Nesting

A friend of mine was teasing me the other day ... when most people nest they clean behind their stove, us well we are building a chicken coop.

Sigh currently we are trying to work our way through a 'to-do' list of epic proportions. I think the main difference between pregnancy #1 and pregnancy #2 is that the second time around the baby stuff feels like more more thing you are trying to cross off your list, it does not have the same sweetness that it did the first time round. Don't get me wrong, those itty bitty clothes...they are too much. But this time around, we are on a mad dash to get things done.

This time around we are all too aware of how little time we are going to have when the little lady arrives. We had a list of projects we hoped to have done, things that would be required, things that we just wanted to do.

So while we are looking forward to our little lady's arrival - we are frantically trying to:

• Get our dishwasher installed! (Woo Hoo!)
  
• Build two new raised beds in our new garden
• Build a Chicken Coop for four new hens to come and live with us
• Complete the painting and mudding for our new mini-mud room
• finish painting in our bathroom
• get the toddler bed back into a crib (that means we have to talk our daughter out of sleeping in it, and sleeping in her big bed)
• wash, sort and package all the baby clothes
• make some meals for the freezer

Phew! Those are just the 'big' things we are trying to do. I know, I know - why a garden and chickens...well for us it just feels like it completes the picture of the big, happy chaos we imagined our lives to be. Neither of us know a ton about gardening, but have always wanted to grow our own food ....so we are going to give it a shot! I'll keep you all posted.

Maybe the baby will arrive just so we can catch our breath! Back to hanging chicken wire now...

Impasse

We have begun the conversation around our house about what is going to happen to our duo when M goes into labor. We are currently at a bit of an impasse. While M can not tell me much at this point about her vision of a 'birth plan' (I use quotes because I believe this is just a guideline more than anything) but one thing she does say is that she wants to labor at home as long as possible.

The current debate is about where our kiddos are going to go. I am not sure why, but seriously every. single. time. i try and talk about it I end up in a puddle of weepy mess on the floor. For me, I feel like this is going to be a huge transition that is going to rock their world. I want them to feel secure in their surroundings and not feel like they are being shipped off.

For me, I am having a hard time wrapping my mind around the fact that even after the birth the reality is I will have to float between my two families. I hope that all goes smoothly and M can come home a day later. But what happens if she is in the hospital for an extended time? I can not imagine being away from the kiddos for that whole time, then where does that leave me?

On top of it, I am not sure who to ask. We have a friends that would be willing to potentially take our kids for a day but any more than that we kind of run out of options...again, the thought of all of this is making me weep. sigh.

I know we'll figure it out but at the moment it feels like a really large hurdle.

Off to dry the eyes before I start work again...

Phew!

Today is 30 weeks.

30 weeks- holy crap the time is flying. It's funny, while I know that there is still quite a bit of time to go, the fact that our duo arrived at 35 weeks has me thinking that we only have 5 weeks left. I hope this is not the reality...but still messes with your head a bit.

With that panic I went in to hyper drive this past week. M has the week off due to spring break and I took the time off to get things done around the house.

We put up a chicken coop, got our garden ready to plant and installed our new dishwasher. Additionally, I sorted out the garage and all the bins of clothing, washed bottles and even found a package of size 1 diapers. While there is still quite a bit to do - I am feeling a little less panic at the moment.

Back to crossing more things off my list...

Recycling Emotions

Sorry for the radio silence, with the arrival of the third trimester a small edge of panic has descended upon the house. Um, yeah - there is a baby coming soon if you had not heard. We have lists stacked on top of lists of things that need to be accomplished, we want to accomplish, and a very short plan of how we are going to afford it all. (But that's another story all together).

With the arrival of the third trimester M has started also starring down the reality that pregnancy ends with a birth. Sincerely, I think there was quite sometime that she took the approach of just sticking her fingers in her ears and shouting LA LA LA LA trying to ignore this fact. But now it is weighing on her mind i.e. our minds more.

More and more I find myself thinking about my birth experience. Having twins I knew my options were limited, and honestly the birth itself was empowering and positive. But my duo was born at 35 weeks, they were small and in the NICU for a week. I didn't get to bring them home with me from the hospital, they did not get to room with us while we were at the birthing ward, I actually did not get to hold my daughter until the next day.

Many of these factors were reasons why I wanted to carry a child again. I wanted to have a so called ' normal' experience. While I know there are no guarantees, my hope was that there might be some healing going through the birth experience again physically. While M is faced with the reality that she has to give birth, my sadness has resurfaced over the idea that I will never get to 'do over' bringing my duo into the world.

I am excited to meet this little baby, I can not wait to hold her in my arms and soak in the newborn-ness all over again. I look forward to having our family together from the time she enters the world.

But all of that makes me a little sad, a little envious and a little nostalgic for the experienced I had once dreamed for myself.

Seeing Double

Recently I have been thinking and remembering about the haze of the newborn days. Trying to remember those first moments and thinking about how this time around might be the same, or different.

