My squirmy worm - (almost) wordless wednesday

I decided to dress Connor in leggings and a little jacket-type thing for a change instead of the standard babygrow.

Here he is, having a sleep.

I lifted the blanket to find........................ no leggings. I thought "am I losing my mind? I'm sure I put the leggings on him" although am sleep-deprived so you never know.......

but then I looked closer. Look at the bottom of the pic - he wriggled out of the leggings :)

this pic is for Natalie - I know you love the toes like I do :)

P.S. I actually took these pics to show D when he got home from work but they were too cute not to post :)

6 weeks - part 1 - about pregnancy and the babies

I almost can't believe it's been 6 weeks since the babies were born.

Guess who this is?

Kendra, of course - the only pic I could get of her and such a familiar sight :)

And this is Connor

things I'm still missing about being pregnant

• my glowing skin :) seriously, I've had to moisturise like crazy to even get my skin to look half-normal


• my thick hair - I went to the hairdresser to have the grey coloured and it didn't take!!! So I'll try again in a week or two. Apparently my hormones are still going haywire.............


• The Bump. I still have 2kg to lose to get back to my pre-pregnancy weight. Started wearing non-preggy jeans a few days ago. Stretch jeans, but still, it didn't look too hideous.


• eating on demand - I am back to my bad habits of eating breakfast at lunch time and eating rubbish like chocolates and chips (crisps). I think I had an orange two days ago for the first time since I had the babies, and before they were born, I was having two a day plus an assortment of other fruits.


• email chats with my pregnant friends!!! Yes, you, you and you :)

things I don't miss

• getting up in the night to pee


• pubic bone pain when I'd roll around from side to side in bed


• pressure under the bump when walking


• people looking at me in horror when I'd say "still 6 weeks to go" or whatever

and now the babies...

• The first nappy (diaper) I ever changed in my life was Kendra's and then Connor's. Since then, I feel like I've changed millions. On the bright side, I am now a pro. I think nothing of grabbing the baby and lifting its bum to sniff if there's a poo.
• Connor has tried his best to aim his pee at me but I'm too fast for him :) He nearly got me today but my super fast reflexes beat him to it. That's a joke - I have the worst reflexes ever but it got better in pregnancy as I'd catch things to prevent myself having to actually bend over and pick them up. Maybe that stayed?
• Another thing I am a pro at is the bottle thing. I (kind of) joked with D and said my life consists of bottles, babygrows and babies (maybe I should start a new blog?). I wash, sterilise and make 16 bottles a day, sometimes more, because when Kendra cries, I give her a bottle whether it's her time to feed or not. We checked with the paediatrician to see if you can overfeed a baby and she said no, the baby will vomit what she doesn't want/ need. I've discovered I'm a bit of a control freak (no!) about the bottles - I think it's because I studied microbiology so I'm super-fussy about germs. Well...that's my excuse.

More on the laundry, emotions, sleep, etc. in a day or two.......... tell me in the comments if there's anything specific you want to know about and I'll include it in my next post.

The night nanny

K - cute toes after her bath

Well, the night nurse worked out beautifully.

I mentioned the money issue in my last post about sleep and I must say it got a lot worse before it got better.

Since Kendra wants to be held all the time, I decided to buy a sling so I phoned (just for you Mandy P :)) the lady who'd come to demonstrate her slings at our antenatal classes to order one. She was coming to the hospital to do the demonstration so we arranged to meet there.

Since I was there anyway, I decided to pop into the NICU to chat to the nurses who do night nursing. Long story short, they charge much more than the R250 I'd been expecting (R384) and was therefore totally out of our budget.

Very disappointed since I really liked these ladies and they know Connor and Kendra from their NICU days.

A friend then sent me another agency's details who place night nannies/ nurses and their rates were R250 per night so I emailed her too.

I also had a bright idea. So I texted my nanny starting on 1 Sept to see if she'd be willing to do some night nannying for us this month. And after some negotiations around price (R200), she agreed.

She arrived on time (actually a bit earlier), I showed her everything I needed to and left her to it. I was concerned that she wouldn't remember everything or that one of them would act up (K) and cause her to be flustered but she was very relaxed.

If you're paying for sleep, then you need to sleep. (earlier on Thursday, our paed said to me that I probably wouldn't be able to relax properly this time - I said "you don't know me - I love my sleep")

So I slept for 9 solid hours, totally uninterrupted by baby cries, worry, etc.

The next day was amazing - I felt myself again. D and my mother were also cheerful because we were all caught up on sleep. D slept 8 hours because he had to get up to go to work and my mother slept 10 hours.

The two of them were all "you're wasting your money" before but yesterday had totally changed their minds :) and came up with all these suggestions - "can't she work one or two nights when she starts in Sept?" etc, etc.

Finally they could see the value of sleep.

And I woke to two sleeping babies and a clean kitchen!

So we will see - she'll work a night for me every week until her actual start date of 1 Sept. I don't think she'll be able to continue after that but I will discuss with her because it's easier for me to cope on my own during the days than endure the sleep deprivation.

D's idea is that we negotiate instead of the 5 days we'd decided on, she does 2 days and 2 nights, so there's no difference in salary for her but we benefit at night, at least for the first month or two.

And now we look forward to our next full night of sleep - probably Monday or Tuesday night.

I'm so grateful to live in South Africa where help is very affordable - I don't know how you US gals do it all alone, I really don't know!

sleep

I'm so excited I can barely stand it.

We've got a night nanny coming tonight so we can sleep :)

Will update you tomorrow.


