Catching up

Catching up, haha, that's funny.  I never get caught up, I'm just always chasing the possibility!  Let me try to recap some of what's happened since the last time I remembered I have a blog :P

L&E are 9.5 months, 8 corrected.  They are doing amazing!  They have such distinct personalities, I am having so much fun with them.

L is a big boy, he's 17lbs,14oz and 69cm long.  He's huge, like for real.  He started crawling on Sept 22 and has been on the move ever since!  He is constantly pulling himself up to stand and has just started furniture surfing.  He loves his oatmeal, yogurt and fruit, mum mums and puffs.  He's hit or miss these days with his veggies, some meals are better than others.  He just got his third tooth this past Monday.  We're not yet sleeping through the night, though we've been told they no longer need to eat in the MOTN so we're going to try and wean off of that one.  I'm excited but afraid, haha.  L is such a happy little boy, except when he's teething.  His smile lights up a room, honestly, he smiles with his whole self and you can't help but smile back.  He has a fantastic laugh that I can't get enough of.  I love this little boy more than I can say, more than I imagined was ever possible.  I am so proud of him and how well he's doing.  We had our 8 month neonatal follow up appt yesterday and they were so happy with his progress!  It was so good to hear objective people rave about how well he's doing.  I am such a proud mama <3

E is the sweetest little girl.  She is incredible, she is my heart.  Well, half of it!  She is 15lbs,2oz and 68.5cm long.  She is strong and determined and smart.  Not to mention beautiful.  She started crawling on Sept 16 (happy anniversary mom and dad!).  She was so proud of herself, as were we!  Within a week she was pulling herself up to stand!  It was like she checked crawling off her list and was on to the next task!  She is a great eater, she'll try anything, just like her daddy!  She loves oatmeal, yogurt and fruit, sweet potato, squash - pretty much anything.  I'm pretty sure she's working hard on some teeth but none have popped through just yet.  And like L, not sleeping through the night yet.  She has on occasion, but far from consistent.  She is a bit more shy with people and wants to be with mom a lot, which is super sweet and I feel special but I also want her to come out of her shell, I want everyone to see how amazing she is.  She laughs a lot, which just makes me laugh along with her.  Yesterday morning she started really chatting with consonants, a very different kind of babbling than she had been doing before.  I swear these two learn and grow day by day.  I can't believe how much I love her, honestly, she is amazing.

I look over and see these two monkeys standing at their activity tables, crawling around and I can't help but be nostalgic.  Where did my tiny little babies go??  They're so big now, time seriously flies by so quickly.  They started out less than 4lbs and now, now they're these big kids, growing and laughing, learning new skills everyday.  I am so proud and so in love and so grateful to have them in my life, for the privilege to be their mom.  I have never before been so full of love and gratitude.

Twin life is crazy

I have tried to write a post for a while now, but I either couldn't find the words or the time.  At some point I know I still need to unpack everything that brought me to this point.  I don't mean to over state, but I feel rather traumatized, quite frankly, when I start to think back to my hospital stay and health scares, the unexpected and terrifying arrival of the babies, being a NICU mom - it is all so much that I really haven't had a chance to process it all yet.  I'm worried that if I start down that road, the flood gates will just open and I may not be able to close them all that easily.  And honestly, I don't have that much time to myself these days.  But that will come later, for now, an update!

We have all been home together for 2 weeks and 3 days.  I can't believe that's it when I write it out, because it feels like much longer!  It has been one hell of an adjustment, that's for sure.  I have never experienced so many different emotions all at once.  I love being a mom.  I love L&E more than I can possibly comprehend or explain.  I am so deeply in love with these two little miracles.  I still can't believe we made them, they are ours and we are theirs.  I feel like the luckiest person in the world, my heart is so full of love it brings me to tears to even type that.  Two years we prayed for these babies, and now they're really here.  Sometimes I wake up (from the brief moments of sleep I get!) and I still can't quite believe it, I have to come downstairs and see them for myself, hold them and kiss them and tell them I love them.  Then it feels real.  Being a mom is what I have wanted more than anything, I feel privileged and honoured to be L&E's mom.  I just hope I can be everything they need and more, I want to be the best mom I can possibly be - they deserve that.

But it's not all sunshine and lollipops.  It's hard.  It's really, freaking hard.  We are on a 3hr schedule that looks something like this:

• Bath, if it's bath day, i.e. they smell
• Feed babies - BF one, bottle the other (H or one of our mom's does this), we bottle them both overnight though.  Feeding takes a long time, they're really still working on getting better and fast at this.
• Diaper change
• Settle them down (ha, this one is always fun!  They often alternate who's awake and fussing)
• Pump
• Wash pumping parts/bottles 
• Prepare bottles
• with my last hour, eat/laundry/clean/sit down/shower/sterilize bottles and pumping stuff/nap

And then it starts all over again.  It.Is.Exhausting.  I have had moments of feeling like I'm doing a job, like I worked so hard to get these babies and I don't even get enough time to enjoy them.  I'm constantly feeding them then having to put them down so that I can pump to make sure I have enough for bottles.  I feel like I have so little time to actually spend enjoying them, especially since I'm trying to divide my time in two.  I've started making more of an effort to enjoy some cuddle time after I BF, but even then, I'm watching the clock because I need to pump, but I also need to pump early enough that I have time to refill before the next feed.

Which brings to me another thing that's stressing me out.  My supply.  I've been just keeping up with them, but without much extra, meaning very little wiggle room.  I really, really want to be able to provide for them.  I know logically that supplementing isn't a big deal, but emotionally and mentally, I am really hung up on being able to provide enough breastmilk to sustain them.  I couldn't get pregnant on my own, I couldn't stay pregnant or have the labour and delivery I wanted, I didn't get to bring my babies home right away - so little of this has gone the way I wanted it to, I just really want to be able to do this.  But the only way to manage this is to BF and pump like crazy.  So there really isn't much getting around the crazy schedule.  I can't even sleep more than 3 hours (usually it's more like 2) because then I need to empty my boobs, one way or another.  Oh sleep, how I miss you.  Like SO much I miss you.  One day, one day I think we will be reunited and it will be a glorious day.

I realize this post is probably really scattered, that's what sleep deprivation, a long over due post, and two babies starting to fuss because, guess what, that 3hr cycle is about to start over again, gets you.  A random rambling from a sleep deprived new mom who is both insanely in love with her babies, and exhausted and overwhelmed at just how hard all of this is.  Duty calls!  I shall leave you with a more recent pic of what makes this all worth while :)