Current Schedule

One of the things I've done to help myself feel in control of my mental state and getting through my days is created a schedule for the boys. Not every day is the same and I do okay at adjusting to the changes in a day as they come but it helps me to have time allotted for everything I want to do with the boys. Then I don't feel like I need to repeat every task every three hours.

Sample schedule at 4 months old. 

The boys weigh about fourteen pounds each, are drinking five ounces of formula six times a day and sleep through the night. The day is broken into two feedings in the morning, afternoon and evening or known around our house as early breakfast, brunch, lunch, linner, dinner and supper. 

Each feeding follows the same rhythm: wake up, diaper change, eat, activity, down for a nap. The whole cycle takes one hour minimum and sometimes up to two hours if the boys are alert; not showing signs of being sleepy. Since we're sleep training them I don't let them go longer than two hours of activity during the day. Typical awake periods for our boys is an hour and a half before getting at least an hour of sleep. We feed them at the same time which has gotten MUCH easier as they've gotten older and have better head control. 

Morning

First Feeding

The first feeding begins between 6am and 8am. We let the boys wake up on their own but when the first one is squawking and ready to be fed, we get both up. I typically tandem breast-feed the boys at the first feeding followed by their bottles of formula. Activity time is usually reading books and singing songs to the boys since I'm NOT a morning person and I can do these activities sitting on the couch with them. A nap in the nursery follows this and typically lasts an hour and a half. 

Second Feeding

The next feeding starts by 11am and if I have the energy I'll nurse, otherwise I just do bottles. The activity after this feeding is a walk outside if the weather is nice using their double stroller or if there's a helper we'll use baby bjorns. A nap follows this in the crib in the living room. 

Afternoon

Third Feeding

This feeding starts around 1:30pm and is followed by a physical activity like tummy time, open floor play time with stuffed animals and/or sitting in their bouncy seats where they kick like they're running in a track meet! 

Fourth Feeding

Around 4:30pm the fourth feeding begins and I'll get a second tandem nursing session in if I didn't do it earlier. The activity time for this break is either more tummy time or sitting in their seats while I do household chores. I'll describe what I'm doing (folding laundry, prepping dinner or rotating the dishes through the dishwasher) which helps them hear more words and sentences. 

Evening

Fifth Feeding

Daddy is home by now so the 7pm feeding is shared by the two of us and if we've already eaten dinner ourselves by this point the boys will both hang out with daddy playing for this break. 

Sixth Feeding

This is the final feeding of the day begins at 9pm and is all business. Diaper change, put on pjs, wash hands and faces with a washcloth, formula bottles and then off to bed in separate bassinets in our bedroom. An average night has them in bed by 10pm and they sleep through until morning when the routine starts all over again!

Since my milk supply is much lower than their nutritional needs I average nursing each twice a day (which is either two tandem sessions or one tandem, then one with one boy and separately with the other) and pump once or twice a day. I spent a lot of time during the first two months stressing over my milk supply and was frantic about how I wasn't healing fast enough to have the strength to do more for my milk. I contacted friends, lactation consultants and talked to other twin moms. I know things I could do to increase my supply but in the end decided I did not have the physical stamina to go through all of that. It's a major source of frustration for me, I want to be able to give them more milk but I don't want to sacrifice other activities to devote more time to build my supply. There is more to being a mom besides breastfeeding and I take joy from crawling on the floor with them, packing them up for a walk outside or looking into their eyes and talking during those many many diaper changes. I will continue to work through my emotions but I'm proud I've stuck with it as long as I have and that I have achieved some of the milestones I've collected. Every day is a chance to do a little better and I'll continue partial breastfeeding until I feel strongly that it's time to stop.

Time Flies

When you're in the first few days and weeks of being home with a newborn time seems to enter a weird warp. The nights take forever to get through but during the day when you lay down for a nap it snaps by in a second. 

We're now almost four months into our adventure of raising twin boys and things have vastly improved over the last couple of weeks. The boys have begun sleeping through the night and the increase in our sleep means we wake up rested, level headed and able to get stronger and do better during the day. Although some mornings we wish we could sleep longer - babies DEFINITELY don't have a snooze button. 

Personally I'm further along the path of healing. I had a few days of tearful relapse in my postpartum depression healing and when the dizzy spells returned I worked with my psychiatrist to make the decision to up my dose of Zoloft. I'm now on 75 mg daily and while it's frustrating to feel like I need more meds it has been working and I guess I just need to take solace in that. I'm finally to the point where I feel present and experiencing being a mother. I'm enjoying my boys and missing them when they're down for a nap or when we leave them with Nana and Papa for an afternoon. 

