Life with the twins!

So it only makes sense that it's taken me 5 months to write any updates on the twins, right? I'm actually using this blog post to avoid doing laundry. I have two loads on the bed that probably have to be re-dried... I shoved way too much into the dryer. AND a load in the washer and the dryer. What the heck?? 

Babies make a lot of laundry.

I always tell Matt that if I kept the kids alive, it was a successful day. But then there are two subcategories of a successful day. Thrive days and survive days. I'd like to think that I have a lot more thrive days where I actually get on the floor and play with the kids, there is more giggling than screaming and crying, and that we take all of our naps. But we have had quite a few survive days. Where I am literally counting down the minutes until their next nap, or I had to rock and hold one of them (cough cough, Kaylee) to sleep, and I almost cry with relief when Matt walks through the door. 

Motherhood is hard work! 

Matt is still working 60 hour weeks. This makes life even harder. We keep being told that this is abnormal and that the hours will decrease. But I call bullsh*t. Sorry - I do. They've been telling us the hours will decrease for forever. We know we aren't the only ones pissed because an abnormal amount of people have quit recently! (The turnover rate is pretty high I believe). And to top it all off, he has worked many a Saturday and then is the ward financial clerk on Sundays and doesn't get home from our 1pm church time (naps suck those days) until 5:30!

Rant over. I love my life. Honestly I do. In Relief Society a couple Sundays ago someone asked if anyone could raise their hand because they were content with where their life was at. And I'm not saying that I'm content, but it made me realize that I am literally living my dream right now. I work hard all day long, but doing something that I love! The kids make it quite easy and enjoyable let me tell you. 

Oh my gosh they are beautiful. 

They LOVE tummy time. And they love it so much that they actually sleep on their tummies! Kaylee hasn't gotten quite good at rolling over. Caleb is probably a week or two from really getting it down but it's so fun (and sometimes nerve wracking) to see them succeeding in different areas. 

Caleb Matthew was 12 lbs 10 oz at his 4 month appointment and Miss Kaylee Jo was 12 lbs 9.9 oz! We are still in very low percentiles for our gestational age, and the zero percentile for our actual age. But they are both following healthy curves and eating well. Caleb has turned into such a talker. He had a week or so after they turned 3.5 months where he was constantly squealing and mumbling. It was cute and then got quite persistent, haha. He is really good at making eye contact with people, and after he does he will give you one of his million dollar smiles. 

Kaylee is such a goofy girl. Like I have said before she is either completely happy or really mad, so she has actually lost her voice a few times from screaming and crying. It didn't help that these instances occurred after getting a little cold. But it was really pathetic to hear her try to coo and babble with a raspy hoarse voice, but then as her voice healed we started to realize that she was continuing to do it?! She thought it was fun to play with her voice and make herself all raspy!

The twins have been sleeping through the night since about 2.5 months old! Our schedule is around a variation like this.

5:50am: Mom gets up and pumps 23 oz of milk (I know, I'm a cow. Moo)

6:15: Babies wake up/changed/fed and everyone goes right back to sleep

9:30: Babies wake up/fed/changed and dressed and then have play time and/or a bath

10:45: Morning nap while Mom pumps, gets ready for the day, does laundry, cleans bottles, eats breakfast (you get the picture)

12:00: Babies wake up/fed (I wait a little while for this diaper change... they always poo after or during this feeding) and then play

If I need to run any errands for the day this is the best time to do it. The babies are the most happy and can last the longest before needing to go back down. I do a lot of shopping on Amazon now a days and I am so fortunate to have family that can bring me groceries or Matt will grab something like milk on the way home. 

2:00: Back down for a nap while mom pumps, eats, cleans bottles, etc. etc. 

3:30: Babies wake up/fed/changed and then we either play at home or go on a walk with the dog. 

*Charlie, our dog, is still young and so he can really be another kid to look after sometimes. But he is learning and adapting to having two new family members. I just need to remember to be patient and that I like him ;)

5:00: Back down for a short nap. Mom pumps, yada yada yada.

6:00: Babies wake up/fed/changed and have play time! I will usually put them in their high chairs and have them in the kitchen with me while I make dinner. 

7:45 (or later...*grumble*): Matt gets home!!!!!!!!!!

