Good thing they're not identical

It took me about two weeks to be able to easily tell the boys apart. For the first two or three days I needed to look at their hospital bracelets, and the days after that I was ok because Duckling was jaundiced and helpfully yellow in colour, but once he faded it was difficult again. Now I can look at photos of when they were first born and easily tell them apart because they actually look completely different, but during the first two weeks of pain, exhaustion and shock, it was very hard. S could tell them apart right after they were born, and now can tell me who is crying on the monitor. I still need to look at them, unless Duckling is making his little goat noise or Pin is doing his super-pissed bellow.

Two nights ago, I was awakened at 4 am by a baby crying and kicking me in the back. This is surprisingly effective; you can doze through a bit of crying, but kicking? When they both get going it's like trying to nap in a hailstorm. It was Duckling. I fed him and changed him, noting with mild interest that his poop looked more like something Pin would produce (yes, they poop different). I put him back in his swaddle and soothed him back to sleep, and then woke Pin for his feeding. (I tend to wake them at that time of the day, so that I can go back to sleep knowing the other won't wake up in 15 min.)

While feeding Pin, I looked closely and realized that I was in fact feeding Duckling. I was so tired that I first thought I had fed the same baby twice, and it took me a few minutes to realize that I had actually fed Pin first, not Duckling. So yes, I had recognized Pin's poop, even though I thought it came from Duckling. Fraternal twins poop fraternal poops.

Who knew.

Milestones

Being a parent of twins, I find that I am so busy all the time that I let a lot of things slide. I don't keep a baby book, I haven't started memory boxes for them, I haven't had any of the numerous photos printed and put into frames. I usually write this blog one-handed, while nursing one of the babies, often in the wee hours of the morning.

I know I will regret this later, especially when telling the boys stories of their babyhood. Thank goodness S is great at saving the photos to the hard drive with descriptive labels, otherwise we would be completely lost.

Today Pin actually saw the rattle I was shaking at him, saw it and smiled and cooed and tracked it with his eyes. I put it in his hand and he gripped it and shook it for a while. I'm pretty sure he had no idea he was doing it, but he certainly liked the noise it was making. I ran around the house looking for the video camera but it's buried in a pile of something, somewhere. I'm sure he'll do it again, but the first time is always so magical and surprising. I tried it with Duckling a while later, and he also smiled and tracked it with his eyes.

At nine weeks of age, the boys can:

• Coo
• Smile
• Follow us with their eyes
• See bright colours and follow them with their eyes
• React to rattle noises
  
• Drool (mostly Duckling, who is nicknamed Bubbles)
• Sleep 3 to 5 hours at a time, sometimes (well, once) more
• Sort of hold their heads up
• Throw their feet straight up in the air and fart, even when asleep
• Make sucky noises and breathe excitedly when they see my breast or a bottle
• Poo only once or twice a day, instead of 6 or 7 times a day, although these poos are now so voluminous that they fill the diaper, leak, and sometimes go halfway up the back
  
• React when the other is crying, even though they ignore each other completely for the most part
• Cry vociferously and with intent (Pin's nickname is Loudy for this reason)
  
• Put themselves all the way to sleep if I lay them down half asleep
• Put themselves back to sleep if they wake up at night and aren't hungry and are swaddled

Who said babies are boring.

Sleep

Why is everybody so focused on getting babies to sleep through the night? Sleep doulas, books, DVDs...all designed at getting babies to sleep longer than is natural or healthy. It's practically a competition among some parents. Bottom line, although I love sleep as much as anybody, I believe that babies are designed to wake up when they are hungry, and should be fed. Why train them to sleep through a natural urge, something that is necessary for survival?

Two nights ago Duckling and Pin slept for 7 hours straight, something they have never done before. I woke up at 8 and was momentarily terrified that something horrible had happened, but no, they just slept longer than usual. Probably a reaction to their first vaccinations. I felt GREAT the next day! Of course I was excited to see if it happened the following night, but we were back on the 4 hour schedule of wake eat sleep. By four hour schedule, I mean Pin wakes up at midnight, feeds and cuddles and has a change and is soothed back to sleep (or not) and then Duckling wakes up at 1 (if I'm lucky, otherwise he hollers until I am finished with Pin by 12:45 or so), feeds and cuddles and has a change and is soothed back to sleep. I fall asleep about 2 am, then Pin wakes up about 4 or 5 and the whole process starts again.

I GET the idea behind sleep training, I really do. I just think that they need to eat when they need to eat. They have little tiny tummies, and are fed breast milk and formula, which digests in the blink of an eye and leaves them hungry a few hours later. That is how they are designed, that is how it is.