We have many friends and family members who continue to provide us with baby care relief, household help and much needed advice and counseling but for the first time since we came home from the hospital I feel like our support circle is extra help instead of vital support. I've had several hours of taking care of both boys by myself and I've done one full day. The thing was it was no big deal. I fed them together, stayed on their schedule and got them down for naps after each feeding without problem. I'm sad that I couldn't have done that two months ago. But. It is what it is. 

I'm dealing with the emotions of anger and grief over how the first two months went and trying to live in the moment now since it already feels like it's flying by too fast! We're healthy and happy and moving forward with learning to be a family unit. 

Recently we were going through videos and I re-watched some of the clips I hadn't watched in more than a month. They already seem so tiny then compared to now!

The latest

We're enjoying another weekend of Nana and Papa babysitting and we've plopped our laptops down at McDonald's to use their free wifi. After moving tables once (this seems to be the ongoing theme whenever we go out with our laptops) we're at a large table next to power outlets. I have iTunes playing (in my earbuds) Jay-Z, our camera and usb hard drive plugged in to my laptop and an empty frape cup to my left. Hopefully this will be a productive session of organizing photos, videos and getting some blogging done.

Things are cruising along these days, the boys turned 16 weeks old yesterday and have been sleeping through the night from after their 9pm feeding until 6:00, 7:00 or 8:00 in the morning depending on how well they sleep. That means Hubby and I are getting a good solid block of sleep every single night. Sleep sure makes a difference!

The current pop culture running through our heads (and to document it for posterity) is the double rainbow song. Our friend A sent us the link a while back when the video had less than a thousand views.



The latest is from the auto-tune the news crew, and YES we've both had it running loops in our ears for the last three days. Thanks A LOT T and K!

Enjoy!

Seal Bark

Early on there would be times where during a diaper change the boys would start to spit up. Then you had the dilemma of what to do, continue with the diaper change while the baby is spouting and choking or roll them on their side to clear things out while they lay naked and ready to spray at any second. Sometimes when you’re lucky there would be an extra pair of hands near by and one person would hold the baby on an incline taking care of the spit up while the other would get the diaper on just enough to properly sit up the baby for burping and suctioning if needed.

One such instance stood out among the rest at six weeks old.

Miles started to spit up while my mom was changing him so I came to the rescue to hold up his top while she tried to strap up his bottom. With him wiggling so much he started getting the hiccups and he ended up suspended mid air while I hugged him under his arms and she wrestled with his middle getting his diaper finished. Mom took him to her shoulder and as we were both cramped in the space behind the dining table where a second changing table had been set up, Miles made the loudest seal bark of a noise we had ever heard.

We froze and as mom pulled him off her shoulder we both looked to see how much projectile vomit would be left behind. We both looked and..... nothing. Not even a drip of spit up had come out. We made eye contact, looked at Miles who was grinning from ear to ear and looked back at each other..... then we bust out laughing really hard.

It was so hilarious to have such a large sound come out of such a tiny being. The room shook at the sound and we were stunned silent.

But then we were laughing so hard and trying to navigate the changing table, the sofa and the dining table while bumping into each other and trying to not drop Miles from laughing so hard. When suddenly my mom said she had to pee.

I did too! I had my legs crossed and I was doing a pee pee dance trying to decide if I should take Miles or run to the bathroom. Well it was too late. We were both laughing so hard and there was no time. We couldn't even think straight to put Miles down. Then we started laughing harder at the fact that we were in danger of wetting our pants that we did!

I left Mom stranded while I dashed upstairs to try to make it to the bathroom, too late. I felt the warmth of what was now flowing and still several steps away from the toilet I figured I could hold the rest enough to go back down to rescue my mom.

I came downstairs and saw my mom had retreated to the laundry room bathroom. I went down to where they were and walked around the corner to find my mom with one hand on Miles holding him steady on the top of the dryer while she did her own pee pee dance. I started laughing again at the sight of my mom trying to decide what to do and little Miles wiggling away batting at a ziploc bag that was getting in his face.

Well then I was REALLY laughing. And started to wet myself AGAIN. I quickly decided I was beyond hope and picked up Miles. I dashed up the stairs and held Miles while I stood on the kitchen floor, peeing my pants. I figured at least I was on hard floor and it would be easy to clean up.

