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The First 6 Months Of My Twins' Life

How we got through the chaos!

By WendyPublished 4 years ago 7 min read
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When I was about 18 weeks pregnant, The doctor hospitalized me for a mental breakdown. See this is nothing new for me as I have battled depression all my life.

So while I was there the doctor asked me if I had an ultrasound yet. I told him no that I hadn’t had much medical care during this pregnancy.

I was at least on my prenatal vitamins and my thyroid medication. I was also on antidepressants, but they weren’t working very well for me at the time. I couldn’t get a job and had to live with my in-laws, hence the reason I ended up in the hospital in the first place.

So the doctor ordered an ultrasound. While it took to place my husband, and I was together during it. Then the tech doing the test said the dreaded word that had me panicked.

Uh oh!

Scared something was wrong with the baby, I started to freak out. I asked her what was wrong. But she assured us that nothing was wrong. But she saw two of them. It looked like twins.

Needless to say, we were very surprised. I mean heck, I always wanted twins when I was little, and twins ran in my family. But I never thought in a million years that I have a set. It also didn’t help that my blood pressure was high during pregnancy. I was taking high blood pressure medication for it. The only time in my life I ever had any issues with high blood pressure.

The doctor watched me during the rest of my pregnancy. I was it into the high-risk category. After getting out of the hospital I was able to get a job. But as my due date got closer my duties and movements got more and more restrictive. I kept begging my doctor not to put me on maternity leave. One month before I had the girls, the doctor put his foot down and demanded that I take my maternity leave right then. He wanted to at least get to 35 weeks before giving birth.

I made it. I was only 10 days early. Damn good for carrying multiples and having a high-risk pregnancy. Even my labor went quick. It started at 11 pm; We rushed to the hospital by midnight. The nurse gave me a shot for the pain until the anesthesiologist inserted the epidural. This made me very sleepy.

They got the epidural in. The next thing I know it is after 3 in the morning and they are coming in to tell me it was time to push. I slept through my labor.

Once the girls were born everything seemed normal. We were so happy. The first one weighed 6lbs 7oz. We named her Rhiannon Marie. The second one weighed 5lbs 3oz. We named her Lavendar Dawn. The nurses insisted that was a good weight with them only being 10 days early.

A short time later as I was resting the girls were in the nursery with the nurses. Then the doctor came in. He told me that the girls had apnea. They were shipping them over 30 miles away to another town. The town had a better hospital with a better neonatal care center.

This triggered postpartum depression in me. They ended up keeping me in the hospital the 3 full days. When they released me I had to face being home without them. Yes, my husband was there and yes my 2.5 old daughter, Mercedes Elizabeth, was there. But the Twins were not there.

To make matters worse, we had no vehicle to drive to the hospital they were into camp out till their release. We could only get one ride one day to see them for a little while. This made me even sadder.

They spent 5 days in the hospital before they could come home. But this was not the end of the problems. Now don’t get me wrong. Other than the apnea problem that they had, they were otherwise healthy. We were happy about that.

When the doctor allowed them to come home, he did it on the condition that they take a special test. This test would take the entire night to complete. The tech that conducted the test came in at the beginning of bedtime to hook them up to these machines. They hooked the girls up to these machines all night. Then the tech would come back the next morning to unhook them from these machines. The information from the machines transmitted the data to the medical center.

I got no sleep that night. One of the girls decided that she was going to refuse to sleep while hooked up to the machine. The problem with this was I had to be up all night with her. I wanted to sleep during the day with her when she would go to sleep. But I couldn’t sleep the whole day I could only sleep when my husband came home from work. This was because I still had another baby and a 2 and a half year old that wanted to be up through the day.

In fact, for the first couple of months, my husband had to sleep in shifts. Which because of this we weren’t getting much sleep. We were so tired.

Anyway. After the all-night test, the doctor put the girls on heart monitors. The monitors were hooked up to the girls 24 hours a day. Whenever we went anywhere, it was a family event. We had with us a double stroller, 2 car seats, a large diaper bag, and 2 babies with a heart monitor, and a 2 and a half-year-old. We took the public bus everywhere we went. We did this when we went to the doctor and shopping. Trust me this was very hard. Luckily we ended up getting a van, so we didn’t have to rely on the bus.

But this wasn’t the worse part of it. The worse part was when the doctor put them on medication for their apnea. So I came up with an idea when giving it to them so I could remember to give it to them. Every night when I took my nightly medication I would give them their medication. Smart right?

If only it were that easy. My husband and I were not getting any real sleep during this time. We had to do it in shifts every day and night. Why? because the girls wanted to be awake all night long and the 2 and a half wanted to be awake during the day. We were exhausted and at our wit’s end.

My mom took the 3 girls for a few days to give my husband and I a chance to have some actual sleep. On the second day that my mom had them, she calls me up and asked me a stupid question. “Did you know that the medication the twins are on is caffeine medication?”

Me: “No.”

So my mom began giving them their medication in the mornings. She had no problem getting them to sleep at night with everyone else. Then they would be awake through the day.

Once this happened we began to experience sleep again. Except for one night every couple of months. On this night the Tech would come back to our apartment to conduct the overnight monitoring test. This is because Rhiannon still refused to sleep while hooked up to the machine.

The girls were on these monitors for 6 months. During this time we never once experienced an issue of either of them stop breathing. We occasionally had a problem with the monitors beeping and going off. If we did, it was only if one lead that connected to the girls was loose or coming off.

It was a thrilled day when we could have them off of the monitors. The only thing left that we had issues with was telling them apart. Lol. Yes. I was a bad mother. Most of the time I had a very hard telling which one was which. I would have to lay them side by side to tell which one was which. We tried lots of different ideas to identify them.

Mercedes at 2 and a half was the only one who could tell you which one was which by a glance and be right every time. I never could figure out how she did it. Even to this day. For this reason, I always refused to dress them identical. Anytime a family member would do that I would get very mad at them for it.

By having these experiences with my twins. It gave me an appreciation for people who have over one baby like this. I know how hard I had it when they were growing up I can’t imagine how people who have 3,4,5,6, or even 8 babies at one time do it. My hats off to them for what they go through.

You know though. No matter what I went through with them in my life, I would never wish to trade that time for anything in my life. They are my life, my love, and my world. I wouldn’t change having them ever. I think there is one thing I would change if I could. Instead of giving them their caffeine medication at night. I would give it to them in the mornings when they first began to take it.

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