Itchy

We had quite the exciting night last night. And by "exciting" I mean "terrible, no good, very bad."

We had Finn in bed early. Relaxed, played some Yatzee (which I won, for once), and had a delightful evening leading up to grown-up bedtime. Because of the heat Steve and I were already sleeping restlessly, when Harley came bounding back the hallway. And then he ran full speed back to the living room. Repeat this several times, with some pausing to shake in between. We assumed the obvious, he had to pee, so Steve let him outside for a few minutes and then brought him back in. We'd just settled back down, when Harley started the whole routine over again. He positively would not calm down. Determined to have a few hours of sleep, Steve contained Harley in his crate. Just as we drifted off to sleep, he did his pitiful whining. So back out of the cage he came, only to repeat the running of the hallway again. At this point, I start thinking maybe he's pulling a Lassie-esque "Timmy's in the well!". So I jump out of bed to prod the completely dead-to-the-world toddler awake, just to make sure he's okay. All was well, and after Finn gave me the stink eye for waking him up we all went back to bed. Harley continued his running. We tried to ignore  it, thinking that giving him attention for it would just encourage him more. This lasted until he bounded into our room and slammed his entire front half into the bed. We stuck him outside on the run, hoping he would wear himself out and fall asleep on the porch. Thirty minutes later he was crying his head off and was brought back inside and put in the crate. Either he was so exhausted that he gave up or we were so tired that we passed out without noticing any more antics. I'm not sure.

So, we wake up this morning and start to get ready to leave. As I'm in the bathroom, Steve yells "Ashley! Get out here!" I lazily wander to the living room, assuming this has something to do with SportsCenter. Nope. Harley's neck was scratched raw to the point that it looked like someone had tried to slit his throat. I fetched a cold washcloth and cleaned him up as best as I could. We both thought his harness had irritated him and he had scratched at it profusely. Then as I cleaned further down, I saw huge red welts on his chest. And behind his front legs. And on his front legs. All over his belly. Covering his doggy junk. Ugh. I honestly had no idea dogs could get poison ivy. Somehow Steve did know this though.  I just know our furkid looks miserable. We've been giving him children's benedryl to help with the itch, but he still looks mighty pitiful. I gave him a nice long scrub this afternoon to get any remaining residue off of him, which hopefully keeps us from getting it and keeps it from spreading on him anymore.

A few pictures of his itchiness:

Front leg

Neck (these are the sores he had scratched open last night)

More of the neck bumps

Even on the paws

And the worst. His belly. I feel so bad for him.