I needed to add this posting

I haven't blogged since last April. Since my babies started turning into toddlers, since things got a bit easier, since I fully recovered from the shock of having twins. My girls are 26 months now.

I wanted to add this posting for the twin moms who come across this blog in the midst of the first year, when things are so hard you feel desperate.

I'm writing this because my girls are upstairs playing in their room. They've made up a game in which one girl hides under the blanket fort pretending to be a dragon while the other walks by and is scared by the roar and runs away. They take turns being the dragon "Lena be dragon?" "Ya!". They are laughing, running, playing together.

I'm reminded of the woman on the street, who walked by with her seven year old twins when mine were only a year. She said, "At first you think you're unluckier than everyone else who had just one baby to care for, but over time you will realize that really, you're the lucky one". Today, my eyes fill with tears as I listen to my little girls playing by themselves upstairs, with each other. They have each other! We are lucky and they are lucky, to have one another.

You'll survive, and it gets so much better.

Goodbye Blog

I've been thinking for a few weeks about bringing my blog to a close. It's been a tumultuous year, and I'm happy to have blogged about it. My girls are getting older, things have gotten easier to handle and the shock of being a mom of multiples has worn off. There's a few reasons why I'm going to stop blogging, one being the privacy of my toddlers who are growing into little girls.

I want to thank you all for following us on this journey. For empathizing with me, for supporting me and giving advice. It got me through some really tough times. I hate to give up on my blog because the main reason I wrote it was for other moms to know that they're not alone in what they're going through. My heart would swell when I heard another mom-of-multiples found solace in an entry. I'm sorry to go, but it's time to move on.

Thank you so much for your support.
Loranda

After Yesterday

Yesterday was a not-so-good day and my blog posting was rather distressing. Reading it over again, I wanted to mention that a) When Lena was calling for help it was because her bunny fell between the beds and she couldn't reach it (I was checking in on her every 5-10mins, I hadn't just left her up there for an hour yelling "help!", b) Lena did not nap, c)Lena woke Carmen up, d)Both girls were cranky, but e)The world did not crumble.

Yes, they were tired all afternoon. We didn't go out like I planned because Lena was acting tired and having accidents in her undies, which is weird because she hadn't had any accidents for a week. Tired? I don't know, but the world did not crumble.

Today I sat in their room with them until they fell asleep, then snuck out. I will have to do this for a while I think, as it's better than the alternative.

Now, to rest until they wake up.

Update...

There's been so much going on in our house lately, but I haven't had a second to sit down and blog about it until now. Last week I ended up in ER with heart and chest pains, a very scary place to have pains. After a lot of hours in the hospital and tests all week, it seems I have acute pericarditis and that I'm recovering. It's when the outer sac of the heart becomes inflamed as a result of a previous viral infection. Lots of ibuprofen, rest (hah) and monitoring of my progress are what the doctor ordered.

When I first started feeling the heart/chest pains I realized how stressed out I was, and I was seriously hoping the heart pains and the stress weren't related. Luckily, they weren't, but before I knew that for sure, I thought a lot about why I was stressed out, and how I could manage it. My job really stresses me out. It doesn't end, I don't get to stop being a mom for a second; it's non-stop and it's full on.

My anxiety is inextricably linked to my children's sleep, and we are going through the crib to toddler bed transition. Trying to get toddlers to go to sleep by themselves in their own bed when they have the freedom to get up and walk around the room is incredibly frustrating and anxiety-inducing.*  I know they are tired, they need to sleep, and yet they won't! Right now, as I type this, my stress levels are rising as I hear Lena trying to open the door to her room, saying "help!" "help!" "Poopee poopee" (I just took her to the potty before nap-time). I've been trying to get her to go to sleep for the past hour. Carmen's been sleeping for the past 40mins. I'm afraid Lena's going to wake up Carmen, or worse, that Carmen will wake from her nap and Lena won't have gone to sleep yet. At that point, Lena will not sleep at all today because if I get Carmen up and out of the room and leave Lena in there by herself, Lena will flip out. Then I will have one cranky Lena all afternoon, with meltdowns at dinnertime that progress until bedtime.

