Post womb- day twenty three.

Biggest stretch with just us parents, pouring rain with a flood watch which I consider to be a justifiable excuse not to leave the house. Trying both in a moby wrap this afternoon as these guys are continuing to be crochety old men much of the time... they are knocked out and mom has two free hands with which to type, fold laundry, and eat ice cream! Well at least peaceful- right now Micah is nursing the top of Phin's head although I think he would know the difference? It's kind of fuzzy.

I have a couple books and a ton of magazines I saved up for this time period but to be quite honest my brain has left for the highlands. I feel capable of food input and output and sleep for babies and myself plus very basic cleaning but that is about it. TV has become my escape and I'm finishing my netflix list very quickly. Also eating is relatively fun. If you want to lose weight it seems nursing twins is a good way to do it- I'm back to pre-pregnancy weight as of today despite eating CONSTANTLY and relatively terribly.

That's all I think. Back to regularly scheduled feedings and sleeping.

The cycle.

Sleep deprivation does not suit my blogging very well, nor my sense of humor. Our lives can be summed up in a 2 or 3 hour cycle: 15 minutes to an hour of nursing (tandem if we're lucky, singly if not), 30 minutes of expelling air, milk, gas, pee and poop from their little bodies, another 30 minutes of hanging out and/or convincing them to go back to sleep, and the remainder of the cycle is a beautiful albeit shorter than we'd like chunk of napping. If they're nursing singly, cranky, and I'm flying solo, this cycle is literally all that I do 24 hours a day. So THANK YOU to friends, family, and spouse that have been helping out.

On fatigue.

I knew this was coming. We all knew this was coming. But thinking about caring for infants that primarily need sleep, food, and clean diapers is much different from actually providing said services. In our first few nights, Andrew and I got five hours of sleep total I think... mostly from in-between-feeding stays in the hospital nursery. Since we've been home we established a shift schedule with my parents that's worked relatively well- they each took a three hour night shift as my "pacer" as the dairy cow in the scenario, changing diapers, soothing, and waking me up for mealtimes. With that I think we all were at around five hours a night not that I'm doing math at this point. But obviously this can't last; how the heck does anyone do this solo? How are any parents of multiples still ALIVE after this nonsense? It doesn't make evolutionary sense for offspring to kill off the parents before they're in a good place to survive on their own, right?

And so, parents out there- hats off to you. I must assume that we also will survive, but thanks for being the light at the end of this tunnel... and all the other tunnels that are sure to come.

There are no longer shrimps in my belly pt 2

I thought I'd give you all two chapters since this is way more than I usually write...

Micah Brant was born first at 9:36pm, at 6 lbs 8 oz and 19.5". He has black hair, an oval face, and a pointy little chin. So far he's been the first to figure out eating, and enjoys stretching his arms over his head and hiccuping.

Phineas Beck was born second at 9:39pm, at 6 lbs 5 oz and 18.75". He has dark brown hair and "fur" on his arms and back, a more square face with pinchable cheeks, and a little cleft chin. Phin enjoys directing invisible orchestras, crowing, and peeing all over himself during a diaper change.

Those days we were in the hospital we faced a barrage nurses, pediatricians, obstetricians, nursing students, lactation consultants, etc... probably somebody every 15 minutes- no joke. It was very nice to have so much expertise at our disposal but definitely overwhelming.  Not having had any surgery or broken bones in my life, recuperation has been an extremely painful process. I can now say I've had multiple catheters, ugh. Never looked forward to peeing or other bathroom activities done on my own ever this much before.

We were in the hospital up to Thursday afternoon; my parents came Wednesday and have taken super care of all of us. I've been feeling much better daily from the operation, and sleeping/eating for the babies has been improving as well although I think we all would appreciate a faster improvement on the sleep! Andrew's parents come for a visit this weekend, hooray!

The are no longer shrimps in my belly!

Hello there, and sorry about the delay but we were a bit distracted.

I was looking forward to posting on Monday because when Andrew and I went out for lunch, he decided to inspire my body to go into labor by backing up and going over the speed bump in our parking a second time on the way in and out. Apparently this is a legitimate way to break your water at the very least. Around four I had a glass of milk and cookie to inspire productivity, and decided to go around and tidy some things. I must have leaned over too far to pick up some board games at 5:45... I know now that this is not a subtle hint- was worried before I "wouldn't notice" such a symptom.

Called the hospital to confirm, and they wanted us in there immediately. We followed our little list of self written instructions and drove there... didn't even get lost on the way. Checked in and water breakage confirmed by around 6:30. Sonogram to check on the babies' positions by Dr. Seidel soon after determined that they would do a C-section; despite my water breaking I was having no contractions which meant waiting for them would add unnecessary stress to the fetuses, as well as a chance for contamination. Baby B was also in transverse (sideways) which was the last straw. We really weren't offered regular delivery as an option at all... oh well.

