Cue the angel choirs . . .

. . . as we celebrate four consecutive nights of uninterrupted sleep! We began giving our little one a low dose of melatonin an hour before bedtime, after we consulted with our pediatrician about the sleep disturbances we were dealing with for the first 4 weeks of school. She had been waking up almost every night between 1 and 3 a.m. and coming to get me, and often in the process Chris and Fer would be up as well, and we would all be changing beds to accommodate needs for closeness and comfort, and all of us were suffering from ongoing loss of sleep. The first change I noticed with the melatonin was that it seemed easier for her to fall asleep, though for the first days of taking it she was still up in the middle of the night. But, for the past four nights, she has fallen asleep easily around 8 p.m. and stayed asleep for 10-11 hours. This has allowed me and Chris to have a little time to relax together and then to get a good night's sleep ourselves. What a difference!

I don't want to count on it, as it's important to roll with whatever comes down the pike, but it does seem that we are over the first major adjustment hurdle to their new school. Both girls are happily getting dressed and heading out the door with me to school in the mornings, we are hearing good reports from them daily about the different classes and activities at school and in aftercare, we have not had any major meltdowns or even low-grade episodes for almost 3 weeks now, and the general vibe at home has been much more peaceful and relaxed. It's not perfect (nothing is!) but even when we are dealing with rudeness or lack of cooperation, there's a different level of intensity. I have been blessed in the last week or so with more ability to shrug off the relatively unimportant stuff, and have been feeling much less stressed overall. I've even started eating regularly again! (The hard times of the first two weeks of school totally messed with my appetite to the point that I was just too filled with dread to eat much at all.) I think my more relaxed mindset probably translates to the kids feeling more relaxed as well -- "if mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy," as the saying goes.

I'm sure we'll cycle back through difficult times, but it certainly is nice to have this breather.