Last night I was catching up with a friend and she was talking about how she spent those first 6 weeks in her 'baby bubble'. How sweet that time was, how she would spend hours just nursing and sleeping and holding this new little being.

Don't get me wrong, we did do some of that - but life with twins is very different. VERY different. I didn't have my kids with me until they were a week old, my first weeks were spent in an out of hospitals and doctors appointments, and the lactation center. I lived in a constant heightened sense of awareness - that I didn't or couldn't get all cozy with one little bambino because the second we would drift off, number two would awaken. There were moments of crying, because you physically could not meet everyone's needs in that moment, and it's heart breaking.

Thinking back, I don't think it was until they were closer to 3 months that I could sit back and savor those sweet moments. For me, with two it felt like we had to be more regimented, more scheduled more on top of it...just to survive.

So as I am preparing for the arrival of this new little lady - I am having trouble imaging life with just one. How will it be different? What will we do differently this time - not only because this will be our second time around as parents, but because this time we will have only one infant to contend with.

I want more of that lazy complete newborn period, those moments where you can just sit and stare and soak up each and every moment of this new little person.

Any thoughts about the differences?

One of these things is not like the other

Poor Mr. T.

Poor Mr. T.

Can I tell you how many times I have heard this statement recently? Since finding out we were adding a new little lady to our home this is what most folks have greeted me with.

Poor Mr. T.

Poor Mr. T for being the solo boy in a house full of women.

Sigh, at first I'll admit there was a small apart of me that agreed with them. I did want another little boy (secretly) to help balance things out around the house. But that didn't happen, and you know what, I'm okay about it. Mostly.

When I first found out that I was giving birth to a boy, I did (and still do) worry about how two women are going to raise a confident, loving and secure boy. The ironic part is, Mr. T is ALL boy. Maybe it's all just amplified because I am constantly looking at the genetic differences of boys vs. girl - but Mr. T is all boy. His goal in life is to see how far something can be thrown, what does it sound like when you whack it on the ground and how fast can he run. It's fascinating in itself to watch. But I digress.

I do not think that Mr. T will be worse off for being raised in a house full of women. It is my hope that he will be more aware, in tune with the needs of the various women in his life throughout his life. But if I am being honest, not being a boy myself there are still moments of panic that I must talk myself down from when the testosterone flares and he is rough and loud and (somewhat) destructive. It is my fear that he will not turn into a confident, secure guy, but turn into an angry guy. Angry that he did not have his needs met, angry that he did not have the right role models.

So while I try and let the "Poor Mr. T" comments slide off my back, there is the small nagging voice that they might be right.

Lactation Nation

When I was the bio-mom, one thing I did well - even with my preemies was B-feeding. The beginning was tough, as it is for most of us, but by 6 months we really hit our stride. I as able to exclusively feed my duo until they were 9-10 months, then we had a great b-feeding relationship until they were 18 months when I had to stop due to my own health problems (a story for another day).

I enjoyed b-feeding, it was something I did well. I did not enjoy my relationship with the pump...(I wish I had read about pumping gifts at that time...what a great idea!). The first time around, M did not induce lactation, she had no interest to. In fact, I think the pump really scared her.

So when M got pregnant I automatically starting thinking about how I could support M this time around by b-feeding. Initially we were both excited about the idea, having 4 boobs, one baby. We day dreamed about sleep and being able to alternate care, and I loved the idea of being able to bond with this new little being on that level.

Then as time passed I have begun thinking about logistics of it all, I read this series of post from the ladies at First Time Second Time. I have begun to have some second thoughts.

So here are some of the thoughts I have been having, combination of pros and cons:

• From all the research and reading I have been doing that at best it seem that I will never have a true b-feeding relationship with this bambino, but more of a b-supplementing relationship.
  
• That induction would take an incredible amount of time, resource and patience. While I could swing the later two parts, time is something that we are short on with two three year-olds running around the house.
  
• Part of me worries I might end up resentful - I already get a sense that M wants to pass some of this off to me. While I want to be supportive, this is her journey, and she should have this experience on her own.
  
• Pumping...it's miserable. If I never had to do it again, I would be alright with that.
  
• My duo, adjusting to life with a new baby and having to share that time, attention and energy even more - I want to make sure that we are available to be there for them and that we are both not tethered to the pump.
  
• I would really like to b-feed again, I loved the intimacy and the closeness that it brought to those sweet moments.
• Hormones - is it smart to have two highly hormonal women when I can save T&R from the wrath and be there more to support M?
  

So while there is no clear conclusion here as of yet this is where the thought process has led thus far. I think M is open and willing to go either way on this, I just want to make sure that we make a choice based on the right reasons. That it is something I am not doing just to satisfy my own personal need, but that it is best for the family.

PS- is it weird that even still almost 1.5 years later when I talk about b-feeding I can still feel that 'feeling' inside my own breasts?