Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

Our family has changed (okay, so that was more than three months ago). Now, so has our blog.
Last night I read an article in the New York Times Sunday Magazine about 'high reactive' babies and genetic predisposition toward anxiety. I recognized a lot of Sam and, to a lesser extent, Jonah in the descriptions of 'high reactive' babies. For example: During a 45 minute battery of new stimuli, high reactive babies were often physically active and sometimes arched their backs and cried. Uh, yeah. You mean some of the babies just sat there? for 45 minutes? Were they drugged?
I also recognized a lot of myself. Like the period in fourth grade when I couldn't make it past second period without a trip to the bathroom to throw up, when I cried myself to sleep most nights worrying about school, when I had a total meltdown thinking my mom had been in a deadly car accident just because she was 20 min late coming home from taking my brother to school (I hadn't even been able to face school that day). She'd stopped for groceries.
I still occasionally stop myself in the middle of a silent rant about Jed's tardiness and think 'What if this time he's late b/c he's been in an accident? Then I'd feel like crap.' And unusual or unfamiliar symptoms can still spark rather melodramatic 'what if's.' But I usually keep them to myself and they rarely keep me up at night.
It was at about this point in my mental ramblings that I suddenly realized something: My kids have mellowed me out. A lot. I wouldn't necessarily describe myself as 'peaceful' (that was the alternative to anxious in the article), but I'm a lot closer than I was three years ago. And that surprises me.
It made me think about all the nights I spent singing 'Amazing Grace' to a colicy infant Sam while he cried on my shoulder. It's one of my favorite hymns, and I think I sang it as much to calm myself as to calm him. The idea that some higher power could wipe away my worrying has always evoked a longing in me. Maybe it's not a higher power I need.
So that's the story behind the new blog.