1 month old

Yes, I am aware that I am a day late. But that's ok cuz I've brought pictures.

Future Olympic Swimmer

Z LOVES to swim! He always has. Even when he was a baby. He had no patience for floaties. He tolerated arm floaties, but just barely. He is in the process of taking swim lessons and he is in level 3 with kids that are 2 years older than him. And he is doing great! He is super tall for his age and they all stand a head above him at least. He is learning to dive this week and he had one with perfect form. Yea!! Can you see a Gold Medal in the future??? I have not gotten to watch him swim at all this summer since I have been on bedrest and having the girls.

When I went to his lessons the other night I was super surprised to see how far he has come. He can swim the length of the pool!! And imagine my shock as his instructor pushed him in as a joke while he was diving (Umm...that's my baby), but he came up laughing and just swam back to the edge like nothing. When he dives, unlike all the other kids, he goes way out and surfaces half way out into the pool. He calls it his torpedo move :-)

New Heading

How do you like my new heading?? Pictures too little? I like how there are more than just 3 pictures, but they are a little small aren't they? I might work on enlarging them a little.

Some Questions...

Feeling a little blah today and you get to hear what is rattling around in my brain. If you read my blog for baby stories only then you'll have to wait for the next post where there is to be some serious cuteness going on :-)

But for now...


I am not one to question the Lord much.

During my divorce, everyone said it was ok to be mad at God. But I wasn't. Why would I be mad at him? He didn't leave me with our 8 month old baby to raise alone. In fact, there was never a time when I felt closer to Him than during those years.

Then when I couldn't get pregnant without IVF, I didn't really question him then either. I kinda knew what was behind that and it wasn't just the medical reason why. (That my dear friends, is another post entirely)

I take the stand of "why not me?" rather than "why me?". This is not to say that others are wrong to question God. I have not experienced anything faith shaking that has made me seriously question God and I hope I never do, but I know there are things that would make me go to that dark place. I totally understand why someone would question him for the horrible things that happen in this world, especially when it comes to babies.

Which brings to me to this...

Why would God create a person to love kids, put them into a job that surrounds them with kids, then make it impossible for them to have kids?

Which brought up my whole problem with this...

Why also would God create a person to love the whole experience around childbirth and then it turns out that I would never get to experience that myself? I almost went to med school to become an OB/GYN but I knew my grades where not good enough and that I wanted to start my own family without the stress of all that school and many years invested. But to say I was fascinated by it is an understatement. Not in a gross way, but in the "most beautiful experience that can ever be" way. I was in the room when my first nephew was born. I was 17. It changed my life. Changed. my. life. I looked at everything differently after that day when I watched a human come into the world. I was blessed to be at all of my nephews births but 1. I loved every minute of it.

When it was my turn, I read up on the Bradley Method of child birth. An "all natural" way of delivering with no pain meds. I was so up for the challenge. But as it turned out not only would I not be doing it with no pain meds, I would not be doing it the natural way at all. The book even said that if you had to have Pitocin to throw the whole method out the window because it was not natural labor and not many people can make it through labor with Pitocin without meds. If you did, my hats off to you :-) But my little boy got stuck in my pelvis where the dr said only a six pound baby would fit through. Since Z was 8lbs 10oz, that wasn't happening. Plus after more than 12 hours of labor, I had only dilated to a 4. I felt incredibly cheated afterward even though I knew it was the only way to have Z safely. The dr who delivered Z said that unless I got rid of half the gene pool (pointing to Z's dad) I would never have a baby vaginally.

Well...circumstances being what they were, half of the gene pool was gone when it was time to have my next one. But did I get a chance to try again? Nope. There were 2 in there and it was far too risky to attempt a vaginal birth. Come to find out, I would have had to have a c-section anyway with the twins bc Olivia was so far up there, not heads down that it would have been very difficult for her to make her way down far enough to deliver naturally after Abigail came out.

