Two week checkup

We all passed our 2 week check up. I was cleared to drive, but not to exercise. I asked if I could pick up Macey and my doctor responded, "Yes, I can't do that to Macey, you can pick her up, but other than that, nothing heavier than a grocery bag." He also told me I was a great healer, it helps to have a great doctor! His staff oohed and awed over the babies and asked about how Macey was doing. I love my doctor and his staff. They really make us feel like family.

Miles weighed 6lbs 3oz and 19 1/4 inches and Camryn weighed 6lbs 5oz and 19 inches. They both got heel pricks, which always seem torturous because of how they bend their little feet. Both of them passed out as soon as it was over. Macey went with us to the appointment as it was the first day that we were flying solo. Macey got a flu shot. We weren't expecting that but she did great. A little crying, but then she was fine.

Video and Pictures

In a previous blog I wrote about Macey winking...here's her being super silly. She looks so grown up to me in this video. This was taken at the hospital.

Macey holding Miles.

Here are a few pictures from today. Yes, that is a cell phone Macey has in the pictures. That was what got her to stay in the picture. My sister, Juli, gave her the cell phone and we got instant smiles and the fighting to get down stopped.

Correction...

We've washed 5 loads of just baby clothes this week. Miles continues to wet himself and the bed between feedings at night. I have no idea how that exactly works. He does fine all day in preemie diapers, no leaks, nothing. And even in newborn size diapers he still manages to wet his clothes and bedding at night. Camryn also takes part in the wetting "party". If Miles hasn't done it, then Camryn has. It makes nighttime very interesting.

One week old

We've survived a week. It has actually been an easy week. Camryn and Miles are doing great. We took them to the doctor yesterday and both are gaining weight and growing. Miles weighed 5lbs 11oz and was 19 1/4 inches long, so up from his discharge weight of 5lbs 9oz. Camryn weighed 5lbs 10oz and was 19 inches long, which is up from her discharge weight of 5lbs 7oz. Both of them are still slightly jaundiced, but still at a very small level. Camryn is only yellow in her face, but it Miles is yellow down in his chest (but not far). I can say that these two have been easy compared to Macey (watch me jinx myself for saying that). They eat about every 3 hours and are still at the point where they sleep between feedings. Sure, Macey slept between feedings at this age, but not in her crib, not in her bassinet, not in anything...only if one of us held her. If we put Macey down she was only asleep for maybe 5 minutes, 15 minutes at the most. So Sean and I spent much time sleeping in a recliner holding Macey (talk about sore arms, back, neck and complete exhaustion). Macey also wasn't too keen on being passed around. So no one really got to hold and cuddle with her, except for Sean or me. When we were at the pediatrician, she commented on how both of us were smiling, so that's a good sign on how we're doing. We both chimed in and said that Macey did a great job preparing us for anything. The twins are completely different. My mom has been here helping us and it has been truly a blessing to have her around. She's cooked us some great meals, played with and cared for Macey, helped with each of the twins, and just been a great support. Now if I could only get her to move to Austin!

Here's a few things we did this past week after we were discharged:

1. We took Camryn (well Miles went along for the ride) to Dell Children's ER on Sunday night. Camryn had issues on Saturday with low blood sugar level and low body temperature; she's the reason we stayed until Sunday. I, being the paranoid mom that I am, took their temperature sometime Sunday. Miles was above the necessary level, however, Camryn was not. After many attempts to warm her up to no avail, we went to the ER. She turned out to be fine and we got home around 11pm...long day.
2. Monday we took Camryn (again Miles went along for the ride) to the pediatrician as a follow up visit for the ER. She weighed 5lbs 10oz at the appointment and was excellent the entire time. She didn't make a noise as the doctor checked out her joints, back, ears, etc. The only time she made a noise was when I had to put her on the cold hard scale. She let out one scream and that was it. She checked out fine again.
3. Miles somehow managed to wet through 2 outfits during the night on Tuesday. We've got them in preemie diapers, however, Miles got moved to newborn size for nighttime due to the wetting issue. I change them each time they wake up to eat, but that didn't matter, he still wet through the diaper.
4. They got their first sponge bath at home. Both of them weren't very thrilled with the experience. Miles added his own fountain to the bath time.
5. We took them to their newborn follow up visit on Wednesday morning. The appointment was at 9am. If you think it takes forever to get out of the house with one newborn...it doesn't... However, we did manage to get to the appointment on time.
6. Laundry...wow...I've washed 2 loads of just baby clothes this week. One thing I have to say about Macey is that she didn't have many blowouts or leaks and she really didn't throw up that much, so our laundry didn't become overwhelming with just her.
7. I counted how many diapers they went through in one night (just the night time)...10 diapers. You do the math!
8. I'm supplementing both of them with formula. We likely go through 12-15 bottles a day...I need more bottles! When we go to bed for the night, I bring with us 6 bottles with water to the room (so we aren't having to go up and down the stairs). The top rack in our dishwasher is taken up with bottles in no time...we need a dishwasher just for the bottles!

