Do twins run in your family?

I'm getting this question a lot lately.  I expect I'll be getting a lot in the years to come.  I'm not sure how to answer it.

Well, ok, that question isn't so hard to answer.  The answer is no.  Out of 50 billion people in my family, this will be the first set of twins.

It's the follow-up questions where things get awkward.  There's always a moment of confusion that crosses the face of the person like "so, uh, explanation please?" and I know that they want to ask the next question, and I really don't care who knows what, but I'm also aware of the fact that people don't really want to discuss a persons infertility issues within 2 minutes of meeting them.

So the follow-up question is usually something along the lines of "Wow, did you have any idea that it might be twins?"  There's only one answer to that question.  Yes, I knew there were two embryos, we've been pregnant with twins before, I had every reason to think and hope that this pregnancy would also be twins.

Here's the thing, I can't lie.  I don't do the little white lies that society makes us tell in order to allow a conversation to move forward in a polite and purely superficial manner.  I would totally be the first person voted out of Survivor because of this little personality trait.  It's a social convention that I simply don't understand.  And after years of trying to understand it and work within it while growing up, one day I just threw up my hands, declared "fuck it" and decided that if someone asks me a question, I'll just answer the damned question rather than kill myself trying to figure out what they want to hear.

Part of this decision is due to my own failure to figure it out, and in part due to deciding that I'm simply not ashamed of a few things that I've had to deal with that most people keep politely behind closed doors.  Behind closed doors indicates shame and I'm not ashamed.  I battled bipolar disorder for years and despite the millions of people afflicted with this, how many in your life can you name?  Probably not many because the struggle tends to be private.  Not me.  When people ask the opening question of "How are you?" I would respond politely, but honestly.  "I'm having a bit of a difficult depression day, but I'm battling.  How are you?"

It's the same with infertility.  I have no shame.  I really don't give a hoot who knows about my IVF or the fact that my periods are wonkalicious.  But if it's mentioned, the conversation has no other avenues of moving forward.  Unlike the depression answer that allows the conversation to move past that little information nugget, you just can't discuss anything else if I answer the twins question honestly.

Again, I'm not ashamed, I have no intention of keeping that part of my life hidden, and I don't care what strangers or colleagues know about it.  However, I am aware of the fact that it's not the most pleasant of topics of conversation and complete strangers really don't want to walk away from meeting me for the first time with intimate knowledge of my reproductive organs.

So how the hell do I maneuver past that follow-up question?  Again, I can't politely lie.  Even if I try, it just kind of hangs in the air because there's obviously something big going unspoken and we all just smile at each other trying to figure out how to get out of this awkward silence.

So I'm open to suggestions.  How would you answer that follow-up question?  It needs to be honest, yet allow for the conversation to move past an infertility discussion.  Wit is encouraged.  Maybe something along the lines of "Oh, we had a whole medical team hoping for a delightful outcome."  Would that work?  Polite, honest, and doesn't drag down the conversation?  Help!

Diaper Deals

Spent the day collecting craigslist diaper deals.

First was a total of 210 disposable premie sized diapers for $45.  That's about a weeks worth for 2 babies, right?  I'm pretty sure our girls will be in premie sizes for at least a week so I'm thinking that's a good deal.


Then I got a collection of 8 all in one cloth diapers, designed to grow with baby through potty training, and 4 small sized diaper covers for a total of $60. Score!

Now these have been well loved, but the snaps are all in good condition so they are salvageable.


The main problem of course is where the absorbent part of the diaper attaches to the cover.  This gets pulled a lot and the there's a lot of holes.  


But that's ok.  This gives me a couple of opportunities.  First of course is the cheap diapers.  The second, I need to practice my sewing skills.  And practicing on something that will be getting pooped and peed on seems rather appropriate.


So!  I went into my "get rid of" pile of hand me down clothing and found a little white turtleneck.  This will be the perfect material to make diaper patches.


In order to practice with my sewing machine, I made a collection of little pouches by sewing 2 pieces of material together on 3 sides and then turning them inside out.  I opted to do it this way for a few reasons.  

1. I wanted each spot to have 2 layers of material.  They are diapers after all. 
2. I didn't want any edges to fray over time, so by sewing them together and then turning them inside out, the seams and potential fraying points for the material are tucked inside the patch.  The last edge, welllllllll, I'm not sure it's worth the time and energy and fiddly bits it would take to tuck the edges in and sew them to the edge is nice and folded.  But hey, 3 outta 4 pretty edges is pretty good for a diaper patch!
3. By adding fabric instead of just sewing the holes together, it will reduce the stress on those corners in the future reducing further tearing.

So here's comparison of what the holes looked like, and what the patches look like when put into place.

28 weeks and all's well

Don't have a lot to report.  Why is that?  Because nothing's wrong, that's why.  It's a really weird feeling for me.  Wow, everything's fine.  Just so foreign!

At my ultrasound today, my cervix length is still holding strong around 2.6cm and the twins are still measuring equal to each other, but about 5 days small, but still within the normal range.  Blood pressure is good.  No sign of anything that might indicate premature labor.  Just, everything is fine!