8:30: Bed time routine - everyone goes upstairs, gets changed into PJs, and then fed in a rocking chair. 

9:00: Asleep!

So there are a few tricks to the Gregson twins that I feel like make for much easier days. 

Sleeping: So putting the twins to bed is something I am quite proud of. We put them down awake and they usually don't cry or fuss for longer than 5 minutes. They will cry longer if I have kept them up too long (the struggle is real). I will lie one in the crib and distract them with the mobile while I rock the other one. Then we switch! Tada!

Bottle feeding: Upstairs we sit in our big rocking chair and I criss cross my legs and prop them up on the outside of my thigh - sandwiched between the sides of the chair. Downstairs I will put a couch cushion at a 45 degree angle in front of me. 

Out in public!: Holy moly the Baby Jogger City Select double stroller has saved my life. We also have the car seat adapters so when I'm by myself I don't have to unbuckle and then buckle both of them. Car seat bases are a godsend. 

The only twin specific items I could think of that we have loved has been our twin Z pillow. The twins quite literally lived in it their first month. We had it just set up on the couch and so whenever they took a nap or I was alone and couldn't be holding both of them, they went into the pillow. 

I feel like I need to keep writing because the twins are taking an absurdly long nap right now. But I won't jinx and maybe go deal with that laundry... boo.

Tell me what I should write about next time. I feel like when I'm not sitting at the computer I have all these ideas and then I sit down and poof, they're gone.

bye.

Caleb and Kaylee's Birth Story

I have to apologize first that this has taken me so long to write! But it's a story worth waiting for - I promise!

So I had only had a few contractions leading up to Friday, January the 15th, and even on Thursday night I felt completely fine and normal. I took a long shower before bed and if I remember correctly, I even fell asleep quite quickly and soundly. Then at 4:30 in the morning I was woken up by my water breaking! It felt so bizarre - literally like someone had poured water between my legs. I yelled at Matt, "My water just broke" and shook him a little bit. He sat up rather quickly and looked around really confused. Then he said, "What? What do we do?"

Hahahaha that is going to be one of my favorite parts of retelling this story. Matt was roused from such deep sleep that he was barely conscious at first. He had no idea what was going on for the first minute.

So I had heard so many stories about how long labor can take and that once you get admitted you can't eat anything. With that information I decided I was going take my time to get ready and make sure that I ate before we got there. I wasn't having any contractions (or at least non that I could feel yet) so we didn't even get to the hospital until 5:30. At this point I was feeling some contractions (I wasn't timing them because we were on our way to the hospital and so I figured it wasn't super important really) but they were more annoying than painful. Matt dropped me off at the entrance and went to park the car. Vainly - I was starting to do the math and realized that I hadn't had a bowel movement in a couple days and was determined that if I went to the restroom I would be able to get something out before I pooped on the delivery table! Like I said - stupid and vain. So I went and tried to use the restroom but to no avail. Even after we checked into triage I tried to go to the restroom again. At this point I was starting to really get uncomfortable. The triage nurse said they were going to run the test to make sure it was actually my water that had broken. HA. I was leaking all over the place. I knew it was my water. When it came back positive I asked her if they were going to check to see how dilated I was and she responded "No, we don't want to introduce bacteria." What? So triage nurses introduce bacteria but any other person that would check me will not? Ugh.

She was trying to get both babies on the monitor at this point and kept asking me if they were usually synced - meaning that they had the same heartbeat and beat at the same time. I responded with a resounding no. They had never ever been the same. The nurse stepped out and I began to realize that all of my labor pain was in my back. And that was getting me annoyed. Since puberty I have had rather rough periods and have always thought that I would be able to handle contractions pretty well because of the pain tolerance that I had established. But now I was being cheated of looking strong and in control because these contractions in my back were going to be the death of me. I got up on my hands and knees in the bed and focused on breathing. Then I realized that the sensation of needing to poop was not going away and started to panic that maybe my babies were coming! At my appointment that Tuesday before I had only been dilated to a 2, but I had been 80% effaced. So here's where I might have cheated the system a bit - I told Matt to buzz the nurse and tell them that I felt like I needed to push. Oh man I had two nurses in there so fast, it was kind of awesome. The second nurse asked the one that had already been assisting me if she had checked my cervix and, to me, it sounded like she sheepishly responded, "No." The new nurse checked (while I was still on my hands and knees) and announced I was a "stretchy 3." Whatever that means... but I guess either the term "stretchy" is code for "we need to get her back to labor and delivery STAT" or the fact that I was in so much pain, they decided I was ready to be admitted. Matt started to ask if they were going to make me walk to my room and my now favorite nurse said, "Uh no, she's in no condition to walk anywhere. We are taking her in the bed." So I got whisked down the hall in the bed from triage all while I was now more loudly moaning "OW, ow, ow." I was in so much pain I had no idea if my hoo-hah was even covered, but Matt assures me that it was.