P.S. Kendra now weighs 2.23 kg.

35 week belly shot aka the reverse belly

I gained 10,9 kg (multiply by 2.2 for pounds) during my pregnancy.

A week later I’d already lost 6,3 of the 10,9 kg I gained during the pregnancy. Other people would be happy but it made me very sad – I cried and cried on the first Sat when I saw that over 5kg had already gone – because I loved being pregnant and it all happened so suddenly.

To date, I only have 2,1kg to go to get to my pre-preg weight.

Here are some reverse belly pics in the same format we took the preggy belly pics. These were taken nearly two weeks ago.

together at last

He looks three times her size but is actually only about 0.5 kg heavier.


plan B with sleeping arrangements - a camp cot. D assembled it, put the babies in andthen called me to see.

Well, I burst out crying.

Tears of happiness for a change.

This long, 4 1/2 year journey has led to this - finally!

Who needs sleep anyway?

It seems I really do!

When Kendra was still in the NICU and we only had Connor at home, it was a MILLION times easier.

D and I had our system - I did the 11pm and 2am feeds and he did the 5am and 8am feeds. No problem.

I could even cope with him alone when D went to work.

Connor is such an easy baby - we change him first (as they do in NICU) and then feed him and put him back in his bed.

Even when he's still awake, he lies there watching with his big eyes and then eventually nods off.

But no crying.

We were so paranoid about feeding him every 3 hours that we'd even wake him to feed at the scheduled times. And it goes against my very grain to wake a sleeping baby :)

Now that we know he's growing beautifully, and we know the formula (150ml per kg of baby, divide by no. of feeds per day), we're a lot more flexible. But I digress!

If he wakes before we do, he makes these little grunts for about 5 minutes and then if still no response, he starts fussing a bit more and then lets out a proper scream after that.

Kendra is another kettle of fish altogether.

She starts SCREAMING from the get go. No warning. 0 - 100 in 0.1 seconds.

Then we change and feed (we've actually started feeding first to calm her down) and have to wait until she's sleeping soundly before putting her down. If she's even the slightest bit awake she starts the SCREAMING again.

Now here's the thing.

She was absolutely inconsolable on Monday night. Here we were picturing another Connor and rosy feeding times and along came Kendra.

Would not settle - was clean and dry, fed, burped but nothing.

A HORRIBLE night.

Tuesday was a bit better - just a bit.

Wednesday more or less a repeat of Monday. Then D said something rude to me, I started crying and we were fighting. This all in the early hours of the morning which incidentally was my 35th birthday. Was emotional anyway because the twins' goal due date was Wed (36 weeks)

So I had a terrible start to my momentous birthday. It got better though at the paed appt because everything was perfect with Connor and of course, he was a nice, big boy at 2,57kg.

Afterwards we went to visit the NICU and told our sad story to the nurse there. She suggested that it may be colic? I'm not sure but I don't think so because she's 10 times better during the day.

D apologised for being rude and sarcastic (said it's lack of sleep).... we then went out for a nice bookshop jaunt (that's our nerdy thing to do) and then an early supper while we left the grandmothers babysitting.

That evening my mother (who's staying with us) offered to keep Kendra the entire evening. I couldn't say YES fast enough. I am a bad mother but I need my sleep and I don't mind the getting up (okay, that's a lie, I do :)) but I do mind the unnecessary SCREAMING. And she wakes her brother who then can't seem to settle. Already he gives me these looks like "who on EARTH is that loud girl?" Poor thing.

So my dreams these days don't include travels to exotic new destinations as they did before but a night nurse.

I have already asked God to show me HOW I can make an extra R5000 a month for a night nurse. He did it before with the IVF money so I know we can do it again. Already found R1000 in the budget for one evening a week, R4000 to go!

Any tips on getting Kendra to settle and settle quickly?

Breast vs Bottle - part 2

he loves sleeping like this and I just melt at the sight of the cheeks and his cute little mouth

Remember the post about the breastfeeding?


I realised that I need to do an update, so here goes...


I'd been carrying on, pumping away day after day, and taking the Espiride. After I did that post about not feeling myself, I halved the dose (only took the morning pill) which seemed to work much better for me. I could feel things again and yet it just took off the hormonal edge :)


The pills seemed to help a bit because I started getting 20ml, then 40 ml and then a grand total of around 60ml breast milk daily.


I know - big WOW :)


I took my offerings to the NICU daily - the one nurse was so awesome. She'd dutifully divide the milk between the two babies and then top up their feed with formula. And best of all, act like it was actually SOMETHING when I felt so stupid bringing in such a little milk.


I love empathetic people.


Then Connor came home. No difference to the pumping but I did feel like since he was well enough to be home, all the milk (ha!) should go to Kendra.


So that's what I did.


The following week we started getting an indication that Kendra was getting well enough to come home (temp regulating, etc.).


This also coincided with me reading an article on breastfeeding in a magazine.


The article said something about the first hours and the first week being crucial. And even if you don't have your baby with you immediately, to start as soon as you were together.



First I got cross (with the hospital staff for not telling me the proper story) and then I felt depressed because I take responsibility for not researching enough to be informed.


Oh dear, does this emotional roller coaster ever end? I'm so not used to being up and down.


That Thursday night I texted a couple of my friends to get the number of a lactation consultant. Well, all 3 of them gave me the same lady's name. And in the article, she was quoted as a reference too.


My one friend (who currently is breastfeeding her twin girls and doing a fantastic job - the only one I know with twins who is b.feeding, by the way) texted me two days later to check what the lady said and I was embarrassed to tell her that I still hadn't contacted her.