So...was that it all along? Can the Lord see the whole picture in a way that saved me from having to endure both a vaginal and c-section births? 'Cause there are some advantages to having a c-section and everything down there being unchanged. Is that it?

(pausing to think about that for a little bit...)

Ok, let's just say it is. I can handle that. I would have gladly given up some of those advantages to have a natural birth, but ok. He knows best and all that.

However... ... ... why then create me with a love and appreciation for the child birthing process?

I am sure there is a reason. Maybe someday I will stumble upon it. I am not angry at God for this but it does make me question him a little bit.

And THAT"S OK. God can handle a few questions from me, since I am his child and all. You know how we listen to children's questions sometimes with an amused ear. I don't think I will be struck by lightening today.

But then I think of the friends, in real life and in the cyper world, who can't have babies or whose arms are empty because their babies died and damn, but I just feel like a total shmuck about complaining about the way I got my babies. I should just shut up about it. Which I will, right now.

For those who are here to see baby pictures, I will be posting some more very soon. I have some really cute ones from yesterday. Stay tuned.

Prayers Please

I heard from my friend Nikki today. Her and her husband just got married in May and couldn't wait to start a family. She found out yesterday that she is not able to have kids. I don't have details yet, but I think it has something to do with her diabetes.

My heart is aching for her and asking all the questions she probably is asking herself. Even though we both know that there is a purpose in everything about God's plan for our lives, in this kind of time we ask those tough questions of God. Why create her with a love for kids and a yearning for her own when she can't have them? I am sure there is a little boy or girl out there that will fill their needs at the right time in some way but right now it is little comfort to think of other options.

So please lift her up in your prayers today.

Sunday Show and Tell

This is my wonderful nephew Cameron. He is the only one of my 5 other nephews that wanted our girls to be girls. All the rest of them wanted boys "because we know boys!" You see, these are the first girls on both Gary's and my side of the family. He loves my girls and always wants to hold them when he visits. He sings to them and just wants so much to take care of them.

He had a special day with his mom recently and got to go to this great little place that lets you make your own project; ceramics, glass, mosaic, and lots of other fun stuff. And what did that darling do?? He made my girls a gift to hang in their room. He decorated each of their initials with pretty mosaic tiles, glass, and other wonderfulness. I will treasure these for so many reasons. It is not every day that a 9 year old will do this and I love him for it.

Just look at his proud little face.

Thank you Cameron!!

When we get a spare minute we will hang them in a special place in their room!

And yes, that is a baby under that blanket, but i covered up for the most part :-)

First Baths

It is the girl's actual due date today. I cannot imagine actually carrying them this long. I like them much better out where I can see them. I know I have been complaining a little (ok ok a lot) about how hard this all is. I just want to stop and say how incredibly blessed I feel to have these two beautiful girls God has trusted us with. AND...I am at my pre-preg weight!! Whoo-hoo!!! I know if I cut out my daily sno-cone, it would fall off even faster.

I am working on a new header so be patient with me. I know I need to update it. I am getting some new pictures together and changing it up a little.

So as promised...bath pictures!

The girls both LOVE their baths. Especially getting their hair washed. True girl even as infants.

Olivia's bath

She got to go first because her belly button was ready first.

Abigail"s bath

She is just lounging in her bathtub like a little queen. I can't get enough of her big eyes!

Catching up

I know you have all been waiting for an update. Well, I have too. This is far more challenging than I thought it would be. I just flat don't have time to sit at the computer. They are both asleep right now and Z is about to leave to spend the day with his dad, so I can't be asleep right now, which is where I would be otherwise. So you get an update!! Whoo-hoo!!

Let's just start with the pure unadulterated cuteness that is my girls :-)

Look at that little Abigail face peeking out at you. So beautiful!

Olivia had two sores on her little bottom, so we aired her out for awhile.
She looks like a little froggy! And oh, so cute.

