If living with a newborn baby is tough and rewarding in equal measure, what’s it like living with two newborns? Hectic, demanding, chaotic and happy, says busy mom Liani Maré
We arrived home with our precious cargo just in time for Christmas. Our three days old boy and girl weighing 2.3kg each were healthy, tiny and immediately every sound in and around the house, sounded like a baby, even the Hadedas outside.
Two months later, being a first time mom with twins, I can’t give you a breakdown of a typical day, but I can tell you I’m busy all the time. I apologise to the mothers I had always thought were exaggerating, when they said they were often in their pyjamas all day. Sorry ladies!
If I understood better what my sisters in law and good friends went through, I would have offered to sleep over, take their baby for a few hours, and give them time to blow dry their hair, water the garden, cook a simple meal or sleep in the same bed as their partner for a night.
I had visions of myself baking while the twins sleep, and reading a lot of parenting books while on maternity leave. But it seems my only tutors now are two 4kg individuals, and the only cooking I do is restricted to the microwave. The one evening all I wanted to do from 6pm onwards was finish my dinner, brush my teeth and shower. In the end all I could manage was to brush my teeth to the soundtrack of a crying baby, at 1am.
In the first six weeks, it took an hour to feed the twins and another hour to get them to sleep. They would drink every three hours, eight or more times a day. Even though it sounds like a routine, it rarely worked out this way. You try to eliminate everything that could be bothering the little ones – hunger, wind, nappy, being too cold or hot – and they still cry for hours at a time.
Many nights I’ve cried with them. I wish I knew how to make them feel better. One of the things that I’m learning is that I’m not going to have all the answers, ever. I’m learning that babies are not patient. I’m learning that it is possible to laugh about things that aren’t funny at all, when you are in a constant state of being tired or overwhelmed.
I’m learning that if one baby cries, you have a very small window of opportunity before the other one joins in. I’m learning that crying and screaming sounds much louder at night.
Mostly, I’m learning that this is not the time to be too proud to ask for help. Help can be in the form of many things. Food (my mother stocked our fridge with healthy meals), text messages from dear friends, saying it is okay to say how tough it is (this made me cry, instantly) or someone stopping to make coffee and ask if you need time to go to the bathroom.
There is no time for worry about such things such as the amount of milk the babies are getting, as we are too focused on providing comfort, food, a safe and happy home. I’m slowly learning to celebrate the things going well, rather than worrying about everything that could go wrong. This has happened too with our little girl being hospitalised for 10 days.
Everything is more than I could have imagined. From the helplessness I feel when they cry to the way my heart melts when they smile.
Some people have asked me what it feels like to be a mother. I really haven’t had time to think about this yet. I just know that no matter how tough a sleepless night is, I look at my children in the morning and I’m in awe of these perfect little people with their very different personalities.
I just want to stare at them, marvel at the things they do and remind myself how long we have waited for this very moment – our very own modern family.
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