I continued to procrastinate until Sunday night. I'm not normally a procrastinator and wondered why I was doing it with this issue. I think it's because I hate failing at anything (um, infertility!) and also, I didn't know if she would be harsh with me because I didn't want to cry some more (up and down emotions).


But then again...I also wanted closure one way or the other. So I phoned.


I left a message for the lady and she called back within 30 minutes and was FABULOUS. Objective, very clear but also didn't beat me up for not contacting her sooner.


Asked me loads and loads of questions to get all the details.... twins born at 32 weeks, in NICU, one out, the other will be out in the next 24 hours, pumping not really working, blah blah blah.

Eventually she said that from the time of the birth, I should have been told to pump every 3 hours, day AND night, whether the babies were in ICU or not. That would have stimulated my milk supply sufficiently.

Well, the bottom line was this - I could still do it but it would be a long, uphill battle, virtually impossible. For starters, I'd have to hire a double breast pump because my Phillips Avent would really only do the trick if my milk supply was adequate to start off with, and then pump 3-hourly, around the clock.

Now that plus taking care of twins = setting myself up for failure

And what a relief knowing that was. She said to me "your babies will be fine with formula" and "there's no point in looking back now" - all very true.



I'd decided to continue until a few days after Kendra was home (up to the Friday to make it a full 4 weeks of pumping - I like round numbers!) but the homecoming day (Monday) was SO hectic, I only realised at 9pm that I still needed to pump.


And thought "stuff this" - I actually don't have the energy.


So that is that.



My babies are being formula-fed and from the looks of it, they seem fine. Look at his nice, fat cheeks.



Connor went for a check-up on Thursday and now weighs 2,57kg (multiply by 2,2 for pounds) and is perfectly healthy.


And the best thing is, his mother's feeling emotionally strong!


Things I am learning on this journey

• not to compare myself to others, especially my friend C with her twin girls
• everybody's body is different
• everybody's parenting journey is different

Kendra's homecoming pics

Last week we knew Kendra was about ready to come home because they'd moved her to a bassinet (which means she was regulating her temperature) and she was feeding from the bottle on almost all the feeds.

She still had the feeding tube though.

So when the feeding tube came out she would have needed to finish her complete feeds from the bottle for an entire day.

I got a call from the paed on Friday telling me her haemoglobin levels were a bit low and they wanted to do a blood transfusion if that was okay with us (of course it's okay). They went ahead and everything was well so she was "nice and pink" again on Saturday.

Then came the snotty nose.

She'd needed to be suctioned (gross!) before each feed because her nostrils were so blocked and we had atrocious weather in Jhb on the weekend so they wanted to keep her in until her nose was better.

That happened to be Monday and is when she was finally discharged.

we'd just arrived home

displaying some awesome lung capacity - my word, this girl can SCREAM!

Connor and I just behold the vision of the screaming baby in wonder because Connor is SOOO chilled. I'm not a screamer either but I don't keep quiet if I'm unhappy.

Maybe this is the baby version of being assertive?!

In case you've been wondering...

Kendra's home.

She was discharged from the NICU yesterday after 27 days - yesss! less than a month.

Life is HECTIC - I will be brutally honest if people want to ask questions :) - I have found myself falling asleep twice during the day and this morning fell asleep while burping Connor.

I am coping okay for now but dread to see what will happen when D goes back to work.........

more later - the boy needs changing and feeding :)

Kendra update

Just had a call from the paediatrician.

Her haemoglobin levels are a bit low (7.something and should be more than 10) so they're going to do a blood transfusion which will fix it.

And then...............

SHE CAN COME HOME THIS WEEKEND!

I'm happy but will we cope???

Thank goodness my mother's arriving tomorrow for 4 whole weeks!

P.S. The pics were taken on Wednesday evening.

P.P.S. Last night, every 3 hours when we changed Connor, he'd peed through EVERYTHING - vest, leggings, babygrow (onesie), receiving blanket. How can a boy that small make such a lot of pee?!

...and then a bad NICU visit

We've been in the NICU twice now when things got a bit hectic.

Not with one of our babies, but drama with one of the other babies.

The one incident happened the night after the good NICU visit, on a Monday evening.

One minute we were all relaxed, loving on the babies and the next minute an incubator was wheeled in with a baby.



Picture the TV show, ER - machines beeping, paediatrician and 4 nurses working on that baby all talking medical stuff, SCARY!

Then of course you can't just get a nurse to give your baby back and get the hell out of there because they're all busy.

SO we're pretending all is normal - la la la la - meanwhile it's all going crazy. V stressful.

By the way, I learned a few days later (from my obgyn's receptionist) that that baby only made it until the next morning. Very very sad!

I keep remembering Dr G (my infertility doctor) saying to me "our goal is a live, take-home baby". At the time I thought he was being overly dramatic (how hard could it be once you were pregnant? Ha!) but now I see exactly what he meant.

That is the first type of bad visit.

The second is a combination or one of:

• nurses being sarcastic about how we're late/ don't visit enough, etc. Normally I would assert myself and tell them exactly what's what. Now however, I shut up and change the subject because I know it's crazy (they're professionals and all that) but I don't want to take the chance that if they don't like me, they'll take it out on my babies and not care for them properly.
  
