Over the hill

I think we're at the beginning of the end of my pumping.

The girls will be 6 months soon and in the last couple of weeks, their demand has caught up to, and sometimes surpassed, my supply.  It doesn't help that my supply has slightly dropped.  I've gone from averaging around 60oz per day to just under 50oz.

I'm not too worried about it though.  We're now introducing solid foods.  For the time being, it's not for nutrition or meal replacement, we're just learning how to eat from a spoon with about a tablespoon of rice split between the girls per day.  We might try oatmeal tonight, and I've got a few veggie purees ready to to be tasted next week.  As their solid food intake increases, their breast milk intake will decrease.

Initially, the goal was to pump for the first 6 months and then see where we are and decide if we want to continue.  Now that we're coming up on 6 months, it seems kind of silly not to just go ahead and bring it on home to have breast milk for the whole first year.

Now we're dealing with milk management.  Some of the milk in the freezer stash is threatening to get old.  For the last week, we've been thawing part of the freezer stash and replacing it with newer milk.  Rotating out the June and July and freezing the November.

At my record, I had 1,188oz of milk frozen but that's now down to 1,068.  Keeping track of how much comes out and how much goes back in has been a challenge.

I think it's going to be another 2 months of pumping 5 times a day to try to keep up with the girls demand.  Around that time, I'm hoping that the solid foods will start to decrease their milk intake and I'll start seeing that freezer stash build up again.  Once I start putting more in than I'm taking out, that will be my signal that it's time to start weaning off the pump.  I figure it will take about 5 weeks to wean, dropping one pump a day for a week at a time.  So I'm looking at returning my rental pump in January or February, and relying on my less powerful pump for any of my pumping needs beyond that, probably fully stopping in March.  From then on out, we'll just go through the freezer stash until it's gone, and hopefully that will coincide with the time that the girls are on a full solid diet around the 1 year mark.

Of course, if my supply continues to drop, my body might have other plans for us.  In relation to my supply dropping, my weight is creeping back up.  While I haven't stepped on a scale, I suspect I'm now back to pre-IVF-induced-diet-from-hell weight.  My jeans were a bit snug yesterday and I might have to break out the wardrobe I was in before I started all this craziness.  Does that mean I'm back to normal?

In other bodily news, I think I've resprained my ankles again.  I had perpetually sprained ankles for years and did some physical therapy to deal with it a while back.  But now they're feeling like they did before so I'm assuming they are back to being perpetually sprained again.  Pretty sure I've developed carpel tunnel in my right wrist as it's giving me a lot of pain.  And a weird pain on the side of my groin every time I turn at all.  It's stopped me in my tracks a few times.  I'm assuming this all a part of ligaments and tendons and stuff tightening back up.  Maybe the bones of the hips and pelvis are doing some maneuvering to recover from the pregnancy.  I dunno.  I'm just kind of a sore, achy, ouchy mess.

Driving myself crazy

Before I get into it, I feel the need to state that things are a lot better than they were a few months ago and I'm feeling much more bonded to the girls than I was at first.  Silly lovely dovey things are coming out of my mouth much to my surprise.  Like a few days ago when I heard myself say "I just love that smile!  I wish I could bottle that smile and pour it on my pancakes!"

Where the hell did that come from?  I'm actually pretty self conscience about acting all ooey gooey.  I'm embarrassed to have anyone hear me sing to the girls.  Not because my voice sucks, I actually have a good singing voice, but because the lovey dovey stuff is so not the persona that I've come to associate with myself.

But anyway, that's kind of an aside.  The driving myself crazy is this overwhelming feeling of being judged and never measuring up.

One of my major mental issues with being infertile and then a miscarriage mama is this overall feeling of the universe deciding that I'm unfit and then denying me children.  Being denied by an adoption agency, the doctors refusing to do a fresh round of IVF until I lost weight, etc etc.  I've just had so many deliveries of the message that my motherhood is dependent on whether others deem me worthy or not.

It's a fear I still carry.  Over the summer when we had the windows open in the house, I feared that the neighbors who didn't realize there were two babies here might call CPS because they often hear a baby crying and might suspect me of neglect.  My fear runs so deep that I've even worked out what I would do if someone knocked on the door claiming to be CPS.  I wouldn't open the door to random strangers claiming to have the authority to take my kids from me (that seems like a fear tactic that an ax murderer might use to gain access to your house), but I would tell them that I would only allow them in if escorted by my father (a retired federal judge who would act as my legal council) or a uniformed police officer.  How sick is it that I'm so scared of something that will never happen that I actually have a game plan?

