Home Crazy Home

I now had 2 newborns and a 23 month old at home. Sleep, peace and quiet and privacy were faded memories. My mom stayed with me for the first week. Sleeping on an air mattress in the twin's room. This was a huge help. The twins were on heart monitors. These were supposed to "help" me, and keep me from worrying about them while they slept. Yeah! Right! They went off constantly. An alarm would sound everytime one of the boy's heart rate slowed. Trust me...once that alarm went off, NOBODY's heart rate was slow.

We had lots of doctor's appointments in the first month or two. There are always extra precautions when babies are born prematurely. These were important but they interfered with everything. Looking back, it doesn't seem so bad but at the time, just packing them up was hard. Getting them and their stuff into the van, driving to downtown Memphis, then unpacking them, getting them into the office, waiting. THEN packing them up and heading home...whew! What a pain. Thank God they were healthy and this did not last long.

Eventually, we fell into a routine. A crazy, sleep deprived routine, but a routine nonetheless. Mark switched to second shift so that he would be home with me during the day. He and Sean were big buddies. They did everything together. I'm so grateful for this. I did as much as I could, but I was very busy feeding twins. My mom would come over after work....every day! Mark would leave at 2:00 pm and my mom would show up at about 5:00. Those 3 hours alone were the longest hours of my day.

I breast fed the twins, just like I breast fed Sean. People were always asking me "How can you breast feed twins?". I told them, "It's easy." Not to mention cheaper. We suddenly had two more mouths to feed. How could I NOT breast feed them? I would hold both of them in a football position and feed them together. They're heads would touch and sometimes they would "hold" hands. Sean would get upset with me because I couldn't get up and do things for him during these feedings. SO....he would throw things at us. There I would be....feeding my babies and dodging toys! I can laugh about it now, but then...I cried a lot.

By the time my mom showed up, Sean and I were frazzled and ready for her help. The twins never seemed to be affected by my stress. They were happy little fellows with really big appetites. Thank God (again) that I was able to breast feed them. I never ran out. I like to think that this was God's favor to me. His way of saying "I know it's tough, so here." I breast fed them for 13 months. Of course, they would occasionally take a bottle when necessary. As they got older they started eating cereal and baby food. Right on schedule. Just like single babies do.



I've got a little secret. Sometimes I miss breast feeding. I'm so very glad that I did it and IF I were to have another baby (not gonna happen), I would breast feed him too. Yes, I said "him". There's no doubt in my mind!