Then I start thinking about the future, if Lena gets away with not napping today, will she think it's ok not to nap tomorrow? Is my future going to be full of these struggles, is she going to give up napping all together? I need them to nap. Naptime used to be a source of pleasure for me. For one hour during the day, I was able to shower, relax, eat something or lay on the sofa and turn off. This relax time has not only disappeared, but it's been replaced with major stress-inducing battles.

Breathe. How to manage this stress?

Reminding myself that this is not the end of the world. That the girls napped well the past few days. Today is a setback but I will not give up the fight that is nap-time. I will win and they will sleep. If not today, then tomorrow.

I need to step back. To accept that the world will not crumble if the children do not nap, even though it may feel that way. This is much easier said than done. It's really hard for me to see the big picture when I live in a world comprised of millions of minuscule and yet important pieces. Book doctors appointments, do taxes, make breakfast, make lunch, make dinner, clean up breakfast, clean up lunch, clean up dinner, buy groceries, do laundry, feed the cat, eat something, pay hydro bill, set-up direct deposit for mortgage payments, buy the babies bigger socks, and in between all that try to teach them something, show them something, and give them new experiences... chill out is the last thing on my list.

Living in that state of stress is not good for my body. I'm still figuring out how to manage. Maybe I won't figure it out, time will just pass and the babies will grow up.

*Although trying to get them to go to sleep in their toddler beds for nap-time is stressful, night-time has been going really well. So at least we've got that.

Toddler Bed Transition - Part Two

Well, we've had two naps and three nights in our new beds. The first time they napped, it took an hour for them to fall asleep, at which time they played, giggled, cried, knocked the clock off the wall, opened the door, closed the door, rolled around all over the floor and finally, went into their own beds and fell asleep. 

The past two nights have been so much better than the first. It only took them 15-30mins to fall asleep in their beds. Like any transition, it's not fun, but with commitment and consistency, I think it can work. If they get out of their beds and cry, I go in and silently tuck them in again. Sometimes if they're really upset I stay and pat their bums. That being said, the girls are waking up earlier than they used to, closer to 7am than 9am but I can live with that. I know I was supremely spoiled and I am grateful for that time. Who knows what will happen over the next week. One thing I'm sure of though, is how incredibly proud I feel of them when I walk by their room and they've climbed into their own beds and gone to sleep!

Toddler Bed Transition - Part One

Last night, we waved goodbye to our baby beds and said hello to our big girl beds. There's no time like the present right? I read somewhere last night that as a mother, if you start to wonder if it's the right time to make a change or introduce something new, it's probably the right time. And so, even though at 6am I was convinced I'd buy two big cribs on Craigslist in the morning and keep the girls in them until they turned five, I know I need to stick to our transition. Consistency and praise are the cornerstones of motherhood! No waffling about. If you're wondering why I need to make this transition now, it's because I bought mini cribs for the girls, which are much shorter than standard size cribs, as we found out we were having twins while living in our one-bedroom apartment and there was no way we could fit two standard size cribs in it. So the downside is that they grew out of them before age 2. And here we are, making the transition to cribs at 19 months.

Here's the girls playing on their brand new beds before bath time. They were really excited about them!

So here's what happened: I put all their toys and books away in the closet and locked the closet doors, and secured a baby gate across the door to their room. I nursed them and put them down at 7 like usual. Since we're potty training Lena, she told me she had to go potty as soon as I put her in her bed so I took her back out to the bathroom and put her on the potty. Carmen came to the gate and cried while I was with Lena (Orlando was in the shower after biking home so I was by myself for a bit) but I had to wait for Lena to finish. When she did, I took her back to the room and said "It's bedtime" and led them both back to their beds and tucked them in. They were both crying. I left the room and they both came to the gate right away crying. I led them back to their beds saying "It's bedtime", tucked them in and kissed them goodnight. They came back to the gate, crying. Every time, I let them cry for a couple minutes, then led them back to their beds. I stopped saying goodnight or talking to them, just gently tucking them in over and over. This went on for half an hour. It started getting darker, and they were getting more tired and cranky so I stayed in their room, sat between their two beds and rubbed their backs while they calmed down. They continually looked up to ensure I was still with them. After another half hour, they had calmed down. I left the room and went downstairs. Five minutes later, they had both come to the gate crying. Orlando went up and they got back in their beds by themselves. He tucked them in. That went on for about half an hour more. By this time it was eight thirty. We decided the next time they came to the gate, we'd leave them for a bit longer and after about ten minutes they went quiet.