Let's start with our little Abigail, the "laid back one." Umm...yeah. Someone must have told her that because she has done nothing but try to prove that wrong. She now wakes up every two hours at night and wakes up starving. She starts crying from the moment her little eyes open until you get that bottle into her sweet little mouth. She cries to be changed the moment a tiny bit of poop comes out, but is she finished?? Nope, she has to continue to "go" while we frantically wipe it up as it comes out. So much fun!! But when she looks at you with those huge eyes...sigh. It all just melts away. She can also be laid down while she is still awake and she will go to sleep on her own.






Now for little miss Olivia. Our diva is still the little diva, but she is pretty patient compared to her sister. When she wants her bottle, it's like she says, "Um, excuse me please. Can I have my bottle, please?" Then if it takes too long, it gets increasingly more demanding. She hates to be messed with, though. Diaper changes have her screaming at times. One day her outfit was on wrong but she was fast asleep on Grana. She didn't care at all, but as soon as she tried to fix it, look out! Her favorite place to sleep is right next to me (See picture to the right). Sigh...which doesn't give me a lot of rest time at night, but gosh, just look at her.

They were sitting so nice and quietly. Olivia was even drifting off on her
sister's shoulder when all of a sudden...

Abigail started trying to snuggle up and tell secrets . Olivia was NOT happy to have lost her comfy shoulder to rest on and she let everyone know it!!

So my weight loss drop has come to a screeching halt, more like it hit a wall. I have only lost 1 more pound in the last week. So I am now only 3 pounds from my pre-pregnancy weight, which is great, but what happened to losing like 3-5 pounds a day?? I am guessing that I have finally gotten rid of all the excess fluid. SO now it is work time to get those pounds off. Except here's the deal. I am still hurting. All the time. I know, I know, I just had major abdominal surgery, but it was not like this the last time. I know, I know, this was twins, I had scar tissue to carve through, I am older (if I hear that one more time...), I went back to the hospital for four days, blah, blah, blah. I want to be better already!! And I. am. exhausted. Like I take a 4 hour nap and get up and feel no better than before I lie down. My mom who is here helping me is also exhausted. We can barely keep up with everything, bottles, laundry, food...I have NO idea how I am going to do it without her in a few weeks. Gary is exhausted. He went back to work this week, but still has to hear the girls get up at night even though we are taking care of them so he can rest. The whole household is exhausted...well...except for a certain 6 year old. He has boundless energy. And that is even more exhausting. The mental patience it takes to parent a 6 year old and 2 infants is more than I have right now. And...that's all I am going to say about that.

Hopefully I will post first time bath pictures in a few days. And FWI...this has taken me an hour and a half to type. sigh...nap time

Sunday Show and Tell

Sorry this is a little late but I just found it. And in case it is not totally obvious, this is a choir that is using white gloves with a black light. Enjoy...




Thank you for the gentle reminder, Lord, that you catch us when we fall and most importantly that we are yours.

2 Week Stats and Bath Time

A few cute pictures just to warm us up :-)


Awww...best friends already

Olivia

We went to the dr today and while we were there Little Miss Abigail used 4 diapers during 1 diaper change. She just kept pooping and pooping. It just kept on coming like a little Play.dough factory. They had to have their little heels pricked :-( but they did great throughout the visit. Here are the stats:

Abigail:
6 lbs 10 oz
19.5 in
head 34 cm

Olivia:
6 lbs 5 oz
19.25 in - we think this is way off.
She can't possibly have grown 2 full inches in 2 weeks.
head 33cm

They are both in the 5-15 percentile in their stats, but we are excited they are on the curve at all!! Some preemies would not be, so this is great news. They will continue to gain and go up in percentile in the months to come. This is so different from Z who was always in the 90-95 percentile.

So both have gained past their birth weight which is wonderful! They are still wearing preemie clothes, but we will probably be moving them toward newborn soon, especially Abigail.

Olivia's umbilical cord fell off last night!! Yea!! Real baths!! Abigail's will be coming off in the next few days.

