Two Months!

Archer and Lyla turned two months old on October 3, 2017.  It's incredible the amount of growing they did in their first two months.  They are filling out and gaining good weight.  They are paying more attention to people and the things around them.  They are also getting more comfortable with Jazzy's kisses! 

 

Lyla continues to be very fussy and screams quite a lot.  At least we know she has strong lungs and knows how to speak her mind!  She loves to look at lights and ceiling fans.  Her favorite place to be is outside.  

Archer is still very laid-back.  He is generally pretty happy, aside from when he's hungry or needs to poop!  And he smiled on purpose at me for the very first time!  Talk about melting my heart!  

Archer and Lyla pretty much ignore each other.  I thought they would have this super close bond from the get-go.  They did spend a good chunk of time cooking together in my belly, after all.  But they really couldn't care less about each other.  It will be fun to see when they actually start noticing each other!  

Adam and I are falling into more of a groove with them both.  We are slowly learning what they like and don't like.  We are also getting more comfortable with each other.  Adam can change a diaper like nobody's business and I am learning just what to do to soothe each of them.  

We have been beyond fortunate to have my mom and Adam's mom help us out!  My mom spends the first half of the week with us.  She's with me while Adam is at work and helps with the night feedings so Adam and I can get some sleep.  Adam have taken FMLA leave and stays home with us on Thursdays and Fridays.  It's been so wonderful to have him around and watch him with our babies.  Janet takes over the night feedings for the latter part of the week, which allows Adam and I to get more shut-eye.  I really don't know how we would have survived these first two months without our moms!  It truly does take a village and we are super lucky to have so much help!  

I can't wait to see what the next month will bring!  

One Month!

Time sure is flying by at a crazy fast pace!  While it's already October and the babies are actually 11 weeks old, I am just now getting around to posting their one month old pictures!  

Looking back they are so incredibly tiny!  Archer and Lyla turned one month old on September 3, 2017.  That first month was the craziest month of my life.  It was equal parts excitement and exhaustion.  I have never worked so hard or been so happy in all my life.  

At one month old, Archer was a pretty mellow fellow.  The only time he would cry would be when he was hungry or gassy.  Other times he would look around with his big, blue eyes and just take everything in.  

Lyla, on the other hand, was far more dramatic.  We call her our little drama queen, because she spent a large majority of her time crying that first month.  Later on we figured out that she had a dairy allergy, which would explain why she was so fussy.  

Jazzy adjusted beautifully during their first month!  She considers Archer and Lyla her babies and thinks it's her job to protect them.  They are super lucky to have Jazzy as a big sister!  

Maybe one of these days I'll get caught up and actually post something current.  But until then I'll just enjoy the crazy, amazing ride that is motherhood!    

Breastfeeding Is Hard

I knew I wanted to try to breastfeed my babies.  There are all kinds of benefits for both babies and moms. But I also knew that if I had to feed my babies formula, that would be fine too.  

I talked about how my milk took longer than usual to come in due to some complications after delivery in this post.  Since my milk wasn't around to feed my babies, they had to spend some time in the NICU.  It turned out to be quite the job for my milk to eventually come in.  Then I had the added challenge to get my supply up enough to feed two babies. 

Getting my milk to come in and my supply to increase required a lot of pumping.  I really, really hate pumping.  For those of you who don't know, pumping involves hooking an electric pump up to your boobs and sitting around while it pumps milk from your boobs.  While it's not super painful for me, it's not very pleasant.  Plus I feel like I am tethered to the couch and can only go as far as the plastic tubing will allow me to go.  After I delivered my babies, it was recommended that I pump every 4 hours.  While Adam tried to help me make that happen, it just didn't.  I was exhausted and pumping wasn't high on my priority list.  But eventually I was able to pump more and more and my milk did come in.  

Once my milk was in, I was able to try to breastfeed my babies while they were in the NICU.  I envisioned breastfeeding to be this wonderful bonding experience between me and my babies.  I thought we would stare adoringly at each other and things would go smoothly.  But that's not exactly how things went.  