• the babies looking especially fragile. While I'm there, I just keep focussing on the vision God gave me about 6 years ago of my two teenagers - a girl and a boy. At the time I just assumed they were two years apart, but when I was pregnant, I realised it was these two. C is a bit bigger than K as well as being a boy so it was them I saw! Of course the minute I walk out of the ICU, I cry!
• being hormonal
  

A good NICU visit

C who now looks very different

D & K

Their isolettes with teddies on the top

Holding C

Well, look what I found in my drafts :) I wrote this on our first Sunday (I was discharged on Friday 10th) of us being parents.

We had the BEST visit with the babies this afternoon. I held Connor and D held Kendra while they fed and then the nurses let us hold them for the rest of the hour. It was soooo good just holding those little bodies (in their blankets). I didn't want to let him go...kept whispering to him to grow quickly so he could come home.

I am in love - they are the sweetest kids ever. He's always been so active but he calmed right down when I was holding him almost like "aaah, this is where I belong" - I know I felt that way.

They do the sweetest things with their cute little mouths when they're done eating - they purse their lips and it's like they're saying "okay, that's enough now, I am DONE!"

here's the mouth

I said to D, "this is going to be interesting for you - not just me being stubborn but these two too!"

I didn't cry today!!!! Miracle!

Tomorrow I'll blog the bad one...

We're a man down

Connor, doing his traffic cop impression :)

We’re a man down in our house. D woke up sick yesterday (oh my word, feels like days ago!) so I did the 2am and 5am feeds this morning and I am shot to hell.

Previously he did these two feeds as I do not get up easily. It's easier for me to stay up (which I may just do tonight until 2am...........) than get up.

This morning poor Connor had to SCREAM to get me up (slept through my alarm) and he is not a screamer so I dread to think how long he was awake before he managed to rouse me.

I banished D to the guest bedroom so he wouldn't breathe his germs all over C and also bought surgical masks for him to wear while changing and feeding him. I'm not taking chances and having C back in that NICU.

Needless to say, I was totally out of it today and as a result, a bit weepy*. I only woke at 11:15 (D did 8am and 11am feeds), decided I needed a day just for me so only went to see Kendra now at 8pm because I couldn’t handle snide comments from the day nurses (about how mummy is late to see her baby, etc, etc).

Hopefully tonight will be better – I’m doing 11pm and 2am – D will do 5am and I’ll do 8am again.

*I thought I was over the "grieving for my pregnancy" thing - not so! A friend sent me pics of her maternity photo shoot and that made me cry again!

What's in a name?

People have asked me how we decided on the baby names, if we chose names based on their meanings or how we did it.

Um, no.

We first decide on the name, and then check to make sure it doesn't mean something really weird or go against our beliefs.

The amazing thing is D and I actually agreed immediately on the names. A minor miracle in itself.

We normally like very different sort of names. I like weird names like Saskia and Tatiana, and he likes very English names like Rebecca (but that just doesn’t seem like names MY kids would have).

We both loved Luke until I got pregnant and said to D one day, “this child is not a Luke. He’s way too active and Luke feels like a gentler sort of boy” :) so that name was scrapped from our mental list.

When we said Connor, we both liked it. But ... I like all things Irish and wanted to spell it Conor, like the Irish do. But we live in South Africa, not Ireland, so he'd have to spell it out for people every time they asked him his name.

I had enough of that when I was growing up so did not want it for my kids too.

Also Conor means strong-willed which I do not have a problem with, since I'm also strong-willed , but Scottish Connor means brilliant, so we settled on that spelling.

As for Kendra, I love love love names starting with a K for girls. We liked a couple of others too like Kyra but eventually Kendra was the one we liked; it is Celtic and means greatest champion.

I recently "met" a Kendra through another blog. I loved her "about me" profile. Go read :)

So there you go.

Oh by the way, Connor was discharged on Thursday. Story to follow. We are doing well - 2nd night better than 1st :)

It's official - I'm a mother!

Last Monday I received the first bill from the radiographer for one of the babies' x-rays.

It's the first time ever I got excited about a bill because it said "Baby _________"

Then we registered the babies on our medical aid and received an emailed letter with confirmation of all the details, and it had their names on with the dates of birth - too cute!

Miss Kendra ________
and Mr Connor ________

Some other non-official instances...

on Friday the gate people came to the house because the gate motor’s not working (so many expenses – I don’t want to think about it) and I said to the guy to please come back and fix it quickly (in Jhb we are BIG on security!) because “our babies are in ICU and we visit them at night, and it’s not safe having the gate on manual”.

It just felt so right saying “our babies”.

There's another baby in the ICU who's been there a day longer than our two so we're friendly with her mum.

The other day we left together and I walked her over to maternity on my way out.

She then says to her mother (who was on a couch waiting for her - only the parents are allowed to go into ICU), "this is the twins' mother".

I smiled because I realised, "that's right! I'm a MOTHER. A mother of TWINS"

Just think - a year ago, I felt hopeless and I wasn't even sure that this would ever be me.

I'm so, so privileged to finally be a mother and I praise God every day for my tiny little miracles.

Breast vs bottle

I want to write so much but I don't quite know where to start because the noise in my head is loud!

Okay, some background.

I'm very goal-oriented but have never been hung up about the how to get there. If one way doesn't yield results, I'm very happy to try another and another until I get to my goal.

E.g. we wanted to have a baby, it wasn't working out the way it works for 90% of the population, so we went the IVF route.

Tried one protocol - chemical pregnancy.

Tried another - TWINS.

No problems because the outcome is the same - there's a baby.

So too with the feeding.

Our goal is to grow them big and strong; I'm again not real hung up about the how we get there.

Plan A is breastfeeding. Plan B is feeding breast milk by bottle. Plan C is formula.