Yesterday at Thanksgiving dinner, Charlotte was having a rough time due to the teething.  The girls were also both massively overtired because they hardly napped at all during the day.  I really wanted to show them off, but ultimately they had to spend the dinner in their stroller in my parents room with the lights off because they needed to sleep and that seemed to be the best way to make that happen.  The whole time, I felt damned if I do, damned if I don't.  I had an internal need to be with them because I almost felt like I was shutting them away for the sake of convenience.  But I also had pressure, both internal and external, to leave them alone because they needed to sleep and they were just fine.

But it was after I ate that really demonstrated how I'm driving myself, and probably everyone around me, absolutely nuts.  Charlotte was crying because her mouth hurt.  Everyone knew what her problem was, everyone understood that there's only so much adults can do to help a baby, but I just felt like everyone was watching me completely fail at mothering my baby.  And I hardly touched Tina because she was being social so others were holding her the whole time.

Everyone is trying to remind me that once you try everything you know to help a hurting baby, sometimes the only thing you can do is to put them somewhere safe, like in their crib, and let them cry for a little bit.  Intellectually, I agree.  Especially since I get myself so worked up when I hear a baby crying that my own tension only makes things worse for the baby.

But when the time comes, I almost feel like I have to try until I'm to the point of bursting before I allow either of us to just chill out by allowing her to cry for a little bit.  Like there's some universal mommy judge overlooking me all the time and if I don't do things right, it's going to take one or both of my babies away.  Whenever I try to tell myself how ridiculous that is, my brain snaps back with "it happened the last time" (referring to losing my girls 2 years ago).

K is on my back about taking care of myself.  That it's not only ok to let the girls cry when they are hurting (again, after doing everything I can to soothe the hurt), but it's what's best for the family as a whole.  That if I make myself stress out to the breaking point, I'm not only forcing myself to suffer, but they are picking up on that stress and it's not fun for them either.

I can predict the comments already.  "I could never allow my baby to cry all alone in her crib."  "How awful, ignoring this helpless little creatures cries because you don't want to listen to it!!!"  "Babies cry because they need you to do something for them.  How could you possibly consider just allowing them to cry!?!"

Welcome to the universal "they".  That's what I hear every time I can't please one of the girls.  That "they" are judging me and if I can't figure it out soon and make it all better, "they" will somehow declare me unfit and my babies will go away.

I wish I could somehow understand that the girls are unconditionally mine.  Intellectually, I got it, but emotionally, it's just not sinking in.  I just can't shake this feeling and fear that my parenthood is contingent upon others approval.

Charlotte is teething

The title says it all, poor thing.  We can't feel the tooth ourselves, but she's showing all other signs.

She's generally ok during the day, sometimes showing some signs of discomfort and chewing on her hands a lot, but once evening rolls around, she'll shriek and it's obvious she's in pain.  She's chomping on our fingers a lot.  Those seem to be her favorite teething soothers.

I have a bunch of the standard chew toys in the fridge, but most of them are too big for her to get into her mouth well enough to really soothe her gums.

Sometimes she's just kind of chewing on the nipple of her bottle instead of really eating so I thought I'd be all ingenious and make bottle chew toys for her.  I took a bunch of the bottles that we had previously rejected for feeding, filled the nipples with breast milk, and then froze them upside down in an ice cube tray to catch drips.  Yeaaaaaaah, she didn't like that.  She recognized the bottle as a feeding instrument and got irritated that milk wasn't coming out.  She didn't catch on that she was meant to just chew on the nipple.  Oh well.  The best laid plans....

I took all the little nipple shaped breast milk ice cubes and put them in a baggie so I can wrap them in a cloth and let her chew on that.  She does like the rags that I dipped in breast milk and then froze.  Some of them have half a dose of baby Tylenol mixed in.

I read that baby orajel isn't a good idea because it numbs the throat and dulls the gag reflex.  Too bad, because it seemed to help before I read that.  K smeared half the recommended dose around the base of a pacifier because it wasn't sticking to her gums when he tried to apply it per the directions.  I'm not throwing the stuff out, but I'll only use it as a last resort if she's in real pain and we can't find anything else to help her.  If we use it, she'll sleep in her car seat so that if she spits up, it will either dribble out, or back down into her tummy as opposed to having spit up sitting in her throat choking her.

I'm not sure what else to do for her.  I'm open to ideas knowing that I'll be dealing with this for a while and with 2 kids.  What doesn't work today might work tomorrow so I'd love to collect an arsenal of ideas.

Sleep training, morning edition and rice from a spoon

What are you looking at?  Nuthin, I'm just chillin in my
awesome blue, yet girly jammies!

Sleep training is going really well.  Last night was a little rough because I allowed them to get overtired during the day (I forgot to turn off the swing for a particularly long nap) but it wasn't pure torture for anybody.

