Friday, August 17, 2012

Inter-Species Conspiracy

Harry, my ferocious feline, and Raphaela seem to have made a secret pact, which involves pushing me out of my amply sized bed, and making sure that I do not sleep well past 4:30 in the morning.

It starts when Harry settles in at night, sitting on both my legs so I cannot move;  if I dare to change position, I hear a vague meow of complaint from the foot of the bed.  Then Raphaela chooses some random hour in the middle of the night to crawl into bed with me, where she of course needs to use my pillow and most of the length and width of the bed until she finds a comfortable position.

At this point I am resting in a cramped ball in the far corner of the bed.

Then, around one hour before sunrise, Harry decides that he needs all of us to start the day on his schedule.  He does so by crawling over Raphaela first, waking her up and reigniting the sibling rivalry between them.  Raphaela shouts in a state of half-awareness, "Go away Harry, there is no room for you here."  At which point Harry makes his point by sitting on top her, and Raphaela makes her point by poking me, curling up next to my body, and demanding that I do something about the situation.

This goes on for longer than I would prefer, and by the time Harry leaves the room and Raphaela falls back asleep, my alarm clock rings.

3 comments:

Amy Charles said...

Hon, you have to close the door, or at least restrain Harry from coming into your room. You're letting this happen to yourself.

If you must allow RR to sleep with you -- and at 3 she can cope with not crawling into your bed routinely in the middle of the night -- then you will have to arrange it so that Harry cannot come in with her.

If you can't do that, then bed her down in a cot in your room with the rule being this: RR in her bed, Mommy in hers, and sleeping in your room is a privilege. If she cannot stay in her cot she must sleep in her room and not come into yours till morning. But Harry is not allowed in Mommy's bedroom. Deal with it as though you have allergies.

Doc said...

Raphaela does not make it a regular habit, only lately and I hope it is temporary. It is, however, much more difficult to re-train a ten year old cat.

Amy Charles said...

Yeah, I know. I had to do the same with a 16-yo cat and a 6-yo cat. But don't underestimate how important sleep is to your functioning -- it's easy to forget/minimize how much you do, and you need that sleep to be a healthy person & good mother. The cat will live with a soft sleeping place outside the bedroom. You have to shut the door, though, and if RR can't help letting him in, she has to be in or out, not mixing it up in the middle of the night.