Here are a few pics from our sponge baths.
Olivia (on the left) does not like to be messed with AT ALL, so she was not a happy camper through her 2 minute sponge bath. She turned bright red and just cried and cried. She was mad!

Abigail did better only crying when she was cold.

Both LOVE to have their hair washed after they are bundled up in their towels. Their little eyes practically roll in to their heads in pleasure.

And of course big brother has to be right
there to help. He combed their hair afterward. He made them so pretty!

I still have to brag about how great he is doing with them. He loves on them and kisses them. He tries to make them stop crying. He even came in their room the other night after his bedtime. One of the girls was crying and he wanted to see if she was ok. He said, "Oh! I didn't know you were in here with her and I wanted to come check on her."


In other news:
I am down to 4 pounds from pre-pregnancy weight!!! Whoo-hoo! I am still not myself yet. I gained about 20 with IVF so that is my first goal: to lost that 20, then I want to be back at my regular weight of 30 more. Sigh... ok, I was excited about those 50 pounds I have lost, but dang! I don't think the next 50 will be as easy.

Tired...tired...tired

This pic of Abigail says it all...


Call me naive, go ahead, I deserve it, but I really and truly didn't think I would be this tired. With Z, I pretty much was the one who got up with him every night because I didn't have to work (I was a teacher and summer vacation was after my 6 weeks leave.) I handled it well with less sleep and no naps.


Ok, so there is the whole "there are two babies this time" thing. That's a definite factor here. Plus, I have heard "you are older" more times than I possibly want to. And there is the fact that I spent 4 days in the hospital with all that fluid outtake. Plus, I am more sore this time. The few days after my c-section were def better than last time, but I know it has taken me longer for the pain to ease this time. It didn't help that my Dr. had to "chisel" his way to my babies this time...nice. I am not taking my heavy duty pain meds anymore, but I can't help but wonder if I should be. I keep reminding myself that I am recovering from major surgery. It helps, sometimes.

Anyway...back to being tired. I finally got to take a nap yesterday after I finished crying pretty much all day for no reason. Well, Gary did cook bacon (MY FAVORITE) for breakfast and I can't have any with my low sodium diet I am on. But really, it didn't warrant the tears that followed so I know it has got to be my hormones leaking. I also took a nap today. Both times I slept for a good 3 hours. Did I wake up refreshed in any way?? Nope! Here it is 11:00 and I am nodding off as I type. So, as stupid as it sounds, I didn't think I would be this tired.

On another hand I am down to only 9 pounds from my pre-pregnancy weight. 9 freakin' pounds!! I am so excited!! I have lost 45 pounds in 2 weeks!! Of course, I had help from major drugs to do it, but I might as well find a silver lining in that dreary hospital room somewhere.



I never posted my last pregnancy picture so here goes...


And can I just say...Holy Crap

You will never hear me say I miss pregnancy...never, ever, ever, ever.

Tons of Posts

I had to break my posts down into sub posts in order to get my thoughts together, so I posted like, 4 posts today...Enjoy!!!

The Girls

Ok, now for what you have all been waiting for.

Abigail
She is our laid back one. She can be put down and sleep for hours. She has not taken to breast feeding because she just can't be bothered with trying that hard for her food. When she is awake , she is AWAKE with her eyes wide open. She is not very demanding unless she is gassy or hungry. She does NOT like having her diaper or her clothes changed. She grunts when she has gas and by the smell you know she just dropped a load (seriously, she has like, grown man fart smells) but when you go check her diaper, nothing.






Olivia
Our little diva. She loves to be held. She does not like to be put down to sleep. She does do better if her sister is there with her. She has this tiny little head and seems so very delicate. She hates to be changed also, but she breast feeds like a champ. She falls asleep easily but doesn't stay that way for long.








Some more of our favs.

Z with the babies

I couldn't have asked for it to go better with Z. He is totally enthralled with the girls.

When they sneeze he says "Oh, bless a baby!"