Disco balls

Last night Duckling terrified us by spitting up a mouthful of blood. He had been crying and we were just about to feed him when out blorped a quantity of frothy red saliva. Granted, it was only a teaspoon or two but trust me, any amount of blood to come out of a two-month-old baby is guaranteed to send the parents into a frenzied panic. We immediately packed Duckling and Pin into the car and drove to the local children's hospital.

We were told to wait outside the triage computer, an area that was completely devoid of health care professionals or any staff at all, for that matter. We waited. And waited. S showed up before the intake worker, a feat considering the state of parking in Toronto. We waited. Finally, a girl in jeans showed up, slouched up to the computer, took Duckling's health card and stared at the screen. Eventually she pointed to the name on the card and asked if that was his name.

She asked us to stand three steps to the left beside a wall. So we stood. With two crying babies. Still in a panic. Duckling was conspicuously not bleeding but we still stared obsessively at his mouth, waiting for another rush of blood. A triage nurse asked if my nipples were cracked and bleeding. They weren't. We were sent to another waiting area, and were eventually called in to see a nurse, who asked if my nipples were cracked and bleeding (still no). She did a preliminary examination of Duckling (who was perfectly happy and still not bleeding) and put us in a room to wait for the doctor.

We were seen by a student doctor, who examined Duckling and asked if my nipples were cracked and bleeding. She took Duckling's diaper off to check him, and as she did so we pointed out that he had a hydrocele (benign collection of fluid around the testicle), unaware of the excitement that would result. She put a light to his testicle and watched as it glowed red, over and over, explaining that hydroceles conduct light (unlike tumours). We were less than impressed by his glow-in-the-dark genitalia, because of the whole spitting up blood situation, but she was enthralled.

She found nothing out of the ordinary, went to consult with the doctor in charge, who while sticking a light on the poor kid's balls asked me if my nipples were cracked and bleeding. He then had the student doctor EXAMINE my nipples minutely, desperate to find some evidence of cracked and bleeding nipples so that they would have a diagnosis, but she was unable to find any evidence of cracks and/or bleeding.

They discharged us with a diagnosis of 'probable ingestion of maternal blood' even though there was absolutely no sign that this was the case. There was no mention at all of the disco balls.

Cats and Babies

We had four cats at the time the boys were born. We had Bamboo, who was our old girl, 13 years old, and very sick with diabetes, since passed away. We also had Betty, 10 years old and very shy, and TC and Larry, each about two years of age and bossy and energetic (above photo).

A popular topic of conversation throughout the pregnancy was how the cats would react to the babies. We predicted that Bamboo and Betty would hate them and hide all the time, and that Larry and TC would be very excited and would try to be with the babies as much as possible, which was much worse. It was actually fairly anticlimactic. After a few minutes of arched backs and sniffing from Bamboo and Betty, they pretty much ignored the whole situation. Larry and TC were initially very excited by the crib and the pack'n'play, mostly because they were new fabulous places to try and sleep (NOT ALLOWED!) but they have pretty much ignored the boys unless there is a lot of crying, in which case they look disgusted and stomp away.

The babies of course have not yet paid any attention to the cats, but that will change, oh yes, cats beware, make the most of your lives now........

Duckling and Pin

We chose somewhat unusual names for our boys. We wanted something meaningful to us and our families, to give the boys a sense of heritage, and to avoid the 'top 100 most common names of 2010'. It was actually very easy to compile a list of possibilities; much more difficult to actually choose. Luckily we were in agreement and there wasn't too much discussion or swearing.

Although traditional Irish names, they are not as well known in Canada. This gave our maternity nurses a little trouble, especially the Asian nurses with English as a second language. The mispronunciations were varied and hilarious, and Duckling and Pin was the closest some of them got to their actual names.

As one nurse explained, the more common names are much easier to pronounce. Good luck with that, little Prances and Pill, where ever you are.

Miscarriage

I knew women who had had miscarriages. This information was always somehow embarrassing, a TMI secret, and I never knew what to say. The elephant in the room. Briefly acknowledged then never mentioned again. We are not taught about miscarriages, and they were never something that were ever openly discussed, at least not in my world. I never thought of miscarriages in any more detail than a few cramps and some momentary sadness. Most of my information came from tv, movies and books; I could be wrong, of course, but if soap operas are anything other than completely unrealistic portrayals of life then they would be classed as educational tv along with Nova and W5.

Point is, I knew miscarriages could happen, but I was completely unprepared when it happened. I did not know about the stunning devastation, the crazy denial, the inconsolable sadness. I didn't expect to wake up crying weeks and months after it happened, and I had no idea that even now, four years later, that thinking about my poor lost baby, for yes indeed people, that was my baby, would bring tears to my eyes.

