If my twins had made it full term to their due date, today they would be one day old. They are three weeks old, and sometimes it seems they have been with me forever, and others I feel like I was just at the hospital delivering them and going through that experience.



At my first Twins Club meeting tonight after the babies have arrived, I am placed in the round table discussion labeled 'Expecting to 6 months. The mother who's baby boys are 5 1/2 months seems the expert at the table. They all assure me andd reinforce my confidence that there is hope, my milk flow will increase, pumping makes you a slave now, but is worth it for the health of your precious ones in the long run, they will begin 'sleeping through the night' or at least for longer than 2 hours stretches (at that if I'm lucky) at a time. There is hope.



I remind my self this phase is only temporary. I will not always be so physically and mentally drained. 'This phase is gonna fly by, so try and just hold on, cause it won't be like this for long.' The theme song and song on my Myspace page replays itself over and over in my head. Like a mantra.

Most of the time time I think This is great! I can handle this.. I'm doing it!

Some days it just seems crazy... HOW AM I going to do this?

Everyone is sick. Everyone is crying. Everyone needs a piece of me, my own body as well, screaming to express its milk, hungering for nutrition other than the pop tarts and frozen meals I squeeze in between a rush to make a bottle, change a diaper, pump my breast milk, nurse a hungry baby who needs food now. I need food now, yet I pass the banana on the counter yet again because they need me. My babies.

Then I get some sleep... enough sleep to matter, just a few hours of interupted sleep makes a world of difference to the zombie I have become. I wake up energized and refresh and ready to go again and suddlenly things dont seem so hard. I feel like a normal person again.

I shower and put on fresh clean clothes, a real bra, socks, shoes. I apply make up and listen to music and feel the flicker of excitment like when I used to get ready to go to the club.

Now its over a trip to the grocery.

Let me count the ways...

He lets me sleep uninterupted when I become slightly psycho from having been up for days on end with only two hours nap breaks.

Once when I was pregnant, he began my day with breakfast in bed and ended it the same way- late night snack in bed. (And he brought two spoons and the whole dman gallon of icecream to bed! That's my man!)

For our 2 year anniversary December 30th, he got me a present anyways even though we said we weren't going to exchange gifts- and what is more thoughtful and special than a t-shirt with a screen print of our babies ultrasound on it???

He brings me cappacino in bed as I sit blearly eyed and pump breast milk before a day filled with appoinments on little sleep.

For Valentine's Day 6 1/2 months pregnant he took me out for drinks after dinner- at Starbucks!

He takes the night shift sometimes. Enough said.

The babies are just over one week old and we have already made our first middle of the night hospital run. I hope there are not many of these. One of the hardest parts of being a parent for me is the anxiety and worrying over your children just being alright. It's going to be a long 18 years, and just because they reach the legal age of adulthood, I know the constant worrying and praying for their well being never ends.





Saturday night Carly, who has been the more alert one and vigerous eater from the moment she was born, refused to awake for her 4:00a.m. feeding. No amount of light, probing, stripping of her clothes would arouse her. For the first time ever she wasn't interested in food. Then I noticed her breathing seemed irregular. I took her temertaure and it was 99.9 degrees, which for a baby who struggled to stay above 97.5 was alrming. Her chest was rattling and obviously full of fluids. Strange air bubbles were coming from her mouth as she struggled to cough or cry.





I began panicing. I called the doctor, who recommended from her preemie status and sound of her symptoms I take her to the emergency room. Several hours later we were discharged with an upper respitory diagnosis and a very tired mom and dad. Good news is her lungs are free from fluid, unlike her chest and sinuses. Unfortuntly there is nothing that can be done to treat a cough and cold for a baby so small.





She continues to eat well, her pitiful cough is just the most heartbreaking thing I've ever heard. There are not many things worse than a sick baby who just reminds you how powerless we are as parents. Not much is worse than a sick baby period, but when she's already so tiny to begin with, a preemie 8 days old and less than half a dozen pounds, it is even more pitiful.

Now both babies are sick. And so am I. My son started coughing, such a sorry bunch. I muddle through the motions, even more sad knowing for as bad as I feel, this is what its like for them. :(

Bringing Baby Home

I was a nervous wreck. No pain killer in the world really makes a ride home in scrunched up in the back of an SUV after major abdominal surgery on a windy, twisty ride home to the country feel good. I was emotional. Scared out of my mind probably, but happy to be headed towards my new life. Country Hootie's new song 'It won't be like this for long' comes on the radio and I lose it. I'm so happy (hurting, terrified) I cry.

A Baby Story

Here's my TLC version of 'A Baby Story', the show I watched countless times while pregnant wondering how my episode would play out.

After my doctor's appointment last Thursday showed the amniotic fluid surrounding the girls was low yet again, they admitted me into the hospital and scheduled a c-section for the next day. Months of waiting building up to this moment! I made it 35 weeks and 6 days with a twin pregnancy, amazing!

It was finally happening and I felt surprisingly calm. It was a totally different birthing experience than with my son, where my water broke in my sleep at 4:00 in the morning and I spent 20 hours in labor before he was born via c-section 20 hours later. The day of their birth I was able to eat breakfast, walk around, even take a shower..... and best part of all: no contractions!

When the time came to prep me for surgery, Kenny's sister Tabitha accompanyed us in the operating room as a nursing student at Galen college and she helped keep us calm and laughing until it was showtime. I felt immediate relief from all the pressure my body was enduring carrying around two babies as soon as the first baby was out of me. 'Baby A' was delivered first at 6:47p.m. and weighed in as the smaller of the two at 5lbs 8oz.

The first cries of your newborn baby is the best sound you've ever heard in the entire world.

'Baby B' was delivered shortly after at 6:48p.m. weighing 5lbs 15oz. Though she cried initially, the second baby breathed in some amniotic fluid during delivery and had fluid in her lungs. They showed her to me briefly before taking her to the nursery to monitor her more. She was very blue. I could tell the babies looked different than each other, Baby B was bigger and had more hair than the smaller one, who we named Carly because her name means 'Little and Strong.' Baby B became Alyssa, which means 'Rational and Kind'.

Carly was alert and born ready to eat, sucking on her hand and rooting around from the moment she was putin my arms. I was able to nures her immediatly in teh recovery room. Proud Papa ran back and forth from the nursery where Alyssa was showing off their first pictures adn birht video to the waiting room full of family.

By the next morning, Alyssa's lungs had been cleared out and she was able to leave the nursery and I got to hold her for the first time. Carly had to be readmited to the warmer because she could not keep her temperature regulated. It was two days until I had them both together with me at the same time, which was actually kind of nice because I had the chance to spend a little time with each individually before the craziness began! I had the honor of chosing the babies middle names, a right I claimed considering I was the one carrying them for the whole nine months.

I chose Carly Angelia in honor of my friend Angie who died in a car accident when we were teenagers. I always wanted to name my daughter after her in some way and thought combining my name with hers was

Baby A: Carly Angelia

Baby B: Alyssa Gail

Bryce visited several times and loves kissing his new sisters. I missed him terribly the four days I was in the hospital and by Tuesday was ready to get home to begin our new life together.

Our New Family