a random post at last

a cute photo

(whitman - left w/ hat on, charleston - right w/ hoodie on)

a funny video (comedian Tom Papa - check him out on Youtube. He is funny and pretty clean)




I will endeavor to become a cinnamon-scented bean bag chair (must watch video to understand)

and lastly, a great song

if you like them, check out songs, Lesson No. 7 and Belongings

that's all for now. Feeling a bit like I live in the movie Groundhog Day and yet I'm not getting any better at juggling it all... someday perhaps

helpless heart

I'll never forget that day. November 15, 2011. It was the day after my birthday. They were both doing so well on my birthday. They came off breathing support and we got to hold them for an extra 30 minutes. I remember thinking that their improved health was a fabulous birthday present. I remember saying so on Facebook.

But only a few hours later, things changed.

I got a phone call early that morning. I wasn't inherently worried because I got a phone call from the NICU every morning, telling me how they were doing and preparing me for what I might see when I saw them each day. But that morning, the tone was different. From the moment I picked up the phone, I knew something was wrong.

The neonatologist told me that Whitman had developed an infection sometime in the night. He was on heavy breathing support and medication to fight the infection. I was told it was "very serious".

I hung up and began to sob. I ran to Doug and told him everything I could remember from the call and we practically ran to the hospital.

When we turned the corner to see the boys, I saw a large group of nurses and doctors gathered around Whitman. There were three times as many machines around him now too. I could almost hear my heart breaking.

Doug and I stood by his bed, holding his little hand, sobbing. Doug asked questions of the doctors and tried to understand the gravity of the situation as best as possible. I just stared at his little body moving up and down to the rhythm of the machine and listened to the constant beeps to tell me he was still alive. The nurses needed to give him another injection and Doug and I went into the hallway and collapsed with grief. We did the only thing we know what to do when something like this occurs - we prayed.

We begged God to spare our son. We promised Him anything and everything and offered what was left of our stolen and broken hearts.

That was the only time we left his bedside for days. I remember holding Charleston and feeling so guilty that I could hold him and not his brother. I felt guilty trying to enjoy that moment while my other son lay listless only feet away.

Mostly, I remember feeling completely and utterly vulnerable. I don't know when I gave these guys my heart. I certainly didn't intend to. I tried so hard to keep it guarded for fear of the pain but despite my best efforts, these boys have a key that I am incapable of getting back.

Sometimes I don't like them. Sometimes when I'm taping their swaddling blankets around their bodies so they'll sleep, I think about taping their mouths, or even better, their ever-poopy butts. And sometimes I fantasize about sleep. Ok, a lot of times I fantasize about sleep.

But

always I love them. I never thought about the consequences on my heart of having children. I knew I'd offer up my love but I never thought they would steal my whole heart.

some photos for your brain

Charleston in the green shirt and Whitman in the gray

Boy are we going to have fun once they are smiling and giggling! The blog might become just a photo blog at that point... :)

thank you

I just wanted to say thank you to all of you for giving so much to me. I SO appreciated and needed your many emails, and phone calls, and comments on my last post. Shortly after writing it, I had the best weekend I have had with these little guys. We went up a nipple size on the bottles and got some medicine for reflux and suddenly, feedings went from taking an hour and a half to half an hour and the boys didn't squeal the entire time they ate. Voila! Awesome!
I also read this post that was recommended by a wise and respected friend and I felt like it really spoke to me. Its exactly how I feel. I don't have to enjoy every minute. But I try to at least stop and enjoy a few minutes each day. kairos. perfect.
And my breasts still feel like they are going to fall off most of the time and I'm still insanely tired BUT it is getting ever so slightly better.

SO

thank you. I appreciate your collective wisdom more than I can express.


(and more pictures of the boys coming soon :)

new momness

(charleston - left, whitman - right)

I'm not even sure where to start. Life is crazy right now. The first week of having them home was insanely hard. It was a tough adjustment for everyone. The second week we started to get a better groove but it was still a little rough trying to figure out how to do everything times two. This week and last we have had the in-laws around and its been easier in some ways and more challenging in others. Easier because they can take some of the feedings and changings and sorts but more difficult to figure out where/how to breast feed, for example.
Most days, though, are hard.
People tell me that things will get better and I'm really hoping that's true. They are great boys but it wouldn't matter if they were the baby Jesus, so little sleep is just rough.
The other challenges right now include -
1. I am now back at work part time for the next two months until I go back full time.
2. My milk supply is decreasing because I don't have as much time to nurse and I'm discovering that pumping without nursing doesn't produce big results.
3. I don't have as much time to add up a bunch of one hour sleep increments so I get less sleep and have more responsibilities.

