While Maggie has never been able to jump up on our giant bed by herself – at least without a running start – she’s always been able to jump down on her own.

One morning that all stopped.

Eric was already gone, off to his daily PT, and I was still trying to wake-up – rubbing the sleep out of my eyes.

I climbed out of bed to start my morning routine while Maggie remained in bed – as usual.

I made it downstairs to get breakfast, booted up the laptop & was settling in when Maggie began to whine.

Maggie was sitting on the edge of the bed, refusing to jump down….terrified to jump down.

Moo-Moo, what’s going on? Let’s go!…

Maggie – c’mon, you’re a big girl. You’ve jumped-off the bed dozens of times. Let’s go!

It’s not that far down, see?

 About that time, Eric made it back home.

 I asked Eric to call out to Maggie to see if she’d jump down for him – she’s a Daddy’s girl & will go anywhere for him.

But she only whined more.

She wanted down – I tried every way to coax her down. Nothing was working.

Not Daddy’s stinky sock. Not peanut butter potty treats. Not even abandoning her to fend for herself.

I just couldn’t figure it out until Eric shared a key piece of information.

Apparently the morning before when she was jumping down, she somehow either got her feet caught in the covers or just wasn’t awake enough and she wound up falling out of the bed & onto the floor.

Well – that explained it. So I had to find a way to get her down.

I wound-up having to swing her backside around to set her back feet on the floor. (She’s just too big for me to pick up.) At which point the lightbulb went off in her head - ’Oh, I’m down.’ 

We went through this routine of ‘I want down – come get me’ for almost a week before she finally was able to jump down on her own – but only if you stood right next to her.

That took another few days of doing until one day she finally hopped out on her own.

Now if we can only find her a bed of her own…that she won’t destroy.