We got Radar last April, and he’s been settling in nicely. Local friends and neighbours who have dogs have been commenting lately on how much better he’s doing on walks and his behaviour as a whole — still far from perfect, mind you — which has been heartening. Validation from your peers evidently still feels really good even when you’re middle-aged.
Until recently, he’s been living on the main floor of the three in our house. One baby gate and one makeshift gate have been keeping him out of our bedrooms and out of the storage contents of our basement.
But then one night a couple of months ago a thunderstorm hit.
It was pretty loud and aggressive and we felt bad that the little boy, abused in at least one of his former homes and so already dealing with trauma, was left alone to ride it out. So we opened up the gate and invited him up to sleep on the bed with me and my wife. And while not panicked (as I recall he was just waking up as we came downstairs, maybe even woken up more by us than the storm), he happily took advantage of the offer and was up there immediately. We were under the covers, he was over the covers between us, and he settled in and fell asleep quickly.
Adorable.
Because we then didn’t want him to feel like he was beind denied something he had earned, we didn’t want to prevent him from joining us to sleep after that, so we’ve been leaving the gate open at night and giving him the option to come up with us when we go to bed. Or more to the point, when I go to bed. J usually crashes earlier than I do, and I fall asleep at the drop of a hat and my snoring keeps her awake, so often I’ll give her a head start to crawl in and get to sleep before I go up. And Radar, always happier with company around, will stick with me and curl up on the couch until I go up to bed as well, and then he usually comes up with me and curls up with us.
Adorable.
What isn’t as adorable, however, is the way he sometimes sleeps. While he was initially happy to hang out in the valley between our bodies, he then started migrating more toward one of us or the other, curling up and leaning his head on us, or curled up tightly but pressed right up against one of us. The crook of our knees is evidently a happy place for him. Sometimes he’ll lie stretched out and leaning hard into us.
And it’s that lean that becomes an issue. Numerous times in the last few weeks, I’ve woken up in the wee hours to find myself precariously close to the edge of the mattress — once partially hanging over it — because he’s gradually gotten me so far over. He’s not a small boy (medium sized, yes, but a notch over 40 pounds these days, which is no light touch when he’s insistent or, in these cases, dead alseep), and with the physics of sheets and blankets being what they are, a lot of weight on the top makes it difficult to regain that precious real estate back.
Regaining my rightful place on the bed has thus involved a bleary-eyed shifting of him to be able to get back in and hopefully back to sleep. This can happen a couple of times a night, or more.
All of which is to say, we love having him with us on the bed, but it makes for some not particularly restful slumber. Especially when he’s up earlier than we’d like to be, and ready for some attention/petting/food/access to pee outside/a walk/all of the above.
The flipside to having him sleeping with us, however, isn’t a lot better. We now miss him when he isn’t with us (again, wanting to leave it up to him if he wants to snooze on the main floor couch or loungey chairs, or come up with us), but while you’d think that we’d at least get to actually sleep comfortably on our bed, last night reminded me that the fact is that we then our minds are a bit preoccupied wondering if everything is okay with him. So, not super restful either way.
It reminded me that I’m learning, time and time again, that having a dog (Radar is my first) is very much like being a parent all over again, only with a young one in the house instead of just a mercurial teen. There are more similarities than I would’ve expected to having another child.
Happily, Radar is very much worth the time and effort.
But seriously, buddy, we’ve gotta figure out the bed thing.