He sings to them, "Put your little foot right here" into their outfit.

He says "Awww....they smiled at me...waved at me...looked at me...whatever they are doing at that time.

He can't wait to hold them and kiss them each morning.

He just loves them to death!!

Here are some of my favorite pics of them:

Seeing Olivia for the first time

Seeing Abigail for the first time

I am not sure what Olivia did, but this is a great picture
of how he is with them all the time.

Such a great big brother!!!

Some Birth Pictures

Gary looking so proud in his scrubs

Olivia

Abigail

Us with Olivia
Abigail was on her way to the NICU

Hospital Stay

Here goes my scary and sucky hospital stay story.

Before I left from the hospital I had stopped peeing as much as I needed to, I had shortness of breath, and I was huge puffy, like my eyeballs were swimming with tears when I wasn't crying, I was so filled with fluid. Looking at all these symptoms now, I realize that I should never have left the hospital in the first place, but no one dr put them all together to point toward a problem. Plus, I wanted to go home, so I probably did not push for them to listen to me as much as I should have. So I headed home on that Saturday the 28th.

When I went to bed, I was the puffiest I had been so far. I really wish Gary had gotten a picture of me then, because it was so bad. My earlobes were even puffy!! When I got up the next morning, I noticed I was having trouble catching my breath. My wonderful Gary had been up all night along with my mom with the girls. They were super fussy. I got my little Olivia, who just would not calm down, and put her inside my nightgown and laid down with her. She went right to sleep and I started to doze. This is where it got scary. I wasn't able to breathe with her so close to my chest. I would nod off to sleep and jerk awake not breathing. I finally woke Gary up to watch my go to sleep to make sure I would still breathe after I fell asleep. Yes, I actually said these words to him. Well, of course, he said we are going to the hospital. All I could think of was, but Olivia wants me. I called the on-call doctor and of course, he also said go to the ER immediately. The more upset I got the harder it got to breath. I would actually have to work at inhaling. So off we went.

After numerous tests, 7 hours in the ER and Lasix, which made me pee out 3 liters of fluid (!), they said I had congested heart failure. Which sounds scarier than it is. Before Gary and I got the full picture of what happened, we were terrified. All we heard was heart failure!! And because of his lack of sleep the night before, let's just say he was more...well, you know how it is when you need sleep. Everything is so much worse than it really is. But really, we were both really scared for me. Only old people have this, right???

Ok, I have to stop and do some back story here. For weeks before I had the girls I could not shake the fact that something would happen to me and I would not live through my c-section. I even went as far as to compose a letter to Zachary in my head and tell Gary what to say to him if anything happened to me. I know that if I had not woke Gary up and told him to watch me breathe that something would have happened to me. I would have stopped breathing. I think that since we talked about it previously that we didn't fool around with it, we just got in the car and went to the ER. Had we waited, it might not have been ok with me.

So as we were sitting there in the ER just looking at each other, we realized that quite possibly, he could have lost me. We just held each other and cried, so thankful that we acted fast and listened to our instinct.

We found out it is actually where there is so much fluid around the heart and lungs that your heart has to work overtime. And boy did I have fluid! They admitted me and I pretty much gave up the hope of breast feeding at that point. They wheeled me down to my hospital room, in the oldest part of the hospital, the cardiac floor, aka - the nursing home floor. Take into mind that I just came from the newest part of the hospital, the women's building aka - the hotel. As they wheeled me into my room, this is what I saw.


Well, I didn't see myself laying there, but you know. The nurses settled me in, all the while I am looking around fighting tears that I am even here instead of home with my babies. The one of the nurses asked if was still going to breast feed and I totally lost it. She got down and looked me in the eye and told me that she would help me, she would get me a pump, that I could breast feed even without the girls' stimulation, she would help me through this, etc. Let me just say that the whole nursing staff up there totally rocked. They made my stay there bearable. I was a bit different from their usual patient let's just put it that way.