At nine, I walked past their room and heard Carmen say "HI!" and I bolted up to my room. Quiet for another hour as I had a bath. I went in before bed to see where they were. Carmen was in her bed but I couldn't find Lena! Finally I found her in a pile on the floor, snoring, with her head under Carmen's bed! I put her back in bed, covered them up and didn't hear from them until 6am.

Now this is not something I want to admit. It's a guarded secret that I don't like to tell anyone. Carmen and Lena go to bed at 7pm and usually sleep until 8 or 9. This is one of the reasons I was SO reluctant to make the transition to toddler beds. I was petrified of losing this luxury. So at 6, I heard Lena come to the gate and call for us, cry a little, and then to my horror, I heard her go over and try to wake up "Dodo" (sister). For the next half hour I heard them on and off, and I had such anxiety worrying about waking up at 6 every day now... and this is when I became determined to buy two cheap cribs off Craigslist and keep them in those until kindergarten. But after a bit, all was silent and we fell back asleep. They woke up at a normal time, 8:18 (for some reason this exact time is often when we get up). I went downstairs and they were both standing in their reading nook, happy.

So that's the first night. Success? I'm not sure. It's 10am and I'm already worried about today's nap-time. I think I'll start early. Breathe in, breathe out. I am patient and loving. I will not lose my cool. Repeat.

Pinnacle Peak

I saw a bunch of yellow flowers growing out of desert rock.
The stems strained out between two boulders,
reaching up, towards the sun.
On tips, the vibrant yellow sang,

We can be beautiful, we can grow
in the most unlikely places,
in the most difficult places,
flowers can bloom.

When it's hard,
too hard to say,
not only can it be ok
it can be beautiful.

Ch-Ch-Changes!

It's exciting times in the Vazquez house. We're just re-adjusting to life at home after our vacation, Lena's wearing big girl undies during the day, and yesterday we said goodbye to sleep sacks. From about 3 months old, the girls have been sleeping in little sleep sacks that zipper up so they can't kick off their blankets or wrap them around their faces while they sleep. Then, the night before last, Carmen threw a fit. The sleep sacks we have are up to 18 months (girls are 19mos) and I knew I didn't want to continue using them after they outgrew this size, so it was only a matter of time before we got rid of them.

I believe Carmen was hot, or feeling restricted in her now-too-small sleep sack, but for the first hour of her crying and screaming in the middle of the night, I couldn't figure that out. Finally I took off her sleep sack and she said "uhoh" a few times before falling back to sleep. Then she woke at 4am because she was cold so I covered her in a blanket. They slept through last night too, minus the 4am "we're cold" cry. So... I'm thinking maybe I just need to leave the heat on in their room now to keep them toasty (and, most importantly, asleep).

Since we're on the topic of change, Orlando and I set up the toddler beds last night. Now it's just a matter of when we start using them. Today I'm going to the store to look for child-proof mechanisms for the closet and dresser. Then I'm going to make room in said closet for all their toys and books to stay locked in during bedtime. I'm going to put a gate across their bedroom door so they can't get out. Then... I shall change beds. *sigh*

On that note, if you're interested in buying some excellent condition Grobags of all sizes, or a DaVinci Emily style mini crib, let me know!

We Did It!

Well, we're home from our second family vacation and first flight with the babies. We went down to Arizona to stay with my parents for just over a week.

I was anxious about flying with the babies, and although it wasn't fun, it wasn't too bad. As it turns out, about a million other parents had the idea to go down to Arizona with their children to visit their parents as well, so there were a lot of babies on the flight. We even saw triplets! The crying newborn behind us took most of the attention away from our squirming toddlers.

For the first year of the girls' lives I did not feel like I could go anywhere (on vacation) with them, but after they turned 1 we went with our family to a wedding in Kelowna and we had a great time. So when we talked about going to Arizona, I knew that we could do it, and that most importantly, the girls would really enjoy it. I'm always surprised at just how much they learn when we're on vacation. While we were in Kelowna, Carmen learned to walk. While in Arizona, Lena started potty training herself and learned a million new words. I come home after being away for a week and feel like the babies have grown up so much!

