Finding our New Normal

The week of Jillian's due date, which was the last week in July, my mother and Aunt Sis came to California to visit.  I thought it would be lovely to have two of "my mothers" present at my first child's birth and their help during that first week would be wonderful.  Much to everyone's dismay Jillian didn't show up until August 6, 1987.  More than a week after my family left!

When I was pregnant with the twins my father and my step-mother, Betty, came to California to visit and hopefully be present when the girls were born.  Betty was not a particularly good flyer.  She was uncomfortable sitting for long periods of time and she suffered swelling in her lower extremities when she flew.  She actually spent the first couple of days of her visit in bed recovering.  We couldn't exactly pin-point when the girls might show their little faces but I didn't want my Dad and Betty to suffer the same fate as my Mom and Aunt Sis.  All that way for nothing!  So a few days into their visit and with no signs that I might go into labor, I was off to the store to purchase the Castor Oil!

When I made the middle of the night call to the doctor he told me to meet him at the hospital at 9:00 a.m. the following morning.  At 10:40a.m. on April 24, 1991, I was in the operating room ready to deliver my babies by caesarian section AGAIN!  Alison had turned into position for delivery but poor little Natalie didn't have any room to flip around therefore her feet were still down, below Ali's head and dancing on my bladder, leaving out a normal delivery.  Natalie was pulled out first.....feet first and screaming.  What a set of lungs on her!  Apparently she liked her little snug home nestled up to her sister.  Alison's turn came one minute later fast asleep and not interested in being awakened.  After a little time they got her to "wake up" and breath on her own.  She still doesn't like to wake up before 11:00 a.m.!!!

I can't believe I'm going to tell you this but I entered the hospital that day at 192 pounds.  Within three days I had lost 45 pounds!  Alison weighed 6 lbs 6 oz and Natalie weighed 5 lbs 14 oz - both big for twins and actually a good size for singletons thanks to the steroids!

After the girls were born the doctor told me there was one placenta and they wanted to test it to determine if the girls were fraternal or identical.  Fraternals are two separate eggs and two separate placentas - identicals are one egg split and they share a placenta.  They had to freeze the placenta and then section it to test and this process would take 24 hours.  But I knew immediately that the girls were fraternal.   When they were side by side they did look a lot alike - both tiny and bald on top!  But when I held them individually I could tell by the shape of their eyes and the length of their fingers and toes that they were fraternal.  Alison's hands and feet were like my own and Natalie had the Corsie's long fingers and toes - same as Jillie.  The doctor eventually reported that the placentas had fused together making one placenta.  I was not surprised to learn they were simply two babies conceived and then born at the same time.

Betty with Natalie and Dad with Alison the day they were born.

Jillian got a new baby too!

My next two days in the hospital were spent juggling nursing the babies and trying to sleep; the first difficult, the other impossible!  The staff had given me a private room right outside the nurses station and nurses are noisy and busy all night and sleeping was impossible plus I had the babies in the room with me most of the time.  The doctor said it was okay to stay at the hospital an extra night but I was ready to go home and sleep in my own bed.  What was I thinking.....that I'd actually sleep?

Leaving the hospital April 27 with Natalie and Alison.

When I came home Jillian, who was just three, continued on like nothing had happened.  She still brought piles of books into my bed and a bucket full of little toys and insisted that I read to her.  I was recovering from surgery, literally exhausted and felt horribly guilty about not having the energy to spend time with her.  I was just so tired.  Dad and Betty and Gordon were doing all they could do to help out but I insisted on nursing both babies exclusively so the feeding came down to just me and the babies fed constantly.  I remember one afternoon that was particularly horrible.  I couldn't get Natalie to settle - the girl had some lung power and was screaming/crying for a long time.  I couldn't take it any longer and took her to Betty who was resting in her bedroom.  As soon as I handed her over to Betty Natalie stopped crying.  I crouched on the floor next to them and Betty and I both stared at her.  Both girls were absolutely perfect - their tiny hands and feet so delicate and cherubic.  Natalie had the most perfect, gorgeous oval fingernails; like tiny porcelain doll hands and Betty and I marveled at them.  Beautiful little Alison was more content and slept longer and when she fussed it was a softer cry compared to Natalie's performing quality voice!  Both girls were jaundiced, particularly Natalie and she had to be taken to the hospital every day for almost a week to have a tiny pin-prick of blood drawn.  The girls spent a fair amount of time in a tiny bassinet side-by-side taking in any direct sunlight they could until their billirubin count was normal.

Letting the sun shine in!

Natalie and Alison doing her best Judo chop imitation!

Soon it was time for my father and Betty to leave and I knew I was facing a week without help, other than Gordon, until my sister Sandy arrived.  I had arranged play-dates for Jillian virtually every day but that left me alone with two preemie babies (the girls were born three weeks premature).  Gordon was now sole provider for his family of five and was gone from the house working feverishly to support us!  I think his working out of the house served a dual purpose for him; aside from the obvious need to make a living, being away from the house offered a break from the everyday madness that had become our lives; our new normal.  Neither of us were sleeping because the twins were feeding about every two hours, waking each other up, feeding and burping at the same time.   Complete exhaustion was the name of the game.  I don't know how he got up and found the energy to actually get dressed and go to work.