Got to labor and delivery and I had the whole freaking maternity staff in the room with me. It was close to shift change now and so I had someone trying to get the babies heart rates monitored and two people trying to simultaneously figure out which arm was going to take an IV. I have the veins nurses cringe at because of how tiny they are. In my left hand they poked me twice trying to thread it and were unable so they finally did in my right. 

I was still on my hands and knees with my face pressed into the bed trying to stifle my own cries. I'm pretty sure Matt felt extremely helpless. Finally the anesthesiologist came in and claimed that because of how quickly my contractions were coming and how much pain I was in that they would administer my epidural while I was on my side curled in fetal position. That was a pretty miserable minute or so as she gave me a "double dose" epidural. 

After the epidural life was bliss! I started cracking jokes about how embarrassed I was about the amount of commotion I had caused but the doctors and nurses were all so nice and assured me they believe my pain was well founded. Turns out I had gone from that "stretchy 3" to a 7 in about an hour and a half. The doctor that was there told Matt that he needed to make sure to pay attention to the doctor during delivery because Matt would be the one delivering our next pregnancy because I probably wouldn't be making it to the hospital. The doctor even wrote in my chart that I am a "fast and furious laborer." Ha!

My sister-in-law Emily then arrived and we found out that she would have permission to join Matt and I in the OR during my delivery! We have known since finding out about the twins that we would be delivering in the OR regardless of a vaginal delivery just because of the risk of C section. Then both my parents arrived and we continued to wait. The nurse had told me to let her know if I ever felt the need to push, or a consistent need to poop. I might've waited a little too long. I promise I never felt a consistent need to poop. I finally called the nurse back in around 1 and said that I thought she might as well check my profession. She didn't even need to check - Caleb was already crowning! The nurses kind of scrambled to get things together including gowns for Matt and Emily. We wheeled into the OR and after about 20 minutes of pushing Caleb was out at 2:03pm!! He was 5 lbs 14 oz and 18.5 in with a full head of hair. Pushing was almost anticlimactic because my epidural was so effective (how lame to even complain about, huh?) but Caleb came out screaming. Matt left to be with him since we knew there would be at least some time between him and Kaylee. I thought it was so funny that the first thing Matt said was "I know he's mine, he's got the Gregson webbed toes!"

Kaylee's entrance was a bit more dramatic. During active labor they kept an ultrasound on Kaylee to check her positioning so that the doctor could follow her feet since she was breech. We knew there was a risk of delivering Caleb vaginally and then Kaylee by c-section so making sure the doctor was able to grab her feet was key in her delivery. So the doctor went almost elbow deep and did a footling breech extraction and Kaylee was born at 2:05pm weighing 5 lbs 10 oz and 18 in. I didn't know until afterwards why having a footling breech extraction was such a miracle. Most doctors refuse to do them because after you deliver baby A the cervix will start to close and can squish baby B - making it impossible to deliver. If my doctor hadn't been able to stop my cervix (get her hands in fast enough) or if Kaylee had moved too quickly after Caleb had been delivered and she hadn't been able to grab her feet, Kaylee's recovery would've been quite different. She only needed to be on the CPAP machine for about a minute but after that she let the whole world know how mad she was to have left her nice warm womb!

I had the worst shaking when I was wheeled out of the OR, which I was told was a side effect of the epidural and adrenaline. We were only in the hospital for 2 nights and the only things that ever had us worried were the babies blood sugar levels which took a while to come up and Caleb failing his car seat test (dumbest thing ever). We were about to have Matt take him home on the bus because there was a possibility him not passing would mean a third night there. 

My recovery was quite quick - definitely helps that the twins were small - and now I need to write another post about life since we've been home! Whew.