They went swimming in a pool for the first time in their lives, and they LOVED it. Carmen took to it right away, but Lena cried and was afraid. She sat with Nana at poolside the first day. The second day we took them in, and both girls had a blast. Lena was saying "kick", "splash", "jump" "step", "pool" and "aqua" (Abuela teaches her some Spanish so she calls water "aqua"). Carmen couldn't get enough of Papa and was waking up much earlier than normal calling for him. Both girls are still waking up too early for my liking, but I'm hoping that will go back to normal and that daylight savings tomorrow will work in my favour!

Here's some pictures from our holiday. As amazing as our trip was, and as much as we'll miss the sun, we're happy to be back home in (rainy) Vancouver.

18 Months

Somehow, my girls aren't the littlest babies on the block anymore! Today they are 18 months old and I am dedicating this posting to the little things they've been up to lately, so I won't forget.

This week, Carmen climbed up onto the structure at the park all by herself. There's three steps up to the top, one about knee high (my knees, not theirs!), one about waist-high and the last about shoulder-high. Carmen wriggled and pulled herself up, up, up and with the biggest, proudest smile, she toddled over, sat down and went down the slide. All by herself. She ran around and did it all again and again.

Lena's vocabulary expands every single day. We have a huge picture book and she says the words for all the pictures as we flip through. Bike. Grapes (gapes). Apple (bapple). Banana. Baby. Clock. Car. Pig. Kitty (ditty). Doggie. I can't believe how many words she knows. She loves doing puzzles too, and is incredibly curious about everything. She takes things apart, tries to zip things, buckle things, open and close things. She likes trying to figure out how everything works.

As I was cleaning the kitchen after dinner the other night, Carmen tore through and, to keep her busy, I asked her to put all her blocks back in the bag. I didn't pay much attention, but five minutes later when I looked up, she was scooting around filling the bag up with all the blocks! Lena was "sweeping" with her little broom and Carmy was picking up her toys. My little helpers!

They've also been playing together more and more. Giggling, running, chasing, screaming. Holding hands, pulling each other around. Sitting and playing with their blocks, making (or taking apart) a tower together. Talking to each other, giving kisses and squeezes. It's a really fun age right now. I am so honoured to be able to watch them grow up together. <3

Happy Valentine's Day!

To celebrate Valentine's Day, just for fun, we did some finger painting for the first time. I bought heart-shaped paper from the dollar store, finger paints, and then covered my entire dining area with drop-sheets. I did my best to let the girls go wild with the paint, only a few times saying "not in your mouth" but mostly encouraging them and admiring their beautiful little paintings. It was quite a mess, I'm definitely not used to getting messy! They had fun and I was so proud of their first art projects. Lena mostly mashed all the colours together, and Carmen meticulously pushed each colour around on the paper with careful little fingers. Here are some pictures. Happy Valentine's Day!

Toddler Beds... *insert ominous music here*

 Sharing a crib for the first month.

When we found out we were having twins, we came back to our one bedroom apartment and looked around trying to imagine where we were going to fit two cribs (and everything else...). After a lot of online research, we found the "mini cribs" by DaVinci, a popular crib manufacturer. They are just a couple inches slimmer and quite a few inches shorter than standard cribs, and they fit perfectly side-by-side in our bedroom window alcove. When the babies were first born, they slept together in the same crib for the first month.
After about a month, we discovered that Lena was crying and was generally unsettled a lot more often than Carmen and it was easier to have them in separate cribs so Carmen could sleep undisturbed by herself. Although I will say one babies crying never seemed to wake the other baby, or even make them flinch for that matter! Thank goodness. When we first moved them into their own cribs in our bedroom, Carmen seemed so happy to have her own space. She excitedly waved her arms around and smiled.

So now, at 18 months old, they're growing out of their mini cribs. I ordered their toddler beds online and they've come in; we're going to pick them up from the States on Saturday. After that, I'm going to wait until the very last moment when their heads and toes are literally touching the ends of their crib. I've literally read nothing but terrible stories about the transition out of cribs. What I've read a lot of is toddlers simply giving up their naps and playing in their room instead, and I can totally see that happening. So I ask of you, dear readers, if you have any stories of encouragement or advice for this transition. Did you transfer your toddler/twins before 2 years old? If so, please share!

I just didn't think it would be this hard...