Since my babies were born prematurely, they struggled to latch, maintain a strong suck and stay awake long enough to get enough to eat.  So breastfeeding was quite the challenge in the beginning.  Archer got the hang of latching pretty quickly, but Lyla struggled a long time.  She would turn her head back and forth with her mouth open like a crazy person.  It was so frustrating!  Even if I would shove my nipple in her mouth, sometimes she still wouldn't latch on.  We both wanted the same thing, but somehow couldn't make it happen.  The occupational therapist that worked with us suggested we give her chin a little pressure.  So I would try to be squeezing my boob to get the milk going and then pushing up on her chin and trying to hold her head in place.  Man, what I wouldn't have given for another hand!  

After all that work, sometimes she would only nurse for a few minutes and then fall asleep.  It was exhausting!  Archer managed to latch quicker, but he would fall asleep as well.  I would have to tickle them and jiggle them a little to keep them awake.  

After they got to be a few days older, then I started having the opposite problem.  They would want to nurse for up to an hour for each feeding!  The NICU staff told us the optimal feeding time was 30 minutes, so it was frustrating for the babies when I would cut them off.  Apparently nursing for too long used up too many calories.  And the babies needed to maintain as many calories as possible to gain weight.  Of course they would just cry if they were still hungry.  Eventually I just started nursing them longer until they were satisfied even though I wasn't technically supposed to do that.  I felt like crying and crying because they were still hungry would burn up calories too.  If I fed them longer, at least they would be happy.  But then that meant the time in between feedings became shorter and shorter.  

Then after I fed each baby, I would have to pump.  The purpose of pumping after they ate was to increase my milk supply.  So it kinda felt like I had three babies to feed.  I was not as enthused about breastfeeding at this point.  But I continued on because I felt like it was the best thing for my babies.  

When we got to leave the NICU, I thought things would be simpler because I could nurse the babies whenever they were hungry instead of trying to keep up with a schedule.  But I was wrong.  Nursing them whenever they were hungry meant I was nursing ALL THE TIME!  And then I tried to keep up with pumping after each feeding.  It was exhausting!  

So then I decided to give tandem feeding a try.  Tandem feeding is when you have one baby on each boob at the same time.  I had a nursing pillow to help position the babies.  It would strap around my waist and the babies would lay on top of it.  There was no way I could do this on my own.  So someone would have to bring me the babies, burp them when they needed, change their diaper and then take them away.  This meant that whoever was helping me (or even just whoever else was in the same room) got up close and personal with me and my boobs.  I've always been a very modest person.  Heck, I don't even like to wear shirts that are too low-cut!  But that modesty went out the window!  I would whip off my shirt and pull out my boobs.  Never in a million years would I have dreamed my mother-in-law would see my boobs on a regular basis!  But that's just how it is now.  

With tandem feeding, I was pretty much stuck in that position for at least an hour, sometimes more depending on how hungry each baby was during that feeding.  I hated it.  It was a struggle to get both latched and keep them latched.  I felt trapped by that pillow and having to stay in that position.  My hormones were still in full swing and I would have hot flashes, so having a giant pillow and two babies close to me didn't help make me any cooler.  And I just got tired of having two babies attached to me for so long.  The babies ate about every 3 hours, so I spent a lot of time just feeding them.  

I also felt guilty about hating breastfeeding.  You see commercials and pictures where the baby is just calmly nursing and the mom is smiling down.  My babies did a lot of screaming and squirming and crying.  I did my fair share of crying too.  Adam would try to help the babies latch, which was nice of him to try.  But that just meant there was one more person in my bubble and it made me super crabby.  I'm sure I didn't treat him as kindly as I could have on more than one occasion.  

So after giving tandem feeding a valiant effort for about a week, I decided it wasn't worth it.  So I decided that I would just nurse one baby at a time.  If both Archer and Lyla were hungry at the same time, I would have whoever was around feed them a bottle of breast milk that I had pumped.  This lowered the level of stress and dread I had drastically. 

I also went to a weekly breastfeeding support group at the hospital where I delivered.  It was very helpful to hear other moms talking about their struggles.  It helped me to feel like I wasn't alone.  At the meetings they also have a scale, so I could weigh my babies to make sure they were making the gains they needed to be making.  It's hard to tell exactly how much milk they are getting when breastfeeding, so it was nice to have proof that they were gaining weight each week.  