I need to catch some z's before the babies wake up. I'll try to post some new pictures soon.

Hospital photo shoot...

So the hospital no longer has a photography service. Apparently they had privacy issues with their last vender, so they've been without that service since February. Sean went to the house to spend time with his girls and my mom came up to stay with me. We decided to do a photo shoot of our own. Here are a few of our products.

Our sweet babies

I had to share something that one of the nursery nurses told us yesterday. She brought them back to us and said that she hadn't ever seen twins love on each other like these two do (she was an "older" nurse, so she's seen quite a few sets of twins). She said usually they are clawing and hitting each other in the face and pushing each other away. She commented how Miles and Camryn like to lay nose to nose or lips to lips and just be so sweet. They are really sweet to watch. I posted a few pictures yesterday of them laying together. We can put them on their backs with their heads facing up and they will end up facing each other and touching. So sweet.

Finally, Miles with his eyes open

A few pics

Macey kissing Miles

Miles is on the left
Cuddled up in their basket (they love laying like this) Miles is on the left and Camryn is on the right.

Camryn

Both Miles and Camryn have a little bit of jaundice, but it hasn't reached a level of being too concerned. Miles and Camryn both passed the hearing tests (mandated test by TX). Miles also got circumcised today. We both feel bad for him. He's been such a laid back baby, but now we've heard him cry...and definitely the hurt cry. :-( Both of them have lost more weight, but still within normal ranges. I believe Miles is down to 5lbs 7 oz and Camryn is around 5lbs 5oz. We are still set to be released sometime on Sunday (probably around lunch time).

How we're doing

Miles and Camryn continue to do well. All of the nursing staff for the nursery has commented on how good of babies they are. I've concluded that having a "partner in crime" helps them get through the whole transition to this big world outside of mom. They both eat well. They have been going back and forth on who eats the longest. Miles started out being my quick eater as he would eat for 10-15 mins and be done. One of the nurses said that he got more of my blood supply and more of something else than Camryn did, so he had some good reserves. Yesterday I asked how much they were weighing now and the nurse said that Miles now weighs 5 lbs 15 oz and Camryn was weighing 5lbs 12 oz. So they are doing well. Yesterday afternoon we had the same nursery nurse that we did on the Wednesday. She asked us if they ever cry because she hadn't heard them. They really hadn't cried since that initial delivery day, Camryn might have let out an occasional squeal, but that's about it. I told her that they were holding off until we got them home. Miles had some stomach issues last night. He needed to burp. I knew immediately that he was in pain because he was squealing (not really crying, but definitely complaining). We finally got him all resolved and he had a great night as did Sean and I. We sent them to the nursery again last night and I was able to actually sleep. They brought them back around 3am and I fed them and sent them back and was again able to get some good sleep. They came back around 6am, ate, and are now sleeping.

I was able to get some sound sleep last night and I think that it was mainly due to my nurse changing my pain meds to a stronger drug. That made a big difference and I'm feeling little to no pain this morning. I didn't even hear my nurse come in at 5am this morning to give me more pain medicine.

Sean's suffering from the back/neck/all over pain from sleeping on the "bed" they have for dad. He slept with me in my bed last night since I felt sorry for him. I'm not sure if that made his back feel any better, but I sure slept well.

Macey loves to hold and kiss her babies. She doesn't really like having me "tied" (via IV) to the bed and not having me at her disposal. I finally got untethered from the bed yesterday, so hopefully it'll make a difference with her.

We'll be in the hospital until Sunday.