and so on

But I don't want to complain. Rather, I want someone to tell me that kids are worth it. I want someone to tell me that these babies are going to be worth all the trouble and I'll start feeling that they are worth it for more than 5 minutes a day sometime soon. I know that sounds awful to say and don't get me wrong, I love them. Its just that a 2 second smile and a sweet momentary gaze once a day isn't really pulling me through long hours at night, feedings that take forever because they want to eat for 2 seconds and then quit for 20 min and then eat for 2 seconds, etc.

I'm complaining again. Sorry.

But as long as I'm on it, let me raise another complaint about being a new mom.

Guilt.

Seriously. What is this? I hate it. I feel guilty for everything. I feel guilty I don't bathe them more. I feel guilty that I don't smile at them more and that sometimes I question if I really want this new life I have and that my milk supply is decreasing. I feel guilty when I eat something that could give them gas or even when they do get gas. Mom guilt sucks.

I'm just excited for things to get better and dare I say, easier? Does it get easier? or more fun?

I need hope here people. Give me hope.

.
.
.
.
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dang they're cute though

Home

(charleston on top with his face a little hidden and whitman on the bottom- or right side depending on how you look at the picture)


We are home now with the boys. We brought them home 4 days ago. Its been an...interesting week. And by interesting I mean difficult. Don't get me wrong - I love them. Oh man do I love them. But feeding two babies around the clock is T-I-R-I-N-G. I am so deliriously tired that I find myself in the middle of the night suckling pillows and with pieces of the breast pump still in my hands.
And for those of you, like myself, who had no understanding what it meant when people talk about how tired you are when you bring home new babies, let me explain the schedule a bit so you get a better picture (something I would've appreciated people explaining rather than just snidely remarking how tired I would be all the freaking time).
Every three hours these guys eat. The rule is "one up, both up" so that they are on the same schedule. These means that I'm either tandem breastfeeding them (yeah I'm bad a** like that) or feeding one on the breast and one with a bottle or for the really early morning feeds (like 4am or so) feeding both on a bottle.
SO
Lets say they wake around 3:30am. At 3:30am we feed them both bottles because I've discovered this week that I'm too uncoordinated and impatient to tandem breastfeed at this hour. My husband gets up and warms up the breast-milk that I've pumped into bottles. Doug will mix it with some neo-sure, which is basically baby weight gainer since these guys are just now at 5lbs each, and then we get all set up to feed them (burp cloths, boppy pillow, etc). While he is doing that, I get the babies out and get them calm. If they cry very long then they use all their energy crying and not feeding and feeding them and having them gain weight is our number 1 priority right now (besides keeping them alive and healthy and all that).
It takes about an hour to feed, burp, and change diapers if we are really on it and the boys actually eat pretty well. Sometimes they take FOREVER to eat and will often just suck on the bottle or breast and spit out the milk, which at 3:30am is really aggravating.
Then after they eat and burp and get changed we lay them down. We then clean the bottles, throw away the diapers, and I pump breast milk. Either me or my husband then need to clean the pump stuff. By the time this is all done its another 30 min or so since they've been laying down. This means that we have 1.5 hrs before they are ready to eat again.
SEE its not every 3 hours from the time they stopped eating, its every three hours since they BEGAN eating.
And this is if we are really rockin. Sometimes it takes longer. SO this means that we generally get about 1 - 1.5 hrs of sleep in random chunks throughout the day/night.
Throw in a need to bathe them and do developmental excercises and our need to eat and pay bills and get Christmas stuff done, etc, and you can see why life is a bit exhausting right now.
BUT
they're home. :) I sure love having them home. They are such good babies. They are already on a great schedule. They are easy to calm. They are so dang cute and they even smile periodically. Its great.

See - I'm even smiling




These are crappy phone pics but sometime soon we'll take some high quality photos and I'll include some photos of their nursery and I think I'll even be brave and post a picture next week of me at 6 weeks post babies. I think its helpful for moms to see what someone looks like 6 weeks after having twins (don't worry - this won't be a "WOW look how awesome I look photo").

Anyway, we were told at the hospital that the first two weeks would be the hardest, as we struggled to get into a routine and while everyone adjusts to the newness of it all. I'm just hoping that it gets easier by the time I start back to work in January. Eek!

