The Fog of the First Nights

People say having a puppy is a lot like having a newborn, and they are not wrong.

After all the excitement of finally getting Cordelia home, we settled her into her crate for the night. I had alarms set to wake me up every three hours so I could take her outside to potty.

The first alarm went off. I took her out, she went potty, and I put her back in her crate.

A few hours later, the next alarm went off. We did it all again, and I went back to bed.

Then she started whining.

I figured she was just having trouble settling, so I tried ignoring it for a little while. When she kept whining, I got up and took her out again. This time I noticed something wet on her.

Then I realized what it was.

Poop.

Poop on my sweatshirt. Poop all over Cordelia. Poop in my hair.

When I turned on the kitchen lights, I discovered poop all over the crate too. It was on the blankets, on the crate bars, and all over the brand new stuffed toys that still carried her mom’s scent. She had apparently been jumping up against the bars and whining, desperately trying to communicate that there was a problem.

And there was definitely a problem.

I called for Sam and handed him the poop covered puppy for her first emergency bath while I tackled the crate. I scraped what I could off the blankets and toys, got everything into a sanitize load of laundry, and wiped down the crate and every single bar.

Eventually Cordelia was clean, the crate was clean, and she had a fresh towel to sleep on. Then I took a shower and got myself cleaned up.

For the rest of that morning, I was on high alert for any whine that sounded even slightly unusual. I also started shining a flashlight into the crate before putting her back in, just to make absolutely sure everything was okay.

The part that bothered me most was that I had thought I smelled poop earlier. I noticed it, but I was brand new at all of this and did not trust my instincts enough to act on it.

I think learning to trust those instincts is a huge part of having a puppy. You start noticing tiny differences in a whine, a look, or the way they are moving, and eventually you learn when something just does not seem right. Unfortunately, sometimes you learn those lessons the hard way. In fact I would say most of the time you learn it the hard way.

It is also much harder to trust your instincts when you are half asleep, which is pretty much how I felt for the next month.

Waking up every three hours puts your brain into a strange fog. You can tell that you are thinking and doing things, but there is a lag to everything and you cannot seem to make your thoughts move any faster. It is like someone turned down the clarity setting in your brain and left everything just a little blurry.

The good news is that it really does not last very long.

Three hours eventually became three and a half. Then four. Then one night you realize your puppy just slept all the way through the night.

And you did too.

These days, if Cordelia whines in the middle of the night, I still jump up because it usually means she really does need to go outside. But getting up at 3:00 in the morning happens maybe once or twice a week now instead of every single night.

After those first few weeks, sleeping through the night feels like an incredible luxury.