Miles and Camryn are here

Miles was born at 10:23am, weighs 6lbs 3oz and is 18 1/2 inches long. Camryn was born at 10:24am, weighs 6lbs, and is 18 1/2 inches long. Both of them are doing well. They've been eating since 1 hour after delivery and love laying together. Camryn favors Macey a lot and Miles has a little bit of a different look, but still looks a lot like his sisters. Both have hair, Camryn has more than Miles, but not more than Macey did. Macey loves giving them kisses and holding them. Here are a few pictures from today.

Camryn crying, Miles just hanging out.

Delivery eve eve...

So in less than 48 hours these kids will be here. Where has the time gone? That's one thing that's keeping me optimistic about the long days and nights ahead, the fact that it goes so quickly and that when you are out of it, you look back and wish you could go back in time since they grow and change so quickly (wow, that's a run on sentence).

I've been a crazy nesting fool. Knowing when it's coming and knowing that there's two only makes it worse. I didn't get the nesting bug with Macey (that's a common theme between this pregnancy and Macey's...nothings been the same, except for the fact that they like to hang out in there). Yesterday evening I found myself standing on a chair cleaning out a kitchen cabinet....why, who knows, but I sure felt better once it was more organized and purged (and no, Sean wasn't here so there wasn't anyone here to stop me from climbing up on that chair). Today, after washing all of Macey's dirty clothes yesterday, I found myself washing the few articles of clothing that she had dirtied between yesterday and today...I guess that was just to make sure my baby girl had enough clean clothes while I am away (as if she wouldn't if I didn't wash those 3 articles of clothes, where does your brain go sometimes?). I think I've gotten the "nursery" in order. We still don't have a crib up, but that's mainly by choice since our plan is to have them in our room (I'm certainly not walking across the house to get them after surgery). One thing I haven't been too concerned about is packing my bag...well, I have the kids clothes packed, but my clothes, etc., aren't in the bag yet...that'll be my thing to do tomorrow.

I saw what I think was an imprint of a hand on my stomach today. I've seen those pictures before where you can see part of the baby pushing on mom's stomach. This imprint wasn't perfect, but I'm pretty sure it was a hand. That was the first time I noticed that. I've also almost got an "outtie". That's a recent development. I've had a pretty flat belly button for a while (which of course never even came close with Macey), but now it's about to pop, so thank goodness they're coming out soon! I showed Sean the recent development and he said that they are trying to make as much room as possible in there.

This is probably one of my most run on sentence posts...so much on my mind. I'll leave with a few recent pictures of Macey.

The fun of having a 16 month old

Macey is in true toddler form. Tantrums, "no's", falls, testing limits, everything. I had her outside this evening letting her play and she decided to climb into the chair next to me. She gave me the mischievous smile and stood up in the chair. I told her to sit down...as she still smiled at me. She did sit down and as she did she said "thank you", which is what we tell her when she listens to us. So then it became a game for her to stand up and for me to say sit down and then for her say thank you. On one of these standing up stunts I started counting to three. I said "one, two, " and then Macey would very proudly chime in with "three". I haven't really been counting in terms of her following the requests as she's a little young to get that idea, but I have been counting in other scenarios. Before I pull off her shirt I'll say "one, two, three" and have the shirt off by three. When I'm bathing her and about to pour water on her hair to rinse it I'll say "one, two, three" and pour the water on three and then praise her for doing so well. The tantrums are not so fun. She does the whole fall out on the floor and cry bit. She was doing one of those today and I asked Sean where she picked up all that drama...how is that hard wired in their heads? She is a handful, but we have so much fun with her. I wouldn't have it any other way. I'm enjoying every moment with her, even the screaming, tantrum throwing, cranky Macey since it won't be long before I won't be able to rock her before bedtime, or pick her up when she falls, or get her out of the crib, or lay on the floor and color with her, etc. I'll eventually be able to do those things again with her once I'm healed from surgery.

Last OB visit

We made it to our last OB visit. Everyone at the perinatal office yesterday kept saying, "you graduated" since we made it to the last visit. So I guess we've graduated again. I asked my OB if we got the award for making it the longest. We all laughed and he agreed that I should get the award. There are a handful of women in AMOM that have the same OB as me. He's also a fertility specialist, although we didn't need him for that. Of the women that are pregnant with me and have the same OB I'm the only one that hasn't had to go on bed rest. One has been in the hospital on bed rest for 3 months (she's having triplet girls), one delivered her babies last weekend at 35 weeks, and the other one is in the hospital on bed rest and trying to make it past 28 weeks. All of them had fertility issues and are having multiples due to that. I guess I was just made to have and carry twins. The receptionist at the OB office asked if this was the last round for us. Sean had just brought up that question in the car on the way to the office. We'll leave it up in the air, but I've lately had feelings of "this is the last pregnancy", so we'll see. Having one set of multiples increases your odds of having another set...not sure if we want to play those odds.