My girlfriend was over the other day with her (very adorable) two week old baby. The day before, on the phone, in a wave of hormones, she broke down with, "I just didn't think it would be this hard". My heart broke, because I knew exactly how she felt. Old feelings of intense sleep deprivation, confusion, hormonal crying and utter despair, feelings I'd locked up in an attempt to forget, suddenly came over me like they'd never left. I didn't know what to say. "Yeah".


So when she came over the next day, I asked her how she thought she could have been better prepared for what it's like to care for an infant. She took prenatal classes and learned about pregnancy, labour and delivery... but there's not really any "class" out there that prepares you for actually having an infant (not one that I'm aware of anyways), and if there were I imagine it should be something like army training where you live in barracks with colicky infants for a month. Even then, you wouldn't have the intense hormonal response that occurs from the moment you give birth and goes on for weeks, sometimes months. Nor would you experience the physiological response of spiked blood pressure, anxiety and broken heartedness you get when your own baby is crying.

I thought I'd been pretty honest with her about how hard a time I had, and she came over once a week in the evening starting when the babies were a few months old. But no one saw what I did every day and night. Only glimpses, and then they could leave, go home and sleep all night long. When I would say to her, "Last night was terrible. I finally was able to fall asleep around 9 and then was up from 11-1 and then again from 3-6 and then the babies woke up at 7" I'm sure she thought that sounded awful. But when you've experienced it, you truly get just how terrible it is. Because it happens over and over, day in and out, night in and out. She now knows what it means to count down hours, minutes, seconds. Looking at the clock the moment the baby cries, waking you up, and then trying to get her to go back to sleep and continuing to look at the clock as hours and hours go by in the middle of the night. Desperate for sleep. Desperate for you baby to stop crying. Frustration, exhaustion. "WHAT DID I DO TO MY LIFE?" I had it so good... why did I do this to myself?

No matter how honest I was about how difficult my first year was, I don't want to assume that other people will have a difficult time. And so, you can't really tell a person, it's going to be hard. REALLY HARD. Harder than you can even imagine. Because you don't know for sure. I've heard some babies are easy and sleep through the night from the moment they're born. This could be mythical, but I can't know for sure.

Point is, I have come to the conclusion that I just don't think it's possible to actually do anything to prepare for having a baby. The best advice I have for a woman nearing the end of her first pregnancy is to rest. Just relax. Lay down. Sleep. Listen to the silence in the air. Listen to no-one interrupting you. Be present. A shit storm's coming your way! But it does get better, and it keeps getting better. Remember that every day and you'll get through.

As it turns out, I wasn't done nursing.

Remember my post back in August about weaning? Well, I'm still nursing. I started dropping nursing sessions at the end of July so that I could go back to work one day a week without worrying about it, and dropped them all by the end of August. All but one, the before-bed-nurse. I'm still doing it. To be honest, after the haze of the first year started to clear, I realized that nursing didn't have to be horrible drudgery. Doing it only once a day for 10-20mins total instead of once every two hours, lasting from twenty minutes to an hour... totally different. I'm actually enjoying the one-on-one snuggle. I may never do this thing again. I don't want it to be over just yet. A bonus of this once-a-day extended nursing is that if they are teething or sick, I still have milk so I can nurse them in the middle of the night. On those rare occasions, it makes me happy I can comfort them in this way.

The girls seem to really look forward to it at night, and it's rare that we get one-on-one time in the day (rare as in close to never) so it's a really great way to end the day. Plus, whoever is getting nursed last gets to spend some one-on-one daddy time while they're waiting for me to be done with the first baby. Downside is, it does mean that I have to be home at 7pm every night (as I have been for the past five hundred days, minus once). And that's fine most of the time, although I do look forward to the freedom of someone else being able to put them down. I'm just not sure how this is going to end. Will they suddenly decide they don't want it anymore, or will it have to be my job to wean them from that last nursing?

How I Shower

When I give people a house tour, and we get to the master bedroom, immediately people notice the play pen full of balls and ask "What is that?"
"That's how I shower".

For a sweet five minutes, the girls are occupied (and safe and confined) while I shower. Works great!

