Dog Guilt

For the last two years I have gotten up each morning at 2:00 a.m. and can’t go back to sleep until around four or five. I know that it is not good for me, but I don’t believe in drugs and really didn’t want to go there. So, I just made do. When I moved last month to the new place, I took the fabulous Luke (my Nova Scotian Duck Toller) to his babysitter for a few days so he wouldn’t be wigged out. Luke is sixteen and the most fabulous dog around.

I slept through the night all three nights he was gone. Didn’t think a lick about it.

Then, when he came back, I was back to being up at two. Not being the sharpest knife in the drawer, it took me another day or two to realize that it’s Luke who wakes up at two and starts roaming around first, not me. For another week I continued to let him sleep in my room, but I was getting madder and madder at him. 

“Nice Luke. It’s two in the morning and you have no respect for the fact that I pay for your paws to be padded and need to work in the morning. You just get up, roam around and wake me up every night. And, not only that, you jump on and off the bed as if I wasn’t even in it.”

Luke is deaf. If he was a hearing dog, I wouldn’t have said what I said out loud. While those who know me think I’m agressive and out there with direct conflicts, I’m not at all. The real things never get said directly by me.

So, anyway, for the last few weeks I have been wavering back and forth between trying to see if he can change his ways and putting him in the kitchen for the night.

But I have Dog Guilt. I’m not Jewish, though we raised our daughter in the faith and perhaps her ability with the guilt thing has rubbed off on me. Dog Guilt is worse than people guilt becuase you feel stupid having it. I can’t believe that I would stop myself from getting a full night’s sleep because Luke might not like sleeping in the kitchen. Really. How do I even write it down? How can I be guilt ridden over where the dog sleeps?

But, I am. I think about it at least five times a day and for the last few nights I’ve stayed up way past my bedtime trying to make sure he has longer quality time with me. It’s partially his fault. He knows I’m going to put him there now, and he sticks his tail between his legs and slinks around avoiding me. I have to lunge at him, catch him and drag him to the kitchen. Now, that really helps my guilt association, I can assure you.

I believe that all things happen for a reason. It’s my spiritual place. I really think that this is happening so I can evaluate the fact that Luke should not be more important than me and my well-being. No matter what he does with his tail when I go to put him in the kitchen, I should recognize that wanting a full night’s rest is my right. So, sorry Luke, I’m resolved to never let you sleep in the room again.

But, do not mistake the kitchen for the dog house. There is no relationship between the two.