Back when I was pregnant I occasionally would run into another twin mama. Whenever these mom's found out I was also pregnant with twins they almost always mentioned that I needed to give myself four months before even thinking about life being normal again. I smiled, thanked them for the advice, and went on about my business. When I had these two wonderful people the first few weeks were a total blur. I am so thankful for Nate, my Mom, and Bestamor who took time off work and their vacations to stay with me and help me out during the day. Naps, which had previously been only taken when absolutely necessary, became a daily occurrence. Trying to breastfeed, bottle supplement, and then pump every three hours around the clock became much, much easier when a second set of hands was available to bottle feed one baby and entertain both during pumping sessions. Slowly, the fog of birth lifted. When daily help went home and back to work I felt confident enough that I could at least keep three kids alive by myself, even if everything else (house, grocery shopping, meals, etc) was put on the back burner. Then I found myself having energy to pull out freezer food and put dinner on the table. A few weeks after that I began to figure out how to grocery shop just me and the twins (weego carrier for the win!). Daily life was finding a routine and I was no longer feeling (well, mostly) like I was trying to run in circles catching my own tail. I looked up and realized these babies of mine were four months. And just like that I realized that all these twin mamas were right. Life does start to figure itself out at four months.
That's not to say I don't have my moments. Grocery shopping is still hard as heck with both of them as I have to carry them to have room in the cart for food which means limited movement when picking things up and putting them in the cart (not including the time to get them into the carrier and then back into their car seats). I tend to push off all random errands (post office parcel pickup, dry cleaning drop off as some examples) until the last possible moment when I can squeeze out an errand trip by myself. Dinners are still hit and miss depending on how the babies are doing at 5pm (I need to work on more crockpot meals). There are times when both kiddos will scream bloody murder and I have absolutely no idea what's wrong or how to fix it. Jake is still the more demanding of the two, requiring to be held more to be happy, so I look over at Elizabeth chilling somewhere and feel such overwhelming guilt for not being able to hold her like I hold him. Free moments are pretty nonexistent and the stack of unread magazines keeps growing higher and higher with not a single one being taken off the pile. But then I look at the precious smiles they give me and the wonderful sounds they make and I realize that they are totally worth the really, really hard days (and nights) and I'm enjoying their current stage as well as looking forward to the next milestone met.
The biggest changes for Jake this past month have definitely been putting him on reflux medication to help with his silent reflux as well as chiropractor appointments for the same issue. The day after putting him on medication he fell asleep on his own, without me holding him, three times that day with ZERO screaming. This was unheard of before. It was like I had my day old baby back before all the medical interventions where he learned to scream. He also got his lip and tongue tie lasered. His upper lip tie wasn't that bad but the dentist thought it might cause cavity and teeth placement issues later in life. His tongue tie was pretty bad, though. Not enough to cause nursing issues for me (no pain) but a few people thought he might be getting too much air while nursing which might have been part of the reflux issue. I will fully admit I'm very tired of hurting my child to medically help him. This little guy has been though enough pain in his short life. It was weird listening to him for a few days after the procedure as he had to relearn how his tongue worked. His cry actually sounded different for a while! And since I had to manually work the lasered spots every 4-6 hours per day for three weeks I got to hear a lot of those cries.
The biggest changes for Elizabeth have been how much she talks now. She's definitely a stereotypical girl who just chats the day away. :-) She also has been in to see the chiropractor to help with her torticollis issues. Basically, she was twisting her neck to one side so consistently that we were worried about development issues. Most likely she'd been in that position in the womb (i.e., head shoved slightly sideways in my pelvis while her heavier brother sat on top of her) and the muscles developed a stiffness that "locked" her in that position. A few sessions and some at home exercises and she went from being forced to look at her left shoulder to freely turning her head right and left. She also had an upper life tie lasered but it wasn't as bad as Jake's so she didn't cry as much during her mouth exercises. Beth did have her first fall experience this month as well. Abby was holding her on the couch and went to shift Beth into a different position when Abby lost her grip. Beth fell from the couch to the floor hitting her head on the coffee table on the way down. There was instant tears on both girl's parts but Mom's hugs and kisses all around made everyone feel better. Beth is also on reflux meds in the hopes of getting her to not spit up so much after feeding.
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| "Birth" - First night at home around 5 days old. |
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| One Month Old - Wondering who this other person is. |
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| Two Months Old - Looking like their own person now. |
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| Three Months Old - Getting their own personalities. |
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| Four Months Old - Beth poses for her picture while Jake is totally over the camera. |
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| And I just love this picture. Beth is all excitedly talking about something and nothing while Jake calmly takes in the scenery. |
Here are Elizabeth's stats:
Height Weight Head CM
Birth 17.5 in. 5 lbs. 8 oz.
2 Weeks 18.0 in. 5 lbs. 7 oz. 33.0 cm
1 Month 19.2 in. 7 lbs. 9 oz. 36.8 cm
2 Months 21.0 in. 9 lbs. 7 oz. 38.7 cm
4 Months 22.5 in. 11 lbs. 6 oz. 41.0 cm
Beth has us a little concerned with her weight gain, or lack there of. Basically each month she's fallen off the previous growth curve. She's always been a spit-uppy baby but her Doctor and I had hoped that trying different feeding methods might have resolved the issue. Holding her upright after nursing, no side-nursing at night, etc. But at her checkup it was decided to put her on reflux meds as well as she needs to start gaining some weight. We're not sure if she's genetically just a tiny peanut or if there's an underlying weight gain issue. We go back in a month to see if she's put on some weight from not spitting up so much and see if we need to start adding in a supplemental feed or two each day of a high calorie formula. I'm really hoping to not have to do that as "one more thing" is just not needed right now. Of course, if she needs it I do it. According to the WHO charts she's 0% for weight and 5% for height. I have no idea if that's truly accurate as it's hard to follow those little lines but that's what it says.
Here are Jacob's stats:
Height Weight Head CM
Birth 17.5 in. 5 lbs. 10 oz.
2 Weeks 18.0 in. 5 lbs. 7 oz. 33.5 cm
1 Month 19.0 in. 8 lbs. 2 oz. 36.8 cm
2 Months 21.1 in. 10 lbs. 2 oz. 38.3 cm
4 Months 23.0 in. 12 lbs. 14 oz. 41.0 cm
When comparing Jake to Beth, he's a heavy tank. :-) He feels solid and chunky and has definitely added on the pounds. His WHO stats are also odd as he's 0% for height and 10% for weight.
I have to admit that Abby's chunky baby status made WHO stats a lot more fun to follow. :-)She was always 85-95th percentile for height and weight. But with these two being a month early I recognize that they're going to be little for quite a while before they catch up to "normal".
