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Monday, August 2, 2010

Count With Me...

One long night.

Two change of sheets.

Three feedings per twin.

Four pj changes.

Five minutes of sleep before the next whimper starts...

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I have survived the first week without M.'s help during the day.

Thank goodness he's here at night. Nighttime is tough. Big Boy keeps wetting through everything. It doesn't matter how often I change his diaper, which way I point him, or how tight I seal up the diaper. I'm guaranteed that I'm going to go through at least 3 outfits a day, and another 3 at night! Moms of boys, do you have this problem? If so, what do you do about it?

Then, there's Pretty girl... She now wants to nurse every hour on the hour during the night. Not during the day, but at night only. Which is hard, especially every 2 hours, when Big Boy wants his turn. I haven't managed to figure out how to tandem nurse them yet, so someone has to wait. If I can pump once a day, we'll give one of them a bottle of breast milk, if they can't wait for the other to finish. Otherwise, one just has to fuss until I can feed them.

It seems that trial and error is the only way to figure out what works best for us, and we've had more good days than bad. I might be sleep deprived, but I'm still in awe, that they are mine, every time I look at them. :)

14 comments:

  1. Wow, I am in awe that you are doing so great with this!! I had a hard time with one. Lordy woman.

    And yes as a matter of fact we did have issues with V wetting through his diaper. for one thing, they always draw their knees up and so if you put on a diaper with their legs drawn up you are going to have a big gaping gap in the diaper and when they do finally put their legs down, which is almost a gaurantee when they pee, they are going to pee up or sideways and totally pee through the diaper. Also, we found we could not use Huggies diapers at all!! Pampers seemed to do the trick for us.

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  2. You are a saint! :) I'm tired just reading about your routine! You're doing awesome, things are bound to settle a bit. (hopefully :)

    I'd say it's time for the Big Guy to move up a size in diapers (I know, already... those leetle ones are so cute!). B was only in newborns for 5 or 6 days and we had to go to size 1s. He was pooping and peeing out the sides of the newborns. I've never had to mess with pointing his bizness in a certain direction (which doesn't hold anyway) if the diaper was big enough.

    Gooood luck!

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  3. You're doing awesome!!

    I hope the diaper situation gets resolved!!

    How is Ms. O doing with them??

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  4. With our boys, we found the Pampers Swaddlers worked well. We also but a thicker blanket tucked into the crib so when the boys leaked, we didn't have to change the sheets. That is such a pain. See if you can put a blanket or diaper changing pad under the boys, especially in the beginning, since they tend to mostly stay in the same spot. We also went through 3-5 outfits per kid per day with thre wetting through. As they get bigger, this doesn't happen as much.
    Good luck and hang in there!

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  5. Two things on the leaky dipes:

    1. Make sure penis is pointed down and not up, to the side, or some other odd direction.

    2. Try different diapers. Some work better for skinny legs, chunky legs, big tummy, etc.


    Another trick with sheets: put a sheet on the crib, top with a water proof mattress pad, top with another sheet. When baby leaks/spits/pukes/poops onto the sheet at 3am, simply take off top sheet and mattress pad. The bottom sheet will be fresh. I've been known to repeat the layers, too, so there are 3 sheets (2 in reserve).

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  6. My boy advice is similar- go up in size (I find that F grows out of diapers way before he is "supposed to" as far as the weights go on the box). Also make sure when you put the diaper on that the gussets are all pulled out, and not tucked in toward his legs. I lay the baby butt down on the back of the diaper then gently pull the diaper straight forward toward his toes, then up to seal it on. Works well to get the diaper in perfect position. :)

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  7. Oh, man. My boys both pee through their diapers all. the. time. Their favorite time to do it is when they are settling in to nurse, squished right up against me, and then... oh, the familiar feeling of something warm and wet spreading across my stomach. It's actually why I've just quit wearing a shirt altogether when I nurse, 'cos I always get peed on. It's also why I just ordered a new nursing pillow, which I will be covering with something waterproof before using it. I've switched diapers (both disposables and cloth) and I have yet to find the right thing to contain the pee. No brand seems better or worse, no size is better or worse (they are currently in size 1-2 Costco brand diapers, which are supposedly appropriately sized for babies 5-6 lbs larger than they are right now, but that doesn't seem to make a difference). I think I may try using a disposable with a cloth doubler pad over it then covered with a waterproof cloth diaper wrap. We'll see if that will work!

    Not that you asked, but here is how I manage tandem nursing. First, get a good nursing pillow for twins if you don't have one already (I like the EZ 2 Nurse Twins nursing pillow, which I wrote about on my blog in a post last week). I use a pillow behind me that has arms-- you know, one of those "sit up in bed", somewhat rigid pillows, and then rest the nursing pillow on my lap. I grab one boy on one side, then carefully pull the next boy up on the other side. I do this in bed, so the boys are laying in front of me or to my side on the bed, wherever I can reach them. Then, I get one latched on (usually J, who is my good latcher/feeder. I then let go of him, and get H latched on. Sometimes, I have to go back and forth a little to get everyone firmly latched and feeding, but once everyone's on, both hands are free to do whatever I need to do (like typing comments on blogs!). Anyhow, I cannot recommend it enough. It took a bit to figure it out, and at first, I had to have someone hand me the babies (it's still easier if someone is around to hand them off to me and take them when I'm done), but eventually, I figured out how to do it on my own. It has literally been a lifesaver to be able to feed them at the same time, and to have my hands free to read or eat or surf the net, etc. Anyhow, if you want more advice or information, let me know. You may have heard everything I've said before, but in the case that you hadn't, I wanted to offer the limited expertise I have!

    Ah, yes. I'm with you on the once an hour thing. It's hard. Really, really hard. I'm commiserating with you virtually!

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  8. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  9. Sorry... that's my dupe I deleted above...

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  10. You're doing awesome! I can't even imagine twins.

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  11. Wow with that schedule anybody is bound to be sleep-deprived.

    I am glad that you are managing to do it all so well!

    Good Luck!

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  12. Crazy! Is he peeing or pooping out of the dipes? Miles didn't have that problem often, only during massive poop explosions!

    (Blogger is being ugly and not letting me use my WP creds to sign in....Raising Miles)

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  13. No advice, just wow! Marathon mothering round the clock!

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  14. Im late on the advice--but I did the same that a lot of the ladies above did--I moved him up a size.

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