Not my best written post but I'm going on very little sleep

Fay has Immune Mediated Myelitis. Her immune system is attacking her spinal cord causing it to swell which interrupts nerve signals to her brain. In other words she's becoming paralyzed from the mid-spine down. To treat this she's on a high dose of Prednisone, a corticosteroid, to reduce the swelling and suppress her immune system. It's working pretty well but there have been some unpleasant side effects. At this point the worst side effects are that she's constantly famished and that she can't regulate her body temperature well. Summer is hard on Pugs to begin with but I think the heat is hindering the medication's ability to reduce her swelling and increasing the energy-sapping effect the drug has.

She's been getting me up at five AM lately because she's hungry for her breakfast and she has to go out (that's got an energy-sapping effect on me for sure) She's uncomfortably hot from the medication so she's often panting loudly and looking for a cool spot on the floor. This is easier to deal with when we're in Vermont since it's much cooler there. When we're in Brookline it's more uncomfortable for her. We have a window air conditioner in the bedroom but she doesn't understand it. This morning at five after I'd taken her out and fed her she tried to camp out beneath the toilet. I'd put the a.c. on to cool the bedroom down but she doesn't understand that when she hears that humming sound the room's about to get cooler. Or maybe she just doesn't want to wait.

The situation is hard to navigate for a non-morning person. Pete and I have the typical couple temperature dynamic going (I'm hot, he's cold or he's hot and I'm cold depending on the season) and the noisy dog's panting loudly enough to wake the dead. She's happy under the toilet for now but if I let her stay there I know that in about ten minutes when I've gone back to sleep she'll get lonely and bust into the bedroom and I'll have to get up again and close the door after her.

My options seem to be either to risk waking Pete up now by turning on the a.c. (which he doesn't want - but I'd do it anyway because I'm hot!) and bringing the pant-y dog in to make noise until she cools down or to leave Pete in peace and her in the bathroom and have to wake up and get out of bed again myself in ten minutes when she's decided to come and join us.

Now that it's eleven AM and I'm fully awake it's obvious what I should do. But at the time I was seriously considering taking Fay downstairs to the kitchen and sleeping there on the rug so as not to bother Pete.

As her treatment progresses Fay's prednisone dosage will be reduced and hopefully the side effects will tail off too. I also hope that she'll have more energy and be able to walk better when the cooler weather sets in. I hope we'll all be able to sleep better then.