As you know the babies were early at 32 weeks. I was still dealing with the pregnancy loss and didn't even THINK about breastfeeding and whatnot, until people started asking me the same questions all the time.

1. Are you planning to breastfeed?
2. Do you have milk?
3. Can you actually breastfeed preemies?

I have a confession. I deleted about 5 text messages with well-meaning questions because I was just so emotionally drained.

Eventually on the morning of day 2, I asked my doctor when he did his morning check-up, "when is this milk supposed to appear?" and he said on day 3.

So then what was everybody fussing about?! It's only day 2.

Well, we started "stimulating" the b**bs that day (with the hospital breast pump, 20 mins per side) - not a drop.

Nothing had changed by day 3 - the day I was discharged.

So I sent D to the baby shop to buy a breast pump. R2000 later (divide by 7.5 for US$), I had my Phillips Avent but still not a drop.

On the Saturday there were a few drops and then they went rock hard and ginormous on the Sunday (day 5). My pregnant belly was the 8th wonder of the world; these were the 9th!

I chatted to the nurses on Sunday afternoon - they felt my pump might be too weak! So phoned a lactation consultant who phoned me back the next day.

Monday 13th
Lactation consultant phoned back. There's no point in her seeing me now before the babies are out but "you need to get that milk out". Try warm compresses and cabbage leaves.

Since we don't eat cabbages, tried the warm compresses and hot showers - nothing but drops.

Tuesday 14th
Sent my friend a text message and asked her if she had cabbage. She didn't but was at the shops so she bought me one. Well, it's winter here and those cabbage leaves were ICE cold but they seemed to do the trick as my breasts were softening and now I was getting a tablespoon of liquid. I'd put a cabbage leaf and then use a piece of kitchen towel over that and then pull down my bra. And you said I wasn't a fashionista :)

Tues pm
Went to maternity to use their breast pump to see if there was any difference. None so it's not the breast pump; it is, in fact, my defective body!

Same story Wed and Thurs and Friday - only about a tablespoon of milk

On Friday night, my husband says, "don’t you want to stop? it looks like it is such a lot of work for so little reward".

I said, "well first of all, R2000!!!! And secondly, today’s just a week."

It takes about an hour to get maybe 2 tablespoons of liquid and you can do nothing because you have to hold that pump in exactly the right position, not one degree off. It only does one b**b at a time.

So I saw the doctor and asked what he could give me for the milk.

He gave me a prescription for Es.piride which is a generic of Eg.lynol.

I thought it was for lactation first and then secondly, an anti-depressant. However, I see it's first an AD and then has the side effect of helping along the lactating.

Okayyyyy then....

I've never been on AD's and really, I don't need it but I'm staying on for a couple of weeks just to persist with this milk thing.

So is this what ADs feel like? (this is day 5 on Esp.iride)

I'm a bit numb – I don’t feel myself – way too calm and dispassionate, like there's a filter between me and my emotions. I’m usually quite passionate and feel really strongly about things. But I'm not a moody person and I'm generally (80% of the time) very optimistic, the other 20% realistic.

I don’t feel depressed – yes I do cry, but it feels normal to me because it’s less than an hour a day, on the days when it does happen, so I feel it is unnecessary but am doing my bit for the team by staying on the meds for a bit!

On Sunday I was allowed to undo Kendra's foot monitor and take her to D to hold so the twins could have their first pic together. Normally I'd be so excited and in my head I am. It's just that I can't really feel that excitement, you know?

A work friend actually said to me on Saturday “you’re way too calm for someone with two babies in the ICU” and I feel exactly that.

On the bright side, no more crying! But how weird – I prefer the crying!!!

Like I said to the girls at the IF support group last night, I am WELL aware that my body's defective and have made my peace with that long ago. What bugs me is people's expectations. and I am battling with this – my body’s failed in so many other ways – at least I carried the twins okay and they are healthy! – because this b/feeding business is not endearing itself to me at all.

Although I am now armed with some knowledge - that it can take up to 3 weeks, even longer. That I need to give this medication a chance to regulate within my body, at least 10 days. I was ready to stop the Esp.iride after a week because I feel too weird.

Am I making too big a deal about this? Is it me wanting to be in control of my emotions?

Any tips on the breast/ bottle thing? And on the AD's?

Baby goals

People have asked me when the babies can come home from the hospital.

Well, they've set them some baby goals.

For anyone who knows me in real life, this is really funny because I teach goal-setting :) I even have products and I do workshops on how to set and achieve your goals. Very funny that my little babies already have goals and they're only 12 days old today.

So, the babies' goals are that they must breathe on their own (K has had no breathing problems since birth; C was on the ventilator for 2 days), they have to weigh 2kg or more (not yet) and must be sucking properly all the time.

The babies can both suck; Connor does this better than Kendra but they were losing too much weight with all the bottle feeds (apparently it takes a lot of energy when you're that little) so they've taken K off bottles entirely and put her on tube feeds so she doesn't use up too much energy. C has half his feeds by bottle and half via the tube.

feeding Connor

Kendra with the tube

As for the weights, the hospital only weighs them every Mon, Wed and Friday (very frustrating for me as I'd like to see daily what they weigh).

As at Friday, K is 1.5 and C is 1.78 kg (remember to multiply by 2.2 for pounds). They're not quite up to their birth weights yet and I can't WAIT for tomorrow as I'm sure they'll have reached those tomorrow.


How are you guys doing?

My last preggy pics - 31 weeks 2 days

Now you know why my babies couldn't/ wouldn't wait inside for another 4 weeks :)

If you're visiting from Wordless Wednesday, the babies were born at 32 weeks - click on the blog name at the top to catch up.

