Since my last post, I refreshed myself on Melatonin uses and dosages. I tried this with Jim a year ago and his sleep seemed to get worse instead of better. I gave up pretty quickly because I’d been trying to nip the problem in the bud. His sleep pattern wasn’t a consistent issue so I decided not to mess with it.

Now it is.

This time I decided to try Nature’s Bounty Melatonin Gummies. They are a relatively low dose and they’d be easier to get Jim to take. I just have to put one in front of him and he gobbles it up without question. Unlike when I tried Melatonin in pill form last year. In hindsight, that could have been much of the problem our trial last year. He knew he was taking something to help him sleep and worried over it.

So, we’ve just finished night 3.

He’s always fallen asleep easily. By the time I come to bed he’s usually already snoring. On the second night with Melatonin, he hardly woke when I came to bed.

Ironically, I haven’t been falling asleep easily, so as I lay there, I listen to him breathing evenly and notice his restless leg syndrome seems to have eased. That’s a win.

He still tells me he’s hardly slept the night before, but when my alarm goes off he doesn’t wake until I’m almost completely out of bed. Note: we have an old mattress and I’m not small, still, it takes a few seconds of a jostling mattress to wake him.

The instructions say it could take up to 2 weeks to experience results. Because of his dementia, it may not work much at all.

I have to try, at least until I can get us moved downstairs to the ground level of our house, so I don’t have to worry about him wandering at night and falling down a flight of steps.