So they gave me more Lasix and and here is my weight loss schedule:

June 25th - girls' b-day up 54 pounds
June 29th (morning I checked into ER) - down 12 pounds
(even though I had 12 pounds of just baby! I gained more fluid after they came)
June 29th (evening I got to cardiac floor) - down 9 more pounds
June 30th - down 11 more pounds
July 1st - down 9 more pounds
For a total weight loss of...30 pounds in 3 days!!! Can you freakin' believe that??
And a loss of almost 3 and a half gallons of fluid after it was all said and done.

So after an idiotic Dr had me stay an extra day for nothing (!!!) I got to come home on Wednesday. They finally ruled out the congestive heart failure. I was just so overloaded with fluid from pregnancy that it didn't have anywhere else to go but to my heart and lungs.

So that's my scary heart story. All is well. I have to stay on a low sodium diet so I don't retain the rest of the fluid I need to lose. Oh yes, there is more, just not as much. I have feet and toes!! And I kinda have an ankle. I am down 4 pounds since Wednesday and I am hoping it will just continue to go. :-)

And I leave you with two pictures. The before and the after. Even if you don't see the 30 pounds difference, please say you do to make me feel good.

We are doing great

Holy Mother of God, we are busy!! All I do id pump, pump, pump, breast feed, breast feed, breast feed, then time to sleep a couple of hours at a times before doing it all over again. I miss posting every day and reading everyone else's blogs. I am not even taking the time to change this font to my usual one.

I will post pictures tomorrow and catch everyone up. We are in total and complete love with our girls :-)

The Happy Birth Story First

We checked in on Wednesday at 8:30. I was having pretty steady contractions by that time. They put me in a tiny pre-op room and hooked me all up with my IV. My OB came in to tell me that he had another set of twins in labor so we would have to play it all by ear.

We went to the OR around 10:20. I got my spinal, which wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It felt really strange and I had jolts all down my legs, but overall wasn't bad. By the time I straightened up, I was going numb. They got started and I felt the tugging I knew from my first c-section. They tugged and tugged. I was just starting to worry when they said they were having trouble going through my scar tissue from my last c-section. He said he was really having to chisel his way through. After about 20 mins (!) they finally said that they were at the babies.

At 11:14 a.m. Abigail Suzanne arrived. They showed her to me very briefly bc she was not breathing. She looked pretty blue. Then at 11:15, Olivia Ann was pulled out. My dr had to go after her because she jerked away from him at first :-) I have to say that as soon as they pulled them out, even though I couldn't "feel" it I felt such a huge relief! I mean, an instant weight lifted. I was like "Ahhhh!"

Olivia was doing well and crying right away. She weighed in at 6lbs 2oz, 17 inches long. They worked on Abigail for awhile. She was breathing but not really well, so she went to the NICU for oxygen for about an hour. They weighed her there and she weighed 6lbs 8oz and was 19 inches long. This totally shocked us, because Abigail always measured weighing less, but here she was, our little chubby cheeked thing, bigger than Olivia. Oliva had some glucose issues so she had to go on the the nursery and stay there for awhile.

They sewed me all up and we went to post-op. I don't remember a lot about how I felt that night. I remember wanting to get my catheder out and them getting it and my spinal out.The next morning, they let me sleep past my scheduled pain meds time and I was in serious serious pain. Like crying pain. I was so disappointed because I just knew that my 2nd c-section would be better than my first, but it wasn't. I was in pain pretty much all day until my nurse talked me into getting a suppository. I felt SOOOOO much better after I went to the bathroom.

We had the girls go to the nursery during the night on Thursday and Friday for us to get sleep. I felt a lot better on Friday and Saturday. I could really tell a difference between my last c-section and the second one by this time. We came home on Saturday and then we all know that I headed back in to the hospital on Sunday.

Home and Well

I am home and well. I will give a full update tomorrow. I just wanted to let everyone know that I am good, no heart failure!!