The Little Things

I love you

and the little things you don't notice, but I do

I imagine you laying in your cribs upstairs

breathing peacefully, 

sound asleep after a hard day's play

I look around at all the things you've touched

strewn about the floor perfectly 

just how you dropped them, left them,

perfectly

I love your messes

A dolly over here, cheerios there, a ring, a ball

No one can drop a toy quite like you

I love you
and the little things you don't notice, but I do

Because I had two.

Poor Lena has four molars growing in right now. For a few nights in a row, she was up crying for hours and hours. One night, Carmen was sound asleep, I went into their room, picked Lena up and wrapped her up in her blankey and held her, and rocked her and comforted her. I smelled her hair, I looked around her dark room, I kissed her head, I sat with her. I lay with her in the reading nook I made in their room, full of pillows and blankets, and let her fall asleep on my chest. I spent an hour loving everything about her. The sound of her breath, the smell of her, the feeling of her pudgy hand wrapped around my thumb.

And I cried. Because it was the first good memory I had of holding her and comforting her at night like I wanted to.

Before I had children, I imagined those moments, when the new mom snuggles her newborn baby who is sleeping on her chest. She rocks in her rocking chair and looks out at the moon. She is peaceful, and full of love for her new baby. Without even realizing it, I had huge expectations of motherhood. In these pictures, I was always rocking one baby. One. I don't think I have to say that I am grateful for my girls, that I wouldn't change a thing, because of course I wouldn't. This isn't about that. This is about the feeling that won't go away. The feeling that I missed out on something I always imagined for myself. The ability to have those moments with my baby. I don't have a single good memory of comforting my newborn baby. I was unable to be that mother. But maybe, now I'm able.

What have you been up to?

"So Loranda, what have you been up to?"
"Um... uh... babies..."

Whenever someone asks me what I've been up to lately, I have no idea what to say. I am busy, from morning to (and sometimes through) night, but how do I sum up what I do, or explain how it takes up all of my energy? I can't. I try to talk about the big things, the things I have planned, the things I'm doing around the house (because lets be honest, I spend 85% of my time at the home because that's where my babies high chairs and cribs are) and I feel like I have to say stuff about myself that's unrelated to babies.

"Um, I am busy working towards some Lush deadlines... um... I painted my kitchen"

How do I tell someone it takes me 10 minutes to simply walk down a flight of stairs (I plan on writing an entire post on just coming downstairs - coming soon), 15 minutes to get from the front door to the car. An entire hour to feed the babies lunch and another hour for dinner (feeding, which doesn't include preparing the food). Whoever said "Patience is a virtue" must have had toddlers.

It's not as though I can "do" much outside of baby-rearing. "My time" is between 1 and 2:30, at which time I have to be at home, and am usually shower/tidying/working/dinner prepping or laying in a heap of exhaustion. And after 7:30, if the babies aren't teething or sick, I get to relax, and I REALLY look forward to relaxing.

Baby-rearing is an emotionally exhausting, physically exhausting, mentally challenging job. I don't have a lot going on outside of that because I am emotionally, physically and mentally exhausted when I finally do have "me" time. So next time someone asks me what I've been up to, I think instead of waffling about I'm just going to proclaim "Twin Toddlers!" proudly and leave it at that.

Are we seriously having this conversation?

Orlando and I have been saying things we never thought we'd say.
"Aw, can you imagine what more of our children would look like?"
"If I could guarantee it would be a boy... or two boys..."
"Having twins again wouldn't be the most horrific nightmare I could imagine. I mean, if you're going to have one baby you might as well have two, right?"
"We would just have to put bunk-beds in both of the bedrooms".
 Wait a minute...

WHAT?!

Have we developed amnesia? Have we lost our minds? What in the world are we talking about? We caught ourselves in one of these conversations today and were like "wow wow wow...back up, when did this become an okay thing to think about?" and we both firmly agreed that more children is a road we cannot go down. It's sad that we'll only do all this once, but ever since I discovered I was pregnant with twins, I always had the thought that it's the only time I'll do this. It does make me really appreciate things, but it's bittersweet watching your kids grow up, knowing you probably won't be having any more children.

While I was making dinner this evening, I looked up and watched as Orlando walked across the living room. He's really tall - he's 6'4". Then it struck me that if I had a boy, or TWO boys, they would be his boys. They would be big and tall and take up a lot of space and eat a lot of food. Scared me straight.

                                       This is our family. Perfect just the way we are. For now.