Every day is a battle between feeling guilty for one thing or another and the gratefulness that comes with being a parent. Sometimes I think this spectrum is much larger for those women who struggled to get pregnant. I remember reading Facebook posts from mothers complaining about a variety of things that come with pregnancy/parenting and my responses would be like this...
"My kids were up all night!" - I would be give up all my sleep to just have a baby
"I am so sick of being pregnant!" - I would give anything to become pregnant...anything
"Does someone want to take a few kids off of my hands? You can have them!" - Ok...I will take them.
You get the point. I swore I would never complain on Facebook about my pregnancy or my children, I don't care how bad it gets and trust me...I had some real content the last few weeks of my pregnancy. Just because I don't post anything on Facebook about how hard it is being a new mom of twins, doesn't mean I don't think it in my head. This is where the constant battle between feeling guilty and grateful comes into play.
As a mom, I feel like I could always be doing something better and with twins, that feeling is more than doubled. If I am holding one baby, then I am not holding the other. There are many times in the day when I am attending to the needs of one baby while the other one is crying. The whole issue of nursing is really for another post but I have basically given up on breastfeeding. I will pause for your reaction/judgement/sadness/understanding or whatever else. I just couldn't sit there and nurse one baby while the other one cried. We also had latch issues, sleepy babies and so on. I can juggle giving both of them bottles but nursing wasn't working for me. I would have to nurse each baby for 30 minutes, then give them any milk I had pumped and THEN top them off with formula. This would equal over 2 hours for one feeding and 4 dirty bottles. By the time I finished with the second baby, it was time for the first one to eat again. I feel guilty because I know some women would give anything to be able to nurse their babies and even though we had struggles, I was able to do it. On the other hand, I am grateful that I was even able to and I am even more grateful that my body does produce (almost) enough milk to feed my babies. As of now, I am almost exclusively pumping. I take it one day at a time. There is a lot of shame and pressure around breastfeeding and anyone who is doing it with one or two babies, you are amazing. If you aren't able to or choose not to, you are amazing too.
I started writing this post a few weeks ago and during that time I have found that between guilty and grateful is a TON of GRACE. The Lord knows how thankful I am for these children and he also knows how tired I really am. I feel floods of Grace every single day. I honestly, don't know how people are parents without Jesus in their life. Seeing a baby born should seal the deal right there but everyday I am only able to keep my head above water because of Jesus and my husband.
Let me talk about my amazing husband for just a minute. This man is super Daddy, let me tell you! Dads of twins are a rare breed and they are truely partners in parenting. Ben changes at least a dozen diapers a day without blinking an eye, does middle of the night feedings every night, gives most of the baths and supports a very emotional, unpredictable wife. Ben works split shifts so he comes home from work at 11:30am and then goes back around 2 every day. When walks in the door he never knows what he will find! Some days I am in tears with 2 crying babies and some days I have lunch on the table with a smile on my face. The latter is pretty rare but you get my drift. The minute he walks in the door, he drops his stuff and says, "What do you need?" I am usually hooked up to my pumping machine and a baby needs a bottle or changing and he dives right in. He then makes us both lunch, feeds and changes one or both babies and then heads back to work just to do the same thing when he gets home at 6:00. I could not ask for a better partner in this journey. I am impressed with him every day and I fall more in love with him every day.
I do believe in God's timing, even in moments where I felt completely forgotten about when the world seemed to be passing us by. Our marriage is so much stronger than it was even a year ago and having a baby, let alone 2, will put strain on any marriage but God was preparing us for this. The lessons He taught us in respect, love languages, financial provision, control, responsibility and trust...were all to prepare us for this time. It also helps that we have desperately wanted children for years before this. It helps when you are exhausted, haven't showered in 3 days, have multiple forms of bodily fluids on you, to know that this is an answer to prayers.
Every day gets a little better and we start to feel like we have this under control, for at least the moment. The babies slept for 6 hours last night...the SAME 6 hours! They went down at 8:30 and 9:00 and didn't get up till 3:00am. What a huge milestone! They both ate and then slept again till 6:30 and 7:00. I am letting Ben sleep in this morning since Carter is asleep in the swing and Elianna is talking to me in the Rock & Play. I have the best babies they are very content as long as they have a dry butt and a full belly.
Blogs to come about going back to work, weight loss/gain and new mom anxiety!
Follow me on instagram to see more pics of the babies! @misheldawn
I try to keep the pictures on facebook to a minimum out of respect but facebook is the primary way my grandparents see pictures of the babies.