Even though both Archer and Lyla were gaining weight, Lyla seemed to hate eating.  It was such an ordeal to nurse her.  She took forever to latch, wouldn't stay latched, would scream and cry and took forever to eat.  I chalked it up to her being born premature and just needing more time to get the hang of it.  

Well, fast forward to her 2 month doctor visit.  As our pediatrician was checking her out, she noticed some specks of blood in her stool in her diaper.  While I didn't stare at her poopy diapers, I did glance at them from time to time and had never noticed any blood specks.  In addition to bloody specks in her poop and difficulty nursing, Lyla was always incredibly unhappy.  It seemed like she had three channels: sleeping, eating or screaming.  At first we just thought that was her personality.  We figured she was just dramatic.  But I began to think we were missing something.  Surely she can't be unhappy all the time.  So after mentioning all these things, the pediatrician put two and two together and determined that Lyla had a dairy allergy.  Apparently this is fairly common in babies, especially premature ones.  Their gastrointestinal tracks can't break down the proteins found in dairy.  This explained why she was always unhappy and hated nursing.  She was in pain!  Cue the mom guilt!  I felt terrible that it took us 8 weeks before we figured out something was wrong with our sweet Lyla.

  

So the pediatrician told us we should switch her to a dairy-free formula called Nutramigen.  In the meantime, if I wanted to continue to breastfeed her, I should eliminate dairy from my diet.  That meant no cheese, no yogurt, no chocolate.  I'm not gonna lie, I was not very happy about this.  But I thought I should do what's best for Lyla.  So we took home some formula samples and I vowed to cut dairy from my diet.  Well, eating no dairy sucked.  The more I thought about it, the more I realized my diet is basically 95% dairy.  I decided it would take too much energy for me to figure out what I'm supposed to eat and plan meals and make sure I get enough protein.  And I decided my happiness was worth something in this equation.  

But, boy did I feel guilty!  I felt bad about the prospect of breastfeeding Archer and not Lyla.  And I felt bad about putting what I wanted before what Lyla needed.  But that all changed after Lyla had her first bottle of formula.  She slurped it down and made happy little noises as she was eating.  It was the first time she seemed to actually enjoy eating.  I decided that she was happy with her formula, so I should be happy about eating what I wanted to eat.  After all, fed is best.  Both of my babies were being fed and that's all that matters in the end.  I kept reminding myself that Lyla did get two whole months of breast milk, so she received many of the benefits of breast milk for a good chunk of time.  And who knows?  Maybe she'll outgrow her allergy and I can try breastfeeding her again in the future. 

So now things have been a bit easier in the breastfeeding department.  Nursing one baby is a heck of a lot easier than breastfeeding two!  Although now I have a pretty big milk supply since I worked on getting enough milk to feed two babies.  So I have been pumping more and freezing what Archer doesn't use in his supplement bottles.  I started the process to donate some of my breast milk to the Heart of America Mother's Milk Bank.  I'm really excited to be able to pay it forward since my babies received donor milk while they were in the NICU.  

One of the best perks of breastfeeding twins is how many calories it burns.  Twin moms who breastfeed can burn up to 1,000 calories a day!  I ended up gaining about 40 pounds during my pregnancy.  I lost those 40 pounds by the time the babies were 2 weeks old.  Now I have lost about 15 more pounds!  I never thought I would weigh less than I did before I was pregnant before my babies were 3 months old.  I thought it would take at least a year to shed that weight!  On a side note, my stomach is a wreck!  I've got stretch marks galore!  But they are a small price to pay for Archer and Lyla.  

Whether moms decide to breastfeed or formula-feed, my hat goes off to you!  Feeding babies is hard, but important work.  Whatever works best for you and your baby is the right choice.  I've got two babies and feed one with breastmilk and one with formula.  Both are fed and happy and that makes me happy.    

Jazzy Meets Her Babies

I was so excited for Jazzy to meet her new brother and sister!  I wasn't quite sure how she would respond to them.  I knew Jazzy wouldn't hurt them, but I wasn't sure if she would be interested in them. 

Adam had brought the babies' hats home for Jazzy to sniff before we brought the babies home.  We had read that allowing her to get used to their smell would help the introduction go more smoothly.  Here she is playing with her babies' hats in the backyard. 