And a terrible thing: for a while, I was the elephant in the room. I endured embarrassment, thoughtless comments, and abrupt changes in topic. I learned not to talk about this huge, overwhelming grief, the loss of my baby. I feel so bad for how I treated other women. I was uninformed and thoughtless, not uncaring, but I wish I could go back and do better.

Fighting for Fertility

When we first decided to start a family, I was convinced that I was not the 'type' of person to actively pursue a family, and if it didn't happen oh well, life goes on, children are not the be all and end all. Then my obsessive personality traits kicked in, and I was determined to maximize my chances and figured out when I ovulated and made sure we had sex on the appropriate days. I was a bit of a mood killer, I'm sure! I was pregnant in five months, and that was it, the family was on the way, and I started planning my life accordingly. I never even once considered the possibility of a miscarriage. We were having a baby for Christmas.

After my D&C for my miscarriage, I didn't have a period for months. I mentioned this to my GP and my OBS/GYN, but neither of them took me seriously. I was told to wait and be patient, but I knew there was something wrong. I know my own body, I know how I work, and I could tell that I was ovulating, I was getting PMS, my breasts would get sore on schedule; I was having a regular 28-day menstrual cycle, I just wasn't bleeding at the end of it. I started charting my basal body temperature, and it showed a textbook perfect cycle, rise after ovulation, drop at the end. I finally persuaded my GP to take me seriously, and he referred me to a reproductive endocrinologist, I think mostly to make me go away than because he thought there was anything wrong.

I was lucky in that I got into see the RE on a cancellation and I didn't have to wait the usual six months. He took my history and diagnosed me with uterine scarring within 10 minutes, and confirmed it after an operative hysteroscopy two months later. They took down the scarring that was blocking the cervix and the chunk that was at the top of the uterus, but it seemed that the uterine walls were affected also, and were not able to generate a decent lining, which impacts the ability for the fertilized egg to implant and start developing. I was put on huge doses of estrogen and then progesterone to promote healing, and then was given the list of reproductive options available to me. I knew very little of infertility, and still didn't really believe I wouldn't be able to have a family. I knew the statistics of a woman my age being able to have a baby, but that was other women, not me. I would be able to get pregnant, why not? Delusional, to say the least!

The list of options available to me was:
1. Do nothing
2. Take fertility meds to increase my ovulation
3. Add intrauterine insemination to option 2.
4. Add IVF to option 2
5. Adopt

We chose to try the fertility meds and intrauterine insemination. This was already far more intervention than I ever thought I would try. The medications had to be injected, and I have a HUGE needle phobia! My partner was amazing, and took on all the injections. I had Gonal F every day to promote egg production, and then Ovidrel to stimulate ovulation. Unfortunately, two things got in the way of this being a successful venture. I did not respond to the Gonal F, and therefore made one egg a month same as if I did not take any drugs. Second, the drugs made me ovulate much earlier than usual, so I don't think the egg quality was helped by that. We did several cycles though, with no pregnancy. I told myself I was 'resistant' to the drugs, when really I was just at the natural end of my reproductive abilities, and made it very hard for myself to come to terms with the failure. I was still very depressed about the miscarriage, and the constant monthly failure to conceive was adding to the depression. It was a horrible time in my life.

Ashermans Smashermans

When we decided to start a family, I was 39 and had no real concept of how much fertility declines by that age. I was having regular periods, so naturally assumed that pregnancy would not be an issue. And it wasn't. I got pregnant five months after we started trying, which I now know was highly unusual for somebody my age.

Sadly, we found out around 10 weeks that the baby was not doing well; I had had some slight spotting, and an ultrasound showed that the heart rate was slower than it should be. It was so hard to believe that there was anything wrong. I had lots of morning sickness, I was gaining weight, all the signs of a healthy pregnancy. But two weeks later the cramping started, which became so severe that I went to the hospital for help. Another ultrasound showed that the baby had died, and I was sent home with pain medication to wait for the inevitable.

It was horrible. I lived in fear of the bathroom, terrified of the baby coming out. I had no idea what to expect, what it would look and feel like, and how I would cope. However, nothing happened, and my doctor scheduled me for a D&C. The surgery went very well physically...emotionally I was a wreck... and I healed very well. It took a few months to realize that there was something wrong. I didn't get a period during that time, and it turned out that I had some scarring in the uterus and cervix, most likely from the D&C. I was diagnosed with Asherman's Syndrome, and the infertility roller coaster began.