So what was the C-section really like?

A couple of you have emailed me to ask me how horrible the C-section was and also what the recovery's been like.


Okay, last year when I had the laparotomy, my doctor told me that when I got pregnant (still love that!) I'd have to have a Caesar as the chance of my uterus rupturing was great because I'd had so many ops in so short a time.

No problem with me. After all, in my opinion, the point was to have a baby, not really how that baby got here.

And I actually really like to be knocked out.

With the first laparotomy, both the gynae and the anaethetist wanted to do a spinal block "you won't feel a thing; but you'll hear everything".

Um, definitely no thanks! I wanted to be completely out of it.

So if I'd had the choice, I'd have preferred to be completely out and wake up to my twins.

Well, that's not how they do things.

As I mentioned in the birth story, much to my surprise, I actually just felt a little prick (not painful even for needle-phobic me) when they put the needle in my back. The worst part was bending over my gigantic belly and keeping still.

Then my legs started going numb. Feels like pins and needles.

They then put up the curtain and put in the catheter.

Then since I couldn't see what they're doing, I didn't really concern myself - I just held D's hand.

I didn't feel any tugging but I did feel the bed move - guess that would imply they were tugging. Incidentally, I had a good look at my scar and I see bruising above and below the cut. Must be from pressure of his hand while he took the babies out. Thank God I couldn't see or feel a thing.

Then the babies were born.

Afterwards I felt NOTHING - they transported me to my actual bed - a couple of people each took the sheet corners and hauled me onto my bed, covered me and wheeled me back to recovery and then to the ward.

I felt no pain, just was very sleepy.

D does his hands exactly like this when he sleeps, and now, so does Connor.

Well, you're going to hate me for saying this but...

I’ve always had excellent recoveries from my 4 prior abdominal surgeries (2 laparoscopies and 2 laparotomies) and I apparently have a high pain threshold… so I hardly needed any painkillers.

I was on a drip so I'm sure there was something in there.... but the drip was out by 3pm that afternoon and so was my catheter.

I'm a bit of a stroppy patient (I know, you'd never guess!) so I told the nurse to go ask the doctor when the soonest was that the catheter could come out. She said 12 hours so at exactly 3pm out it came. And with it the drip (IV).

I had none of the suppositories for pain while hospitalised and I think 3 of the 5 sets of tablets. So was sent home with the 5 pain suppositories and 2 sets of tablets.

The other girls who had their Caesars later that day were getting things in their drips (IVs) (I believe I heard something like Pethidene mentioned) every 6 hours in addition to the suppositories and pain tablets (Synap Forte).

I'm not telling you that to brag, but to give you a broad picture of other normal people.

Now, mobility.

Obviously, once that catheter was removed, it was great because I could get to the bathroom and move around a bit more.

Initially, there was some pain when having a pee but that went away after about the 3rd or 4th time.

We were all given another type of suppository so we could have a poo (sorry, tmi) because this hospital doesn't discharge you until you've done both! It wasn't painful but as you know, I suffer with constipation anyway, so I'm always nervous in case something happens, like stitches coming loose, etc. After that suppository it took me another 5 days to go naturally :)

The mobility? Well, it was difficult getting into a sitting position from sleeping, or getting up from the bed from sitting but once up, I moved easily.

I will say this - I have noticed in the past that if I've been exercising and am fit, I recover much quicker. I even postponed my laparotomy by a month last year so I could go to gym and get fit, because I knew the drill and I prefer a shorter recovery time (am NOT a good patient).

I felt a MILLION times better on Sunday (5 days after surgery) and have been really good since, but if I overdo it, I feel sore by around 6pm.

Now, the shrinking belly - taken on Sunday, 5 days afterward

It would definitely have been more difficult if I’d had to take care of the babies. But then D would have been home on paternity leave hauling them to me in bed :)

I had my stitches out today. Much, much better than the last time. I felt a bit of tugging when he was cutting at the actual stitching but then not much when doing the actual removal.

Wasn't even on that table for 5 minutes :)

Let me know if there are any questions. Don't be shy - as you can see, I'm not!

This is my favourite pic of Kendra so far - "will you two PLEASE stop taking pics?"

Expectations, perspective and lots of crying

K's favourite position, with her bum in the air

Mandy asked in the comments if I was home yet.

Yes, I am. In South Africa, they keep you in the hospital for 3 nights after a C-section so I was discharged on Friday.


I'm still dealing with some noise in my head because of the suddenness of the babies' arrival.

The first thing I thought after my waters broke was "I'm only 32 weeks; this can't be happening to me". I expected to maybe be a week early at 35 weeks, but not 32 weeks!

The craziest things kept going through my head that morning, like...

• My hair's a mess (because I was going to have my hair coloured, washed and blow dried that afternoon)
• I'll have to cancel the pregnancy photography shoot (scheduled for 18th)
• I'll have to cancel our birthday party (D & I have just 10 days between the two birthdays. Normally we do a party on the weekend between the two; this year I'd brought forward the date by two weeks, just in case!)
  
• I still haven't even reached 70 kg (that morning I was still 69.9kg) and
  
• I'm only 32 weeks (over and over and over)
  

Of course this all paled into insignificance once they were born and once the paediatrician told us that blue Kendra was now a healthy pink Kendra :) and I was fine the rest of the day until I woke up on the Wednesday.