That week alone was brutal for me.  I remember sitting on the couch in the family room just nursing, burping, changing diapers and crying.  I was beyond tired and wasn't eating and now I know I was suffering from postpartum depression.  The thoughts going through my head were terrible.  I was used to dressing up and going to work and using my mind.  Adult conversations and going out to lunch were the old norm.  I was now a stay-at-home-mom and the transition wasn't going well.  What had I done?  I couldn't see past the next moment and there was no enjoyment of the moment I was in.  I hadn't slept more than an hour in over a week and I was mentally and physically drained.  It wasn't a good scenario and a weaker person may have fallen into despair.  I wasn't far from it.  I remember thinking about leaving and checking into a hotel, closing all the blinds, cranking the air conditioner and just sleeping not telling a soul where I was.  How Vivi Abbott of me!  I also remember sitting in the twins room staring down the street willing Gordon's car to turn the corner and head home, "please come home Gordon.  Please."  It all sounds so dramatic now but at the time it was VERY real.  Sleep deprivation is a form of torture!

I don't even remember Sandy's arrival or much about her being here.  It was all work and the time was a blur.  She would get up with me in the night to help me manage the nursing so Gordon could sleep.  When you nurse twins you have to manipulate their little bodies so each can "latch-on" either in a "football hold" or across your body or a combination of both.  Sandy called me Dairy Queen.....and I would moo!  You need either two sets of hands for burping or be on a couch where you can lay one off.  I thought about trying to change their schedules so they didn't need to nurse at the same time but that would mean I wouldn't even get a two hour break at night, plus I would have needed to separate their rooms.  With a lot of sensitivity Sandy was able to convince me that it would be okay to supplement the girls with a soy-based formula to give me a break and allow other people to help with feeding.  THANK GOD FOR SANDY.  We went to the store, picked out the formula and mixed it up.  It wasn't long before Natalie began to settle for longer periods.  She was finally getting enough food.  Alison wouldn't take a bottle and insisted on being nursed exclusively.  We did a little better during the day but they were still feeding just over every two hours and throughout the night.

When Sandy's week was coming to an end we realized that we would need continued help and a decision was made for all three girls and I to go back east with Sandy and stay with her and her husband, Doug, for a while.  I stayed just under one month and while Sandy worked from home Jillian and the girls and I continued our feeding and burping and changing but with visits from family and friends too.

In Virginia with Mom and the three girls, June 1991.

When I came home to California I brought my niece, Sandy's daughter, Lisa, home with me.  She would spend the next month with us - feeding, burping, washing, changing and playing with babies and Jillian.  Her help was indispensable and we all thoroughly enjoyed our time with Lisa.  I was beginning to get a few more breaks but still not sleeping through the night.  The girls were now eleven weeks old.  When Lisa's stay came to an end....another  was beginning and Gordon's Mum, Isa, was arriving for seven weeks!

That poor woman! Grammy Isa's shift was brutal!

One of the things I insisted on, but later changed my mind over, was cloth diapers!  Do you have any idea how many diapers two babies can go through?  The laundry felt insurmountable and endless.  Poor Isa spent her day at the laundry line hanging diapers and taking diapers down.  And cooking - we began making all the babies first "real" foods. And walking the girls in their BIG deluxe carriage!  And feeding and burping and changing and starting all over again the next day!

Isa looking fresh...........and tired!

Isa's seven weeks here were draining on her too.  Having two infants and a child under three requires constant effort and although Gordon, Isa and I were even odds against the three girls.....they still won.  They had youth on their side - and a good nights sleep.  We did manage to laugh a lot though.  It was that hysterical "what am I laughing at" kind of laughter that you might expect from a  mentally disturbed person.  It was a funny farm here for sure and there were three inmates!

Of everyone in the house, Jillian seemed to fair the best.  She has always been a very content person, enjoying her alone time.  I attribute that to her wonderful, vivid imagination.  She played for hours by herself with her little ponies and horses and corrals and fences.  She was in her own wonderland and seemed happy to be left alone.  I did wonder if the shift in focus from her to the babies affected her in any adverse way but there wasn't anything I could really do about it.  It seemed as though every moment I tried to spend with her was disturbed by a need from one of the twins.

Our attempts at a normal life, like going out for a bite to eat ended up with screaming babies and leaving early.  When I tried to take them all out to the movies there was a poopy accident and I had to get up and leave.  Twice I tried to manage a trip to the mall and while every one went out shopping, I was left in the ladies room at Nordstrom nursing fussing babies!  At least there was such a room I guess!

And still I hadn't had a full four hours of sleep.  Just one R.E.M. cycle was all I was after.

When Isa left I was determined to get that sleep cycle.  The day Gordon took her to the airport I was in dismantling the guest room and making it into our third daughters' room so I could separate the twins.  That night each girl was tucked safely in their own rooms. At 10:00p.m Gordon and I executed our new plan.  The plan was to pick up the twins from sleep at 10:00p.m. and give them one final feeding.  In we went, Gordon with a bottle to feed Natalie and I nursed Alison until they were full to STUFFED.

It worked!  After five months they slept. They slept soundly throughout the night from that point on.......And finally so did I.

We had found our new normal.

Of course this whole blog sounds like a terrible negative adventure.  I'm sure after reading this that not one of our daughters will want children but I promise once I had four hours of straight sleep things changed.  Anything was possible and the noises in my head were all sweet dreams. We were filled up with love and contentment that pulsed throughout our household and into our garden and filled our world.  We were having fun!  The happiness that came from those little-bitty babies and our now four year old was quite remarkable.  It still is.

Alison, Jillian and Natalie late summer 1991.