My mom, still laughing, went to the bathroom and having no spare pants with her came upstairs wearing her pajamas from the night before. She took Miles and I went up to change out of my wet pants and having no other jeans that would fit my belly, came down in my pj bottoms too.

Hubby was away at work during the day and he came home to us playing with the boys in our pjs while the washing machine tumbled away cleaning our pants. I proudly announced we were having a pajama party and when Husband went upstairs to change out of his work clothes he came back wearing his pjs too.

Mom emailed the ordeal to Mom-in-law and the next morning she got the email at work. Her reply?

I wish I had been there.  I'm at my desk checking email ....  I laughed so hard when I read your message that I spilled coffee down the front of a white top.  I went to the ladies room and rinsed the front of the shirt with water.  There wasn't a hand drier, so I used paper towels to get it semi dry.  Now I have to stay at my desk with my jacket on to hide my wet shirt.  Next time start your message with "Put down your coffee!"


We now have a new motto in the house: If you feel you have to pee, pee 'cause you never know when something funny will happen.

Book Review

A few years back there was a big hub-bub about Brooke Shields, her postpartum depression and some wacky actor jumping on a couch and saying PPD was all in the head and could be overcome without medication.

I was intrigued by the topic and picked up the book Down Came The Rain by Brooke Shields. I read it about three years ago when I was away on a family vacation at a cabin near Mount Rainier. It was a good, quick read and I shelved the book after finishing it.

Jump to today after dealing with my own form of postpartum depression and I discovered the book among many other titles as I was putting a photo album away. I picked it up and brought it upstairs to read through. I was just going to skip to the parts I thought would be helpful but decided to re-read the whole book. I finished it in a day or two and had a new perspective on her story.

Brooke poses many interesting questions to mull over. One that struck me was the difference between wanting to have a baby and wanting to be a mother. How your own relationship as a daughter with a mother changes once you are a mom yourself. How does your new sense of self change once you are a Mom? How do you hold on to your past while finding a new rhythm with your present? How did your parents parent you and what things would you like to do differently?

I feel like I am just now starting to fall into ease with being a mom, and a mom of twins at that. The first three months were very very hard and stressful at times. It wasn't what I expected. We (both myself and my boys) had physical obstacles to overcome that first month all of which added to my struggle with the chemical imbalance in my body.

I'm sad that I missed so much of the boys in the first month, I wasn't as present as I wanted to be and it was very frustrating to be in the moment and feel that way. Each week gets a little easier and I'm working hard to enjoy them while they're still small. I can't get back those first few weeks but I can be proactive about feeling better and not missing another moment now.

I'm glad I read her book, if you're going through anything like I've talked about on my blog then I highly recommend you pick up her book and give it a whirl. It's very reassuring to know other people in the world are going through the very same things you are.

A Letter To My Body

Dear Body,

I'm sorry.

From,
Me


I knew I'd get bigger with a twin pregnancy than a singleton but I had no idea what I was in for. Actually it wasn't how big I got so much as it was the aftermath of the whole thing. I figured stretch marks where inevitable, I knew I'd get uncomfortable and I knew I'd get puffy. 

In reality my belly got so big that towards the end I had to sit with my legs spread wide to make room for the sagging tummy.

Sitting like this eventually became comfortable and second nature. After the birth I realized my legs had adjusted to my new frame and I had to concentrate to sit with my knees together and to turn my feet straight again. I actually cried the first time I realized what had happened and how weird it felt to be able to put my feet straight with my ankles touching.

I grew out of my original maternity clothes and for the last two months I had to buy a few basics that were larger to accommodate the belly. H&M and Old Navy online were my best bets for finding inexpensive but cute clothes that would work. I did manage to find a couple things at Gap in Las Vegas from their clearance rack. It's a good thing my mom talked me into the brown work slacks since I outgrew my favorite H&M black pair and wore those slacks for the last couple of weeks EVERY DAY at work.

My jeans became too small and I had to go to Motherhood Maternity for a larger pair. I did maintain my sense of humor though. Even when Husband introduced me to Matt Harding and I tried to keep my cool and not be bummed out that my belly was too big to fit in the booth at Little Chinooks. 

 

I did my best to suck in my tummy and enjoyed fish and chips and chatted away. When I wiggled out to waddle back to the car I literally had a dent in my tummy from the table. 

About half way through the pregnancy I would get swollen feet by the end of my work day. This was easily remedied by taking off my shoes and putting up my feet as soon as I got home from work. I'd drink glass after glass of water even though that meant I'd be going to the bathroom every thirty minutes. I missed being able to empty my bladder all the way. I'd clunk down on the toilet and only get a fourth of a cup out... only to go about my day and need to go again another thirty minutes later. 