Prep-work and waiting took a few hours, but I was wheeled into the operating room at 9pm sharp. Andrew looks pretty nice in scrubs- a potential second career? but was left outside the door until I was set up. I had a spinal rather than epidural, which really pinched but wasn't nearly as terrible as I imagined. A nurse with a thick accent was describing rapidly to me everything that was and would be happening, and Lourde was playing in the background. Everybody in the room (maybe 10 staff?) introduced themselves and I immediately forgot all of their names. They laid me out on a table like a horizontal cross, set up the tent around my body and sent Andrew in who sat in a stool by my head.

All I can say about the rest is the little I experienced- very surreal. My body was warm and fuzzy; I could feel my torso being moved around and pressure being exerted but that was it. Mostly I held Andrew's hand and listened to the two doctors talking about sports while guessing what was happening and not really wanting to know. By 9:49 both babies were delivered and I was being put back together. They gave both babies to Andrew once they were out and cleaned up... actually they also let him take pictures when each were delivered and walk around to see them being cleaned up- not sure I'd want to switch places on the first part.

To be continued...

37.3

Blerg. Nothing.

37.2

Not in labor?

What is labor, anyway? How can one identify a pain by a book description? Slept in, realized this was our last Saturday without babies, so we laid around some more. Did some lazy errands and chores, had some friends over. Had what I considered to be a legitimate pulled muscle but weird related-but-not-related feelings are continuing. I attempted to track time and so forth like they tell you to, but nothing's consistent. Meh.

So if this does turn out to be something, Andrew has a good number of you on an email list to alert when we go to the hospital, etc. It's fairly safe to assume if there isn't an update here one day that I ended up in labor and got distracted from a blog post by pushing two watermelon sized babies out of my body.

Over and out!

37.1

Not in labor. Super tired. Here's a picture.

Week thirty-seven.

Shrimps:

• Are wriggling a LOT. Whoever's feet are on my right side I think has caused an internal bruise at the top of my belly. SORE.
• Believe it or not, Baby B has wriggled his way back to breech. This kid is going to be the next Houdini I think. Also means that the delivery method will be unknown until we get there, really... not that this is surprising. 
• Vertex(Baby A) + vertex(Baby B) + random doctor on call = regular birth process unless there's an emergency
• Vertex(Baby A) + breech or transverse(Baby B) + random doctor on call = regular birth process if the doctor is brave and experienced, one regular and one c-section if they listen to me and then chicken out/there's an emergency, or both c-section if they're especially squeamish about non-vertex regular birth.
• Non-vertex(Baby A) + non-vertex(Baby B) + pretty much any doctor in the hospital = c-section
• These situations all depend on me going into labor on my own. The nice thing about the induction is that the doctor on call that day is pretty experienced and has delivered breech twins before, I guess. So we'll see what he wants to do.
• No official measurement on their weight this week, but they're most likely getting closer to 7 lbs each. Trying very hard to stuff my face on their behalf.

Laura:

• Is considering what she looks most forward to about her post-pregnancy body. I think it's basically narrowed down to less heartburn and shirts fitting over my torso. There will of course be plenty of other things going on afterward that are not fun, but I'm hoping these two will have been amended. Oh! Also not having to lean over and sit like a giraffe drinking water. Yessss.
• Attempted shaving the ol' legs the other night and man was that a bad idea. Super dry legs + new razor + really limited ability to SEE legs = angrily rashy, still partially hairy legs with a couple cuts. I think I'll just go for au natural.

Andrew:

• Has exchanged normal greetings used toward Laura to ask things like, "has it started yet?" "have you had a contraction?" "has your water broken?".  As if I would keep that information secret if I knew? Tsk tsk.
• Ordered the last of the cloth diapers this week and watched some "how to" videos on cleaning/tips etc. What a guy.

36.6

Not in labor.

Boy is this getting old... although we can't be too complainy because we really only have had a two week window given for this to happen and we're halfway there! Appointment tomorrow so we'll see what the doctor says is going on. In the meantime we're just super dull.

36.5

Not in labor.

Had some April Fool's fun on facebook today, couldn't help myself. Sorry if I disappointed anyone too much!

The weather is beautiful, I just had my last official work meeting... come on babies! Andrew's boss came by today to drop off some projects that require relatively less brain power in the upcoming weeks too. Also Andrew seems to be really focused lately on eating all the leftovers; I think a) he doesn't want to come back to icky spoiled stuff in the fridge, or b) he subconsciously feels that when the leftovers are gone I will go into labor. Either way it's cute.