We also asked my parents to get Jazzy a special treat to give to her when we brought the babies home.  That way she would associate something good with the babies.  So they got her a pig ear.  

The video below shows the first meeting!  (Sorry it is sideways...me and technology don't always mix.)  It was so incredibly sweet!  Jazzy was incredibly interested in Archer and Lyla.  She sniffed them and gave them some kisses.  She was far more interested in them than her pig ear!  We took that as a good sign.    

Jazzy has continued to be an amazing big sister!  She runs to them when they cry and will give them kisses.  She makes her rounds to keep tabs on both of them throughout the day.  She will barely go outside in the backyard because she doesn't like to leave them unattended.  And she sleeps downstairs instead of in our room now.  I think it's because she wants to guard the house and her babies.   

Jazzy has far exceeded my expectations as a big sister.  She is their protector.  And you can tell she really loves Archer and Lyla, even though they do their fair share of screaming.   

We haven't noticed any jealously issues.  She seems to understand that Archer and Lyla require more of our attention and seems to be okay with it.

I am suffering from dog mom guilt at the moment.  We haven't gotten back into our walking routine.  I try to take her at least once a day, but some days we don't make it.  Occasionally she'll sit by the front door, asking for a walk, and I have to walk by her to tend to a baby.  I feel so bad!  Especially since she's been so sweet with the babies!  There's nothing I want more than to take her on a 3-hour walk and let her smell anything her little heart desires.  So she might be getting a few more cookies these days and I try to give her belly a scratch whenever I have a free moment.

I love that our family feels complete now and that Jazzy is still very much a big part of it.  I can't wait to see how the bond between Archer and Lyla and Jazzy grows!    

The NICU

Archer and Lyla spent 15 days in the NICU as grower-feeders.  Grower-feeders are babies that are in the NICU only to gain weight and learn how to eat.  Babies born prematurely often aren't born with the ability to latch properly, maintain a strong suck or have the energy to eat for extended periods of time.  

Our babies were in the NICU to work on learning how to eat, but also to be fed until my milk supply increased.  Since I had complications after delivery, it took longer than normal for my milk to come in and my supply to increase enough to feed two babies.  

Our babies were fortunate enough to receive donor breast milk while I was waiting for my milk supply to increase.  Moms who donate their milk are amazing!  I was so thankful that my babies got the benefits of breast milk so early on in their lives even though I wasn't able to provide it for them.

Both Archer and Lyla ended up with NG tubes.  NG tubes are tubes that go through their noses, past their throats and into their stomachs.  So they could be fed the donor breast milk without having to do the eating themselves.  It was a little scary to think about them needing to be hooked up with tubes, but it ultimately was the best thing for them.  Without them they wouldn't have been able to gain the weight necessary to stay healthy.  

In addition to the NG tubes, they also had leads on them to monitor their heart rates, pulse and oxygen intake.  When I was eventually able to go visit my babies in the NICU, it was hard to see them with so many tubes and wires.  When I held them I felt like I had to make sure I didn't interfere with all the stuff that was attached to them.  But a walk down the NICU hallway quickly made me realize just how lucky my babies were.  They didn't have to be in incubators or be hooked up to ventilators to help them breathe.  My babies were able to breathe on their own and be in open air bassinets.  There were some babies in there that were hard to even see because they had so many wires and tubes attached and were stuck inside incubators.    

I have a newfound respect for NICU nurses after our experience.  They were all so incredibly good at what they do.  They were kind and supportive; they were encouraging and accommodating.  We got to know a few of them really well and were so thankful for their expertise.  They worked 12 hour shifts, so we had day nurses and night nurses.  

Every 3 hours the babies would have care times.  Care times involved taking vitals, diaper changes and feedings.  Adam made it a priority to make it to as many care times as possible while I was still recovering.  By the time I was able to come to the NICU, I was in awe of how much Adam stepped up.  He became a pro at taking their temperatures, changing their diapers, hooking up and disconnecting their leads and swaddling them.  He would take off his shirt and do skin to skin with our sweet babies when I couldn't be there.  It makes me cry just thinking about how much he was there for our babies when I wasn't.  I remember feeling like I was way behind the curve when I finally made it to the NICU.  I was almost afraid to touch them because they seemed so fragile and it was hard to work around their tubes and wires.  But eventually I got more comfortable with them and was able to do more.  