Towards the end there was no amount of sitting with my feet up that would make the swelling go away. For the last couple of weeks my feet looked like this all the time. 

My belly was always resting on my thighs and had cut off some of the circulation adding to the swelling. Forget cankles I had it so bad my knees were starting to disappear -  Calfighs?

I discovered one way of laying down that took a lot of effort for my husband and a lot of trust from me. If I used ALL the pillows in the house I could pad everything and lay down on an incline with my feet up on our padded ottoman. 

Husband would drape a blanket over me and leave me to nap on the living room floor. I even managed to get an hour nap in one time. Although forget trying to get off the floor by myself. It required hubby's help to get back up. When I was lucky I wouldn't need to go to the bathroom when it was time to get up. Usually my butt would have fallen asleep first. Luckily I never had to find out what would happen if hubby wasn't around to help me get back up. And he never left me stranded.

My belly began to have a life of it's own and was definitely THE BELLY at the end. I would get contractions and would either get "square belly" or "scoop belly" depending on the positioning of the boys. Square belly was first, my round medicine ball tummy would tighten up as if all the extra air had been pulled out with a FoodSaver and it would be rock hard with a definite square outline to the sides. When the contraction subsided one or the other of the boys would get hiccups. EVERY single time. 

Scoop belly was a little different. Baby A had dropped a little more and we knew his head was down. When a contraction came on you could make out the lower bulge that was his head and a ski jump scoop would be right above it. The scoop was really deep, you probably could have made a fist, put your hand in the scoop and it would be level with where my belly usually came out.  

Because my belly was so large I lost the ability to look down and see my feet pretty early on. You always hear about not being able to see your feet when you're pregnant and while it makes sense I never thought about my ability to see other things... like my crotch! As the swelling continued I couldn't see my bikini area to even think about shaving it and things grew out of control. Not that I'd be wearing a bikini any time soon. 

When I felt an extra "piece" of skin in the shower one day I knew it wasn't a hemorrhoid because it wasn't in the right place, it was a little further forward. I actually bought what I affectionally called my "crotch mirror" because we didn't have any hand mirrors big enough to look down under. I asked my doc about my condition and when she took a look she confirmed that yes it was a skin tag. What?!?! A SKIN TAG. Apparently common among larger bellied pregnant gals. It had popped out because of all the added pressure down there. I had never heard of such a thing. I was worried about gettting hemorrhoids and never even knew to fear the skin tag. 

So as not to miss any part of the experience; a hemorrhoid appeared in the last week to keep me company while I couldn't sleep at night. Lucky for me though (if you can call it lucky) the hemorrhoid was from the pressure on my system not from straining when going. So there was no pain from it until after the birth. My pushing and pushing and pushing during labor made sure it would swell bigger and then take on traditional hemorrhoid symptoms. 

At four months after the birth I still have maternity clothes I can't fit back into. I have another thirty pounds to be back at my pre-pregnancy weight and my stretch marks wrap from my belly, around my hips and down part of my butt. Some of my stretch marks are so big they are as wide as my index finger. I actually have more stretch marks on my thighs and hips than my belly. When I was pregnant I thought my stretch marks wouldn't be that bad.... until after the birth when I could really see my thighs clearly and my belly deflated a bit, allowing the stretching to show it's true effect.

In the end I've gained some battle scars and my body will never be the same. I now have two beautiful boys and fortunately my husband is too adoring to ever say my body is a wreck. As the weight comes off I'll look like I have a deflated balloon around my middle from the "twin skin" of carrying fourteen pounds of baby. I'm working on getting strength in my legs but crawling on the floor with my boys will bring that back quickly. As my mother-in-law said comfortingly when I was weepy one morning, it took nine months to build the house my boys thrived in and it will take at least that long for it to go back.

Making Progress

Once again we're fortunate enough to have Nana and Pappa watch the boys while Husband and I spend an afternoon by ourselves. We've camped out at a local Sheri's restaurant with free wifi and we've got the ambitious goal of blogging and working for a few hours.

Just like I do with my scrapbooking I've spent the last hour re-reading past posts and browsing through pictures. Taking a couple hours to get inspired to write and then needing an hour or two for the typing and formatting is a tall order when you're the mom of twins. There's just never enough time in the day, or week, or month. Now I need to do letters for months two, three and four months of their lives. So, here we go!