I was sharing a general ward with two other ladies who both had scheduled C-sections at 38 weeks, normal babies, etc, etc. The kind of people we infertiles love to hate :)

Well, these two were chatting away about really normal baby stuff - breastfeeding, etc, etc, and it suddenly hit me that MY babies should also be with me.

Why am I going through this all again? Have I not suffered enough? - you know the drill!

And then I started crying in earnest. Quiet but serious crying.

Then an amazing thing started happening. God always looks out for me like this.

I got text messages from 3 of my friends saying things like, "I remember day 2 being really hard for me. Just want to let you know I'm here for you" and similar.

Which of course makes you cry more :)

After a few hours I felt fine again, especially after D came to see me with the laptop!!!

Thursday was a good day and then I was discharged on Friday.

It's very, very weird to leave the hospital without your babies when you'd arrived pregnant a few days earlier.

The thing is on the Thursday evening a lady had had a natural birth but her child was stillborn. Terrible! But put things back in perspective for me because I was grateful that at least my babies were alive in there.

Thursday night - the first time I got to hold one of them. See, a good day.

Also, that Friday morning a new baby arrived in NICU. A nice, big baby at 38 weeks (3.4kg) but he had lung problems which again reminded me that I should be grateful that there is NOTHING wrong with my babies except they're small.

Anyway, had just got home when a friend phoned me and told me she's a bit jealous that I got to experience things with this birth that she never experienced nor would in the future.

She's had two babies and both times the deliveries were sudden, emergency Caesars due to high blood pressure. The doctor has now said no more babies as it's too dangerous for her health.

Honestly, I never even thought about that. But she's right. At least I got to feel what it was like having my waters break, I got to feel contractions all the way up to being 6cm dilated and then I got to experience the Caesar.

I love having friends who challenge you.

Yes, it was not my plan but those experiences have now made my life richer.

I have to keep saying that to myself because yesterday morning, I weighed myself and I've lost 5.1 of the 10.9 kg I gained. Multiply by 2.2 for pounds.

Other people would be happy but I cried and cried!

I also realised that I wasn't starving like I usually am (it really was the babies making me eat ALL the time) in the mornings, so MORE crying.

My eyes were swollen and red - it was terrible.

• I miss my preggy belly.
• I miss my babies' movements.
• I miss the on-demand pregnancy eating.
• I miss my glow :)

Today, no crying yet. So far, so good!

My hand on K

D's hand on C

At 31 weeks, I was wearing my husband's pants

Who knew this would be my last "official" weekly belly shot?!

Baby updates from the NICU

Kendra under the blue lights - bilirubin (?) levels were a bit high

We are excited that the babies are progressing well but we want them home, obviously.

They are both breathing on their own (thank God) and are now in the growing phase, as the paediatrician calls it.

Same personalities as when in utero – Kendra is still very sleepy and lazy to eat, while Connor is super active, so much so that he keeps setting off his monitors because his little feet move too much, the band falls off and the machine can’t record that he’s still okay.

D changing Connor's nappy

As for me, I'm up and down. Had a bit of a cry this morning because I went to the loo and realised that I wasn't starving like I usually am. Then I realised it's because I'm no longer pregnant!!!

I'll write more about the feelings side of things in a day or two. For now, I need some rest so need to get to bed!

So, the birth story

Thanks first of all for all the great comments on my last post - it means a lot to me.

I actually sent my husband a text message to ask him to bring the laptop to the hospital so I could "blog for therapy". And it's worked!

****************************************

No one was more surprised about having the babies early than I was - trust me!

I'd had a really normal Monday. Still working half days and on Mondays I make sure I'm out of there on time (2pm) because I have a coaching client appointment (it is no stress because it's on the phone - I'm sitting and relaxing and simply talking) at home at 3pm.

Anyway, we had a sandwich before we had to leave at 5:30 for our ante-natal class at 6pm. At the class, the midwife told us that one of our couples wouldn't be back because they'd had a stillbirth the previous week. That was a big shock. We were also told that another couple was going into the hospital that night to have their baby the next day.

Since the classes are held at the hospital, when we finished early (for a change), I decided to pop down to maternity to see her. Well, it turned out she wasn't there so we left.

Went home, watched Survivor, ate supper and went to bed.

Normal, normal stuff. No excitement - just straight to bed, read and fell asleep.

Then I had two uncomfortable contractions that woke me so I thought I needed a pee to take the pressure off...

Went to the loo and back to bed.

Turned around to get more comfortable and started falling asleep. I'd become very good at falling to sleep straight away even if I had to get up to pee.

The next thing I had another one of those contractions and suddenly my legs (and the bed) were all wet.

I said something like, "oh my WORD. My waters just broke" and D jumped awake.

We both looked at our watches immediately, not because we're weird but because the antenatal class lady told us we need to know what time it happens and what colour it all is.

Yes, I know - gross!

Anyway, it was exactly 12:00 midnight. The waters were clear with a bit of blood.

After that, I think it hit me that I'm only 32 weeks pregnant and I started panicking.

I literally started shaking - I didn't think this happened in real life but now I know it does because my knees were knocking together and my teeth were chattering so much I couldn't speak.

My poor D was a star as always. He hugged me tight and told me to calm down and relax. Everything was going to be fine, etc, etc.

I didn't want to mess on the bed or carpet in our bedroom so went to sit on the toilet in our en-suite bathroom.

I'm nothing if not practical :)

D paged the doctor who phoned back within minutes and after a few questions, told D to bring me in, with clothes, because "she'll be here for a few days".

Thank goodness we're only minutes away from the hospital. I was petrified - didn't even bother to change. Kept the pajamas top on and put on tracksuit bottoms.