Doc thinks we're actually going to make it to term and will have to schedule a c-section.  Term being 34 weeks or longer.  Can you imagine?  My birth experience might actually be average rather than some panicking emergency.

It does look like we're opting for c-section.  Because I'm a first time mom and we've got twins, things would have to align just perfectly to go vaginal, and even that would have some risk factors.  We just have no idea how much room my body is going to allow for birth because it's never done it before.  Baby A is currently breech and likely to stay that way while Baby B is transverse.  Unless they both turn perfectly head down by 32 weeks (they won't have enough room to change positions after that), vaginal delivery just isn't in the cards.

And I'm totally cool with that.  My whole concern is that things happen as controlled as possible.  With a vaginal birth, there are too many unknowns, less room to work with, just generally a little more complicated.  With a c-section, things are under control.  I asked about the various benefits of vaginal delivery, like how labor helps the lungs, and my doc said that a lot of those theories were actually debunked about 4 years ago.  I feel good that the issue is settled.  Sometimes there's comfort in having options taken off the table so I don't have to consider them.

I'm starting to get some lower back pain pretty consistently.  I'm going to get a decent maternity belt and hopefully relieve some of that pressure.  

Oh!  And I passed the diabetes test again!  Ok, actually I failed the fasting number.  92 and above is failing and I got a 93.  But the following numbers were all within range.  We're upping my metformin to my pre-pregnancy dosage and he wants me to track sugar after meals for the next week just to see how the numbers fall, but over all, no gestational diabetes for me!  Yay!

Probably no more ultrasound pics.  They are so big now that you can't really tell what you're seeing on the ultrasound anymore.  Back to being big blobbies.

We took a carseat safety class and have a clue as to how to install carseats now.  They had the one that we've chosen as one of their models so I got to really fiddle with it which was nice.  K is now on a bit of a deadline to learn to drive a stick.  Even the pros went wide-eyed to learn that we're having twins and I have a 2-door car.  I think he actually got somewhat convinced that we might need to switch cars.  I'd rather he learn how to drive it now rather than wait until he's in a sleep deprived haze after they're born.  He's going to have to learn from my dad.  I've tried to teach him, but I'm a panicky passenger as it is so I just tensed him up.  My dad is completely calm and will be a much better teacher.

And tonight's grand experiment - I think we're going to try sleeping on the couch.  I just can't seem to get comfortable in bed anymore but I'm able to doze on the reclining couch pretty easily.  While dozing isn't deep sleeping, it's an improvement over the achy insomnia I'm dealing with now.  I dunno though.  Just feels wrong and weird.

Stuff I've been up to

Spent some time on the phone with the insurance company today.  Found out that if Obamacare holds up, come August they will be required to pay for me to rent a breast pump, all the equipment and supplies, and any lactation consultant support that I need.  Yay!  Assuming the supreme court doesn't overturn that, that's quite a bit of money that won't be coming out of my pocket.  Wow, politics affecting my actual life.  Whoda thunk it?

I went to a Moms of Multiples meeting.  I went during my last pregnancy and then unfortunately lost my qualifications about a week later.  So I waited longer to go this time.  Mostly because I'm afraid to do anything with this pregnancy that will deja vu the last pregnancy.

I'll be joining officially before the next meeting.  It really is a great organization with really good, pragmatic benefits for its members.  This meeting had a question and answer session with a pediatrician that was really helpful.

Another cool thing about the meeting, I got to see a friend from the birthing class I took during the first pregnancy.  I was hoping she and I might get to know each other after the class, but then when I lost the girls, I couldn't handle watching her with her boys so I had to break off that budding friendship.  Fortunately, she understood and is just as awesome as I remember her being.  We hung out for a while after the meeting.  Unfortunately, I was in hormonal meltdown mode so I wasn't exactly pleasant company, but we're back in touch so hopefully we'll get the opportunity to hang out when I'm not a snotty mess.  There appears to be a small group of snarky bitches in the toddler mommy subsection of the moms of multiples and I think they noticed that I'll fit in with them just fine even if my twins are younger.

Other than that, all I've accomplished lately is getting registered for baby stuff.  Not a clue as to what I'm doing.  But I have a registry on Amazon and at Babies R Us for the internet impaired members of my family.  We pretty much just tossed everything possible on the registry with no expectations that anyone will buy us any of it.  We don't know what we'll actually need and what we won't, and how many of what since we're having twins.  I figure if we put it on the registry, we might get a coupon for some of it, and we'll have it bookmarked if we find out we do need it later.

I was afraid Babies R Us would trigger a major meltdown, but I actually got through it ok.  Probably because it was a weekday, practically empty, and actually a rather small store.  By the time I was pooping out, we were finishing up.

And now, for fun, a few of the items I've registered for.  I'll try to narrow it down to kind of cute stuff.  The code for these pictures will be blocked if you have an ad blocker on so if you want to see the pics, you'll need to turn that off.