Worst. Night. Ever.

So I'm updating this going on two nights with virtually no sleep.

Greg and I have about had it with Jackson. As much as we love the little guy and know that he isn't doing anything intentionally wrong, he is driving us out of our minds. Jackson is a great dog during the day- we love him. But at night, it's a whole different story. For the past 2 nights, he has woken us up literally every hour to go outside. Last night was especially bad, though, and after 6 trips outside by 2 a.m. we had both had it and decided to ignore his barking for the next few hours. Unfortunately, that led to him soiling his crate, which is not a fun thing to be dealing with at 4:30 am when you already have not gotten more than 45 minutes of continuous sleep. Most of the time that he barks to be let out, he needs to pee. But sometimes, he just wants to play, which is not welcome in the middle of the night. We try to keep his late-night bathroom breaks "all business" and talk to him as little as possible, put him right back in the crate when he's done. It just isn't working. When we talked to the vet about this, they suggested getting him tested for a UTI, which we are going to do immediately. I don't know how much longer either of us can go on with no sleep.

Lance, on the other hand, is still wonderful overnight. I feel bad for the little guy because Jackson's barking keeps him up too. He looked as exhausted and annoyed this morning as Greg and I were. I shot some photos this morning before I left for work. Of course, Jackson fell right asleep after we were all up for the day, but I have a feeling that Greg will not let him off the hook that easy. We're going to definitely try everything to tired the little guy out tonight so that we can get some much needed rest!
I think part of the issue with last night being so horrible was that the boys were off schedule. We had our second vet appointment last night, so they ended up eating dinner 2 hours later than usual. We try to feed them pretty early so that they have time to play and poop and tire themselves out before we go to bed. They didn't have that same amount of time last night, so it threw things off.

In other news, the vet appointment was great! I really, really like Kingsbrook Vet and am very happy that we found them (thanks to Rob and Staci again!). We met with Dr. Cook this time, who was wonderful. He got down on the floor with the boys to do their exams. And everything looked perfect for both boys. Lance's other testicle finally dropped-  hooray! The biggest shock though was their weight. The last time we were there, Lance outweighed Jackson by 2 lbs. This is not surprising at all, because Lance looks much larger than Jackson. he's longer, taller, and fluffier. So imagine our surprise when Jackson ended up outweighing Lance by 2 lbs this time! Jackson had gained almost 7 lbs since the last visit and Lance gained 4. Guess Lance really is "all fluff" while Jackson is just solid muscle. The boys got their second vaccine and didn't react negatively to it. We gave them Thuja, a natural supplement that was recommended by the owner of The Midas Touch, to ease any side-effects or negative reactions. Our next visit is in 3-4 weeks, so I'll be very interested to see how they weigh in then.

Through all of this frustration, Greg and I still try to find some humor, which is hard when you feel like the walking dead. The boys still constantly make us laugh- and I'm sure they always will. I almost want to watch Marley and Me again to appreciate what John Grogan went through when Marley was a puppy. But, I could only watch it up until a certain point- the end is just too sad. I will never forget seeing that in the theater and just hearing sniffles and sobs everywhere around me- including the giant frat-boy type sitting next to Greg.