It was a good thing I got more comfortable since Adam eventually had to go back to work.  He decided to take FMLA leave and work just 3 days a week through October.  So he would be around Thursday-Sunday.  He also spent each night in the NICU with me and the babies, crammed on the too-small couch.  
   

Once I was released from the hospital, I moved to the babies' NICU room.  I spent my days and nights with them until we all got to go home.  I sat and slept in a recliner that had all kinds of pillows situated just-so.  I was so sore from my c-section and was actually glad that I could sleep in a recliner instead of a bed.  But I got mighty tired of that recliner and certainly wasn't sad to see it go.

When Adam was at work, my sweet mom came to stay with me and the babies.  I can't begin to tell you how grateful I was to have her there.  It was such an incredibly difficult and emotional time.  Sometimes having your mom around is just what you need.  And I needed my mom.   

My days in the NICU were long and seemed to be on repeat.  Every 3 hours, I would try to breastfeed them before they got their donor breast milk via the NG tubes.  It was a struggle.  They both had trouble getting latched.  They would get frustrated, then I would get frustrated.  There were lots of tears- both theirs and mine.  Those hormones were no joke!  I think I spent half of my time crying.  After trying to nurse them, I would hold them while they got their donor milk.  Then I would pump to try to get my supply going.  Then I would try to get them back to sleep.  It got increasingly harder.  Plus it was difficult to have to get up from the recliner when they would cry.  I would have to find time in between their care times to take a shower or eat or sleep.  I would have to walk out of the NICU and eat in the lounge outside of the NICU.  It took so much energy to hobble to the lounge, sit in the most uncomfortable chairs ever made and eat before their next care time started.  

I really, really wanted to be able to breastfeed my babies.  But my milk took forever to come in.  The nurses and lactation consultants were all incredibly supportive and encouraging.  However, some of the doctors weren't all that hopeful that I would be able to breastfeed.  Each morning there would be rounds that included neonatologists, lactation consultants, physical therapists and more people whose titles I can't remember.  They would give a run down of how sick I was after delivery and that they were still waiting on my milk to come in.  It got to be really frustrating to hear how my milk was the thing that was holding my babies back from going home.  

And it seemed as though Adam and I got conflicting information from all the different doctors and nurses.  Adam and I wanted to do all we could to help our babies, but it was hard to do what we were told when we kept being told different things each day.  By day 13, Adam expressed this frustration.  I think it helped turn the tables.  A kind doctor who happened to have triplets herself suggested they start a formula supplement mixed with breast milk.  By this point, we were all for whatever would get us home, so we said we were on board.  My milk supply was finally increasing!  And the babies were gaining well.  In order to go home, we had to have two days of weight gains.  

So night 13 rolled around.  That night we had a nurse that wasn't our favorite.  She meant well, but we questioned her judgement.  She decided to give them baths before she weighed them.  Our babies weren't exactly fans of baths at this point, so they did a lot of screaming.  Screaming uses up calories and our babies ended up losing weight that night.  We were both devastated.  I did a lot of crying on Day 14.  

However, Night 14 turned out to be a game-changer for us.  The night nurse made me sleep. (Bless her!)  She had me "top off" the babies before we weighed them and kept them wrapped up in blankets to conserve calories.  They both gained that night!  

The following morning, the doctor gave us the option of being discharged that day, so long as we took the babies to the pediatrician the next morning to make sure they gained weight again that night.  Or we could stay one more night in the NICU to make sure they gained weight for the required two days straight.  The catch was that it was Friday and if they didn't gain that night, we'd be stuck in the NICU over the weekend.  

So we said we wanted to go home before they changed their minds!  I think the fact that we had stayed with the babies the whole time they were in the NICU helped.  They said they weren't worried about the kind of care they would be getting at home.

So we buckled our babies in their car seats and the NICU nurses brought them down to our car.  I'm not gonna lie, it was a little unsettling bringing them home with us.  It was nervewracking knowing that we couldn't just push the call button and have a nurse come help or answer a question.  It was now up to us to take care of our babies full time!   But we were so ready and even more ready to introduce Archer and Lyla to Jazzy!