Got there around 12:30 and the same nurse from earlier says to me, "weren't you here earlier this evening?"

I said, "yes, but now i'm here for me. My waters have broken"

Anyway, they got me strapped onto those machines where they can monitor the babies' heartbeats and check contractions.

Then the nurse did an internal (with long nails - horrible horrible!!!!) and went to phone the doctor.

Meanwhile, I'm feeling these contractions and with each one, there's a new gush of water which was freaking me out.

At least I was calm and able to speak again. I think it was because I was at the hospital where there are trained people to deal with any situation!

The nurse arrives back to say they need to give me a steroid shot to mature the babies' lungs and some pills to slow down the contractions.

No problem.

I asked her about the contractions and she says "oh they're mild" but I'm thinking "mild or not, they're frequent!!!" because we'd started timing them and they were 5 minutes apart.

The doctor arrives about 30 minutes later, does another internal and apparently I've now dilated 6cm, which is no surprise to me but made the hospital staff move their butts.

The doctor then tells the nurses to phone the anaethetist and paediatrician on call because I need to be prepped for surgery NOW. Something about being worried about the girl (the one whose sack had ruptured).

Oh my word!!!!

So I get formally admitted and had to complete and sign some forms, get into those gorgeous, backless hospital gowns and into my bed.

Eventually everyone arrives, and a very grumpy anaethetist did the spinal block at 2:30am. I am a BIG baby with needles but honestly, this was no big deal. It really just felt like a tiny prick. It was more painful getting into position with that big bump in the way.

I was worried in case they started cutting before the anaesthetic took effect but I must say I hardly felt a thing. I did feel the bed move a couple of times but no actual tugging feelings.

We had the camera with us but honestly, that was the last thing on my mind - I just wanted D next to me, holding my hand. Which he did brilliantly :)

Then the doctor takes out the girl who was blue and quiet, and then the boy who was pink and started screaming straight away. Just like they were in utero actually.

Later found their APGAR scores were 5 & 8 (for Kendra) and 9 & 10 (for Connor).

The doc asked if we had names and we said yes, and told them to all who were there in theatre (doc, paed, anaethetist, and 4 nurses).

The paediatrician remembered and has been calling them by their names ever since. I love it!

She comes to update me daily (while I'm still here in the hospital) and says things like "Kendra just didn't like how cold it was in theatre because the minute we took her to ICU, she went pink straight away".

So that was it. K was born at 2:50 and C at 2:51.

I was then stitched up and taken back to the room. No drama with nausea, pain, etc.

And just like that, our lives changed. We are now parents of live babies!

My babies are here

The twins made a very unexpected and sudden arrival on Tuesday morning, 7 July. At 31 weeks 6 days by an emergency C-section.

Will tell you the whole birth story at a later date but wanted to at least post an update.

Kendra was born first at 2:50 am weighing a mere 1,590 kg (multiply 2,2 to get the weight in pounds).

Connor was born a minute later weighing 1.850 kg.

Together 3,5 kg of baby (a very healthy size for one baby, but obviously tiny for two of them).

They are both in neo-natal ICU - Kendra can breathe on her own but she is really tiny so needs to fatten up and get to 2kg.

Connor is on a ventilator but is apparently doing well (his blood stats improve every time they test them, which is 6-hourly) and should be off in the next day or so...

Me?

Physically I am totally fine (I recover very quickly from ops) but emotionally I am up and down.

I was fine until this morning and then started the crying thing. I try and block it out that those are MY tiny babies with tubes in them. But it's really difficult because that's not the picture I had in my head...I only go see them when my husband is here so he can give me a pep talk before and after. I'd much prefer to just hear the paediatrician's twice daily update as the verbal message sounds so much better than the visual reality. She is happy with their progress - keeps saying they are fine, just small. In a month's time they'll be perfect.

I don't even know what they look like (properly) because their faces are obscured by all the tubes ...and I haven't held them. I have only touched a hand and leg of each baby.

I am still in the hospital - will be discharged on Friday.

I tell you, this twins thing is not for the faint-hearted.

Finally getting the room ready

I'm soooo glad the baby showers are over because we could actually go get some things we needed, like vests and leggings and more babygrows (onesies).

I also got the baby washing powder (detergent) on the weekend so I could get the clothes clean.

And look what arrived on Friday last week!

Aren't they beautiful?! Those drawers are gigantic - two of them are now full of nappies (diapers) and the other two will store extra linen.

I am beyond thrilled with how these cots turned out. And the best thing is the guys who delivered it also assembled it. So when they came to tell me they were all done, I was greeted by this sight...


We went to buy mattresses, sheets, pillows, duvets, etc. only to find that these are actually large cots, and not standard cots. I didn't specifically ask for large cots and the price was very good... but anyway, it will be a bit of a hassle now finding large everything but at least the babies/ children will be able to use them for a long time as they convert to toddler beds.

I do love functional furniture!

Here is the laundered premature/ tiny baby clothes - girl and boy stuff :)

girl & boy bibs, and then caps/ beanies

This is what it looks like on the shelf

and here are the burp cloths and blankets. The rest of them were in the wash - they're now done but I'm too lazy to take new pics and download.

So next on our list is to return all the standard cot stuff and get the right sizes, and then get those cots made up to look beautiful.

And then we STILL need to go buy the pram. Somehow it's not high on my agenda because if something does happen (shhh, the babies might get ideas) earlier than planned, at least my hubby knows which one to go buy.

I am fussy about the cot stuff (no!) so I need to be doing that myself :)

How are all of you doing?