Four Hours of Sleep

This morning, at 3:00 a.m., I was all set to write a blog about how horrible this week has been.

Kevin has decided this week that naps are for pansies. Sunday, he never took a nap at all, but he went to bed fairly early. Unfortunately, this resulted in him waking up fairly early Monday as well. Tuesday, he had a nap and went to bed late. Yesterday, he wouldn't take a nap, so he went to bed quickly again. This has made things a bit difficult.

However, on top of Kevin's horrible schedule, Arkhon has had diarrhea for the last couple of days. It has been a sporadic thing, and it only happens at night. Tuesday night, almost every hour on the hour, Arkhon would wake us up with his whining. Grig was kind enough to take him out, but that meant that he didn't get much sleep before morning.

Last night, after scouring the internet, we tried something a little different. I made a concoction of pumpkin and white rice. The white rice was supposed to be easy to digest, and the canned pumpkin was supposed to get rid of the diarrhea. However, he still woke up at 11:00 and 1:00. I let him whine for a while, and then we took him out. My goal was to get Grig some sleep. The first time, he did really well, but the second time we waited too long, and he had an accident in his kennel. I felt really bad about that. However, Grig took Arkhon out while I cleaned it up. Then he went back to sleep and I had a really hard time doing the same. Before that, I had only gotten one hour of sleep, and after the mess, I had finally fell asleep around 2:15 a.m.

At 3:15, Grig woke up for work and asked if I could help him get ready. I agreed and got up . However, after I made him breakfast, I told him I was going back to bed. Two hours of sleep just wasn't going to be sufficient.

It took me a while to fall back to sleep. While I was laying down stewing and hoping that Arkhon wouldn't wake up, I was feeling a bit grumpy. At that moment, I composed a blog about how this has been a really rough week.

However, when Arkhon and Kevin woke me up at 7:30 a.m., I felt a lot better. There's nothing like a solid four hours of sleep to help someone feel better.

The sleeping cycle may have been off this week, but a lot of great things have still happened. Grig and I have been working at keeping better schedules, and I know that we've gotten a lot accomplished because of that. Though I've gotten behind a bit on my NaNoWriMo, I've also written over 17,000 words. That's no small thing.

It's amazing what four hours of sleep can do for someone.

It certainly made me remember the bright side of the week.

Grig told me the other day that I'm too positive sometimes. When he's in a bad mood and wants to grouch about something, I have a tendency to find the lighter side of things. He told me that sometimes it can be annoying, but usually he really appreciates it. On the other hand, he helps me be more realistic.

A couple of nights ago, Arkhon got a hold of one of Kevin's Schleich toys. These toys are well-made, cute, and somewhat expensive. He'd gotten a couple of others, but he'd only chewed off legs. I had been able to glue those back on. However, on this occasion, Arkhon chewed off a horse's face. By the time we noticed, it was too late.

I was a little upset at first, and it was with great regret that I threw the toy away. Grig told me that we probably should lock the toys up until Arkhon's a little older. I told him that Arkhon would probably learn not to chew on toys, but Grig replied that by the time that happened, all the toys might be destroyed.

I didn't want to hear that, but Grig had a point. If we really didn't want Arkhon to get a hold of Kevin's toys, we would need to put them out of reach.

However, I had decided long ago that people were more important than things (dogs too).

One Christmas, my parents gave me a glass statue of a dog. I really liked it, and that night, my sister and I were in our bedroom and she asked to see the dog. I handed it to her, but before she had a good grip I let go. The dog crashed to the floor and its head broke open.

For a moment, a decision rested on me, and in that split instant, I decided that my sister was more important than my new dog statue. Since then, I've tried to remember that. It has really helped me keep things in perspective

So, ultimately, I decided that we would let Kevin continue to play with his toys. What good are toys if they're not played with?

So, yes, there have been some hard things this week, but ultimately it's been a good week.