“Since Georgia came Tallulah can finally sleep at night.”

This is something I don’t write about often. I write a lot about being bi polar but PTSD is in the basket of things I carry with me through life as well, and it exacerbates the bi polar bits and parts, and it is unpleasant. I was told early on by more than one psychiatrist — and Lord knows their views on things may have changed and the terminology may be different now that it is more openly discussed but I’ll go with what I know — that there are 2 types of PTSD. PTSD Type 1 is curable. It may have occurred because of an isolated incident, say a terrible car accident that makes one afraid to drive or afraid of something related to the accident. It is terribly painful and not easy to move past but with a good therapist, medication, and whatever is deemed appropriate treatment it can be worked through. PTSD Type 2 as I was told is treatable but not curable, i.e. people whose trauma was so severe or long lasting that it not believed that even with treatment and medication it can be healed but therapy and medication can help it become more manageable. I beg your pardon if it is thought of some other way now, but you will understand my premise in this piece based on what I was told years ago.

I have PTSD Type 2 according to my doctor, and at 60, with more than 4 decades in therapy and most of it on medication I can tell you that it has never gone away. My own situation is exacerbated by the fact that my flashbacks and night terrors have to do with being sexually abused from 4 to 18 so that bed for me in and of itself just doesn’t feel like a safe place. For years I slept on the couch and not in a bed. Then came the pugs.

There is a curious misconception that pugs are dogs. I’m not sure how this came to pass but I can assure you that they are not dogs, they are magical little beings, soft little armfuls of love, no wimpy small people are they, no, they are sturdy little individuals, and they are psychically attached to their people which is true of most dogs bonded to their owners, but they have magic sleep powers that go beyond the realm of anything medication can touch. As you see above, Georgia helps Tallulah sleep. This is also true in my house.

I don’t dare try to go to bed until I am so tired I am falling asleep sitting up and actually many nights I intentionally let myself fall asleep a little before trying to go to bed so that I might sort of sleep walk to bed. Lately it has been somewhere between 3 and 4 a.m. when I am able to head to bed. My  pugs are completely in tune with my schedule. They sleep here around me, snuggled up, until I am ready to go to bed, and as soon as I sit straight up and say “Time to go to bed,” they bound off the loveseat (I have a reclining loveseat so we are all nicely packed in together, snug and cozy.) and head straight back to the bedroom.

Once we are in the bedroom they all sit expectantly on the edge of the bed looking toward the bathroom while I brush my teeth and as soon as I come back in and start to get into bed they spread out to let me get in and situated. As soon as I am tucked in they drift back toward me and attach like limpets on rocks. In our king sized bed we five don’t take up more than one person would anyway. I often feel like Gulliver tied down by the Lilliputians and sometimes have to sit up, turn on the light, and shift them around a bit so that I might have an inch to breathe freely, but my wee girl Delilah is always attached.

Toward morning Delilah moves from being wedged tightly against me to getting on top of me. I am a side sleeper and I put a pillow between my knees which helps my back, and I use 2 pillows to kind of lay over on. She hops up on my hip and goes to sleep there. Of late I have awakened to Delilah, Laverne, and Pugsley ALL along the edge of my body, whichever side is up. Like those pictures of peas on the edge of a knife I have pugs on the side of my body (Although it must be said that I am a tad wider than a knife. I make a nice shelf for pugs.). I can shift 2 off but Delilah will get right back, and you know what, it is very comforting.

And the most touching thing to me is that if I am having night terrors, if I have awakened screaming or crying they are all on top of me in an instant. I take a pill and literally cling to them like a little girl to her teddy bear and I have often thought that pugs are like little living, breathing, teddy bears. I have cried into a pug’s fur while holding them tight and shaking like a leaf. When I calm down and the medication begins to take affect I lay down and here is Delilah…

 She is not officially registered as a service dog but I can tell you most definitely that she is one for me.

I understand why Tallulah so loves Georgia. It wasn’t until the wee little pug came that Tallulah began to sleep at night, most of the time, and she, like I do, goes to sleep at night to the sound of sweet pug snoring, and there is nothing more effective to help me finally drift off. God bless these tiny people. They are truly magic…