Miles was head down and Camryn had turned head down (I'm foolishly hoping that her moving around so much doesn't equate to Macey's temperament and I'll have 2 laid back babies...one can dream, right?). I'm measuring at 43cm and still 1cm dilated. If this growth keeps up I'll be 45cm by the time I deliver them next week. We'll have to really appreciate the time we have in this next week and get out of the house as much as possible. I'm not nervous about having the babies and not nervous (yet) about having surgery again. I'll probably be really nervous the day before and of the surgery, just because I know what I'm in for as far as pain and recovery goes. As far as having the babies goes, I've just tried to mentally prepare myself for the fatigue.

Whoa, what a morning...

I went in for my second NST (nonstress test) this morning. I got there around 8:30. They got me set up with all the monitors and we were off. Miles decided to become frantic for some reason and his heart rate would stay in the 170s-180s. The doctor didn't like that so we were off to an ultrasound, but not before another wait in the waiting room. The lady that did the ultrasound took a while and was studying their chest/heart and checking them out for movement and breathing. Both babies seemed to be asleep (after the 30 minute wait back in the waiting room, I would be too) so they weren't moving much. Camryn finally woke up and moved a bit, so she "passed" the ultrasound. Miles took his time and I had to move from side to side to get him to move around. Camryn is laying across my stomach (head on my right side, facing my back and feet towards my ribs on my left). She's been causing me lots of stabbing pain on my left side because of her position. Laying on the ultrasound table only made the pain worse, but once moved to my right side it relieved a lot of that pain. The lady said she thought the babies were doing great but that the doctor would be in to check and make a decision. She also said that Camryn had hair. She couldn't see Miles's head that well since he is head down and so low. So we know that at least one of them will have hair, who knows if it'll be as much as Macey's. While I was sitting in the waiting room for the second time I had a feeling that if they didn't pass these tests then I would be sent to the hospital for delivery. Sure enough, the doctor came in did more ultrasound testing and then said that he can't ignore the high heart rate but didn't want to jump the gun in sending me the hospital and having my doctor deliver these babies a week early. So I was back to the NST room for more monitoring. Miles decided he'd be good for this monitoring and had a great heart rate the entire time...so we passed and were finally released (around 11:30).

Sean didn't come with me as no one can come back with me when I have the NST done. I had sent him a message when it all started unfolding and would periodically send him updates so he wouldn't be worried about us. I called him on my way home and he said he was going crazy. He told me that I really wouldn't be doing anything now. I just had to laugh.

So were down to one more week. We see my OB tomorrow.

Short update

The OB appointment went well. Miles is still head down and Camryn is still head up. My OB was a little amazed at the fact that Camryn had changed positions. There is not any room in there. It seems like I'll have 2 boisterous little girls and Miles will be the laid back one...that's all I need...pray for their teenage years! LOL! He said I'm the same as last week, which was 1cm dilated and 50% effaced. He measured my uterus at 41cm.

NST and ultrasound

I got to experience the "fun" of a nonstress test (NST) today. I actually enjoyed watching each babies' heartbeat. Looking at the monitor in amazement, thinking "that's 2 babies heartbeats". They monitor contractions and the babies reactions to the contractions. I was definitely having contractions and both babies did well with the contractions.

The babies are growing well (I'm not sure there is much more room for growth though). Each babies weighs in around 5 1/2 lbs. Miles was head down (I think he's engaged or close to being engaged as sometimes I feel like he's going to fall out) and Camryn was head up. The way she is laying is causing me all kinds of discomfort on my left side. It was really hard to see anything on the ultrasound because they are very crowded in there.

Last night when I woke up around 1:30 and went to the bathroom, Miles got the hiccups. He didn't react as much as Macey would to the hiccups, maybe that's because he doesn't have the room to do so. Camryn got the hiccups this evening, her reaction wasn't like Macey's either.