This morning, I woke up at 9:30 needing to pump (it had been over 9 hours) and got myself all hooked up.  2 minutes in, I see little open eyes on the monitor.  All I can think is "oh crap.  Well, Mama's gotta pump, I think we're all gonna just have to suffer for a half hour or so."

Charlotte, denying the camera
her smile as usual.

But we didn't!  They quietly babbled with each other and the mobile until I finished.  I got the milk distributed into bottles and by the time I was ready to go get them, they were asleep again!  It's 10:30am now.  This is awesome!  I've made myself some coffee, warmed up a cinnamon roll and I'm eating my breakfast, bottles at the ready, watching them sleep on the monitor.  I'm assuming one or both will wake up again any minute, but until that happens, a leisurely breakfast for me!

I think it's because they aren't scared when they wake up in the crib anymore.  Yes, they're hungry.  It's been about 6 hours since they've eaten.  But they aren't waking up and just freaking out so if I can't get to them immediately, they can go back to sleep if they aren't just starving.  Before, if they woke up, there was no doubt about it, we needed to get to them before they got majorly upset.  This is so much better.

Oh, random funny conversation K and I had last night.  I knew the girls bed time was going to be off because their nap was at a weird time and Charlotte was kind of falling asleep at the bottle.  K asked if we should skip their bath and do the short version of bedtime routine.  I said "I'm not sure, she might be all alert in a few minutes.  We'll play it by ear."  To which he responded "Did I just hear what I think I just heard coming out of your mouth???  Every time I say the words 'play it by ear' you growl at me!"  "Well Honey, usually when you say it to me, it's when I'm asking you for information I need to create a specific schedule!  Besides, in the last 5 months, I've learned A LOT about how to play it by ear."  So there's a little indication of how my personality is changing since becoming a mom of multiples.

Tina, totally hamming it up,
as usual

The pediatrician told us a month ago we could start introducing some solids.  I'm not real gung ho on it.  While they are on breast milk, I know they are getting the right balance of nutrition, everything they need and nothing they don't.  Once we start substituting milk for foods at feedings, we have to start thinking about balance and making sure they get everything they need.  It's a challenge I'm not real excited about taking on. I've certainly never figured it out for myself but I'll be a better person for them than I am for me so in the upcoming months, it's something I'm going to have to finally learn about.

Yesterday was just an experiment.  We have some rice flakes from one of the many hand me down bags I've received over the last year and it doesn't expire for quite some time, so I opted to start with that since I've already got it.  The girls haven't really shown any interest in our food so I don't feel a real need to start introducing it.  But on the other hand, they are now eating approximately what I produce every day, if not a little bit more.  In the last 2 weeks, we've had to thaw out 60oz of my frozen stash and that's making me a bit nervous.  My thinking is that if we start adding a little bit of rice, perhaps they won't need quite as much milk per day.

Onto the experiment!  I mixed up about an ounce of the stuff according to the directions.  It was a 1:4 ratio of rice flakes to my fluid of choice (breast milk).  I got a little spoon, and off we went!  This experiment was not about getting rice into their bodies, it was simply about seeing if they could figure out what I wanted them to do when I brought a spoon to their lips.

Tina was a bit fussy in general but seemed to enjoy herself.  I didn't trim that video like I did for Charlotte because she scared the cat which I thought was funny.  Charlotte isn't sure what to think, but I got a good smile of hers on camera, something she does not like to give me very often, so I'm happy.  Yes, proof that she does often smile even though every picture of her comes out looking contemplative!

I tried adding a teaspoon of rice to Charlotte's 5oz bottle, but even though I was using the tricut playtex nipple designed to let rice flow through, and even though it was hardly any compared to the amount of fluid, it kept getting stuck.  It usually takes her between 5-10 minutes to eat, this time it took over 40 with me occasionally squeezing the nipple and pressing on the drop in bag to help add pressure to the milk from the other side.  I made up a bottle for Tina with 2oz of breast milk and 1/4 tsp of the rice (I had the rest of her bottle set aside so yes, she did eat a full bottle), put in a level 2 Dr. Brown nipple on her bottle and she was able to suck it down really easy.  It's possible that the difference was that Tina's bottle was warmed up and stirred more, whereas Charlotte's bottle was straight from the tap so it may not have been quiet as warm.  Maybe the rice didn't dissolve as well in Charlotte's bottle as it did in Tina's.  Oh well.  Live and learn.

Wow, I'm almost done with my coffee and they still aren't up yet.  On another day, I might actually get them up, but since they've had that mild cold, I'm thinking I'll just let them sleep all they want.  Maybe I'll get that video done that's due in a couple of hours.  Is this what it feels like to have time to accomplish things?