Thanks to all of you for your thoughts and prayers as we struggled through the NICU. We truly felt an outpouring of love during that time and it was SO greatly appreciated.

much love and have a great weekend

The NICU

I've received many inquiring emails since the boys were born about what we're doing these days and why the lack of communication through this blog, especially at a time when there is a lot of information to be had.

I apologize.

But then again, I don't.

Let me explain.

I'd like to explain to everyone what the NICU is like. I personally had NO IDEA what it would be like. I thought the boys would be born a bit early and they'd go to this mysterious acronym place and then come out all clean and smelling nice and ready to come home.

Nay.

So, here is what the NICU is like for those of you who have no idea, like me.

First, a few pictures to frame the conversation -

(above pictures - Whitman on the vent)

(Charleston under the bilirubin lights to help prevent jaundice)

(Whitman wearing the c-pap)

(above - the boys beds, prior to being put in the same bed)

Everyday we go through 4 different sets of security in order

to get to the floor that the boys are on. After getting several wrist bands, heavy locked doors are opened for us to go into the NICU. We immediately put on hand sanitizer and walk past the beds of 6 or so different babies, including Kaydance, who was born at 24 weeks and is a crack baby. We pray for her everyday. There are around 40 - 60 babies in the NICU at any given time.

We approach the bed where our babies are at check all of their monitors before we even speak. We are allowed to touch them to say hello but because of the risk of over stimulation, a serious concern with premies, we only touch them for a moment. We touch them the same way everytime in order to get them familiar with us. If we see that their monitors have alarming numbers (low respiratory rate or oxygen numbers) then we don't touch them at all.

We set down our stuff and Doug goes and places all the milk I've pumped into the refrigerator after having it checked to make sure its adequately labeled. Every 3 hours we do their cares. Their cares consist of checking their temperature, changing their diaper, weighing them, and then trying to feed them. Two times a day I try and breast feed them. The other times they are fed through a tube in their nose. Immediately after the two times a day that I try and breast feed them, we get to do "skin to skin", where we take off our shirts and hold their little bodies against our chest. This helps regulate their temperature and is good for development.

That is, hands down, the best moment of my day.

It usually lasts for 30 minutes.

The boys both have 4 monitors on them at all times as well as a feeding tube in their nose. This makes holding them, moving them, changing them, or doing just about anything difficult. The monitors also beep all the time. Loudly. Many times the monitors are just faulty and the boys wiggle and the monitors just sound off. Sometimes, though, the boys stop breathing or their heart stops for a few seconds and the monitors sound off. You never know which it is so we nervously check them ALL the time.

Because most babies are protected by the womb until they are full term, they don't have to prematurely use or even develop their eyes, or ears, or nose, for example. Our boys don't have that luxury so we must keep things dark and quiet and unscented - very difficult things to do in a hospital and with loud monitors going off all the time. We've become very protective of the boys in this regard, for fear of them becoming over stimulated and not developing appropriately.

In addition to these things are the nurses. NICU nurses are mostly amazing. However, nurses are required to report on me just as much as they report on the boys. If I wear sweats everyday to the NICU, for example, it can be a sign of post partum. Any signs of post partum require that the nurses stay near you and your babies at all times. This means I'm seldom allowed to be around my boys alone because the sheer stress of the NICU usually results in me showing some sort of post partum issue.

Add in lots of crying babies, monitor noises for all of them, nurses and doctors and practitioners and lactation consultants and nicu parental support group people, other nicu parents...

and you can see why the NICU is sorta hellish most days.

However, its the only way we get to see our boys so we are there all day everyday.

And they are doing better. Now they are in the same bed and are actually in the NICU overflow, which is much quieter.

And because people ask - lastly, let me explain what they must do to come home.

Three things

1. breath on their own (check)

2. regulate their temperature (check)

3. take all feedings orally (not check)

The third one takes the longest and is what we are working on now. They currently eat about 1/3 to 1/2 of their feeding orally twice a day. They must take the entire feeding before they can be moved up to 3x a day, then 4x a day, then over 12 hrs of oral feedings, then 24 hrs of oral feedings, and then finally we get to take them home. The connection in their brain telling them to feed orally isn't even made till around 36 weeks (and they are 35 now this week) so the fact that they are breast feeding at all is really great. But still, they tell us to expect to take them home by the end of the year (4-5 weeks from now).

ugh

so thats the NICU and the reason for the radio silence

aren't they cute though?

(below - Whitman)

(below - Charleston)

Pray that they learn to eat so we can bring them home!