Surprise Thunderstorm = Bad Night

I'm really too tired to be blogging right now, but I just have to tell you about how Elsie ruined my night of sleep!

Mom took us to bed at 11.  Elsie and Sophie went in their crates, and I slept with Mom as usual (although she's threatening to start rotating).

Elsie started pawing at her crate at about 11:30, but Mom was fast asleep.  I tried to tell her to shut up by barking and growling at her.  Yes, I meant business.  Then, can you imagine the nerve--Mom told ME to be quiet!  She obviously didn't know what was going on.

Midnight comes and Elsie starts fussing again.  Needy.  Mom got grumpy, too, and finally told her to be quiet.  Elsie did not listen, of course.  Mom wondered if she had to go to the bathroom, so she begrudgingly got out of bed and went outside with us.  Elsie went #1 but that was it.  She was panting, so Mom took her to the water bowl.  Problem solved?  Nope.

Elsie was put back in her crate.  In a matter of minutes she started up again.  Mom tried to wait her out.  Fail.  Mom took her out again and tethered her to the dining room table where her dog bed is.  Finally!  Quiet!  For maybe 20 minutes.  Then Elsie started knocking stuff over and jumping around.  Back into her crate she went.  More whining, more scratching at the door, more growling by me telling her to knock that shit off, more of Mom trying to wait her out.  At this point, Mom started crying because she was so tired and frustrated after about an hour.

Mom decided to try sleeping out on the couch and turned a loud fan on by her to fade out Elsie's tail beating her crate.  Sophie started barking.  Great.

Half an hour later, Mom sucked it up, decided to quit being selfish.  Of course, the whole time, she knew something was wrong because Elsie does not normally do stuff like this at night.  But she didn't know what was wrong and just didn't see getting any sleep if she didn't try comforting her.  Clearly, waiting it out was not going to work.

So... she sat by the crate and started petting Elsie.  She noticed she was drooling and panting again, so she took her out and got her more water.  Then they sat on the sofa, but Elsie wouldn't settle.  They did a training session, which was great to refocus her, but at 1:30ish in the morning, there was only so much training Mom was up for.

I'm quite bitter about what happened next.  Mom took Elsie up on the bed with us.  I dunno if you know this, but I have a bit of an RG issue with space when it comes to other dogs.  FYI, that's pretty much my bed.  Mom slept between us and had Elsie on a short leash wrapped around her wrist, naively thinking she would be able to sleep.  Surprise.  Elsie wouldn't settle for more than half an hour.

And that's when Mom saw lightning flash and heard very loud thunder.  Duh.  A storm had been brewing.  Humans are so slow....  That's also when Elsie starting shaking and rattling.  I almost felt sorry for her.  (Dog Mom here: I definitely felt sorry for her.  Fail on my part.)  Comforting wasn't helping, so even though Mom realized Elsie was afraid of thunderstorms (our first one here), she made a slightly selfish choice again.

Benedryl.

Yes.  She drugged her.  Now, I'm not gonna judge.  She didn't know Elsie had this fear, she didn't know there was a storm coming, and she didn't know how she'd ever get any sleep last night and make it to school this morning if she didn't sedate her.

Elsie is still wearing my Thundershirt today.

Once she gave her just 25mgs of Benedryl, she wrapped her up in my Thundershirt, put her back in her crate, covered the crate with a blanket, and put the loud fan next to her to muffle the storm.  And then she waited.  I had to remind Elsie to be quiet a couple more times, but eventually, there was quiet.  I dunno if the storm ended, if the Thundershirt helped, or if the Benedryl sedated her, but we got to sleep for a whoppin' four-five hours after that.

Mom had better check the forecast.  I do NOT want any repeats of last night.

I'm going to go nap now.