistent thing about our lives is bedtime. We tried doing scheduled feedings, and found that we’d forget to feed the dog until quite late. She does seem to be doing a lot better though, even after just a couple days!
Jason: thanks for the suggestion! I’ll look for it at the library.