Our beautiful babes...

I just couldn't wait...I know I have to load so many pics before these, and I still will...but here is a sneak peak of the photographs at their "1 week old" newborn shoot (corrected age as they would have been born 20 October, but actually 6 weeks old or 37 weeks old - all depends how you look at it)...how precious are they?

Wow

Wow...respect for twin parents!

The days are merging into waking babies, feeding babies, winding babies, cleaning babies, dressing babies, loving babies, and then starting all over again! In the 45 minute intervals, you can try to snooze...hard though as they niggle a LOT and of course you are worried so you check on them all the time, or pop one into a sling or onto your chest - which they love. And you sneak in a snack, a quick shower, a quick google or post if lucky...haven't even got around to downloading pics yet - but am taking loads!  So more will be coming soon promise...

Oh dear...Finn is niggling...gotta go....

And feeding time is here again at 12pm...got to make bottles...oh heck...have to express now too...eeeeek what am I going to do when DH goes back to work tomorrow?? Heeeeelp.

Our babies are home!

The twins weren't quite ready to come home on Friday as they still weren't finishing their bottles and the rule is, they have to finish all their bottles in 24 hours and then they can come home.  So we spent the weekend preparing for a possible Monday homecoming instead. And they caught up beautifully! On Monday morning, we got the call...come and fetch your babies!

Rebecca weighs 2.090kg and Finn 2.560kg so they have gained weight beautifully from their birth weights of 1.430kg and 1.940kg.  Also, they lost about 300g each in the week after being born so had to catch up that too.  I can't believe how well they have done in NICU with only a 4 week stay!

Instant butterflies in my tummy eeeek!  Finally after so very long, we would be welcoming our two precious little miracles into our home where they belong. It was incredibly nerve wracking fetching them and driving them home in their snug car seats looking so adorable.  They were hungry as we were just over feed time so the first thing we did when we got home was to start the feeding session.

Wow...we soon realised how daunting having two babies will be on a 3 hour cycle! On the hour, every 3 hours, we have to have everything sterilised, prepare the bottles, add whatever meds or vitamins needed, warm them, wake the babies, change the babies, get into feeding mode with burb cloth, feed the babies, wind the babies during and after the feed, let the babies settle, swaddle the babies, put the babies back to sleep. If all runs smoothly this takes an hour to an hour and a half.

Then I still have to fetch all expressing stuff and express milk for upcoming feeds. Then we have to wash all bottles, lable and store milk, re-wash used bottles and sterilise them etc.  Then of course there are the niggles - checking on the babies and making sure all okay and comfy. So all in all, we get an hour or so every 3 hours.  But try snooze next to them - not easy as they niggle and moan and cry every now and then so of course you are up in a shot to check on them. And this is every 3 hours, 8 times a day - 6am, 9am, 12pm, 3pm, 6pm, 9pm, 12am, 3am!!!!!! Because they are prem, they have to be fed every 3 hours so even if they are not awake, you have to wake them. They sleep, eat. wee, poo, have windy grins, burb, sleep, gurgle, niggle and eat again. 

This all sounds hectic and it is....but....how incredible beautiful and cute and gorgeous are these little treasures!  Having them with us is unbelievable.  It is pure love. I am under no illusion that we will take serious strain in the upcoming weeks and months, but every moment is as it should be.  I will treasure every second.

We have waited so long for this...and we will sleep again one day! I stockpiled enough sleep during 12 years of infertility!

Will add pics soon soon - just have to download from camera!

Home coming...

It is very possible that the twins may be coming home on Friday!!!

Or Saturday or Monday - depending on how quickly they master the art of completing full bottle feeds without needing to be topped up by tube. SO exciting and SO scary at the same time!  Up until now, while all I have wanted is to be with them...in a strange way, I have become used to them being in the NICU knowing that they are being so well cared for.

Soon, they will become 100% our responsibility. No support from well-trained neonatal sisters. No one to whip them away for a feed, a change or to sort out a wind.  This will become our new life. I had a mild panic attack today trying to work out how the hell I was going to keep expressing and then also bottle feeding, changing and winding two babies every 3 hours?  When will I ever sleep? Eeeeeek!

Their sucking reflex is getting stronger but they are no way ready to solely breastfeed so will need most of their feeds by bottle until they get stronger and realise that they need to work a little harder to actually get milk flowing from the boob.  I introduced Rebecca to the boob for the first time today and she latched on only to promptly fall asleep.  Finn is slightly better - he has actually got down 10ml of breast milk by sucking, but today decided it was far too hard so also went to sleep...oh dear...lazy suckers!  I am sure with time they will get the hang of it. In the meantime though, poor mum is going to be busy trying to figure this whole feeding thing out...

It is more than a little daunting!

Tomorrow they have their eye tests and hearing tests.  If we are given the go ahead for discharge on Friday then I will room in overnight on Thursday to get the hang of things with a little night support.  Our CPR lesson is on Friday morning...and then...we may be loading up two babies and starting our lives as parents.  This is a huge and incredibly momentous thought.

I had their natal chart done by my astrologist and they have the most beautiful charts with some incredible aspects and amazing connections to us as parents....I am so overjoyed that they already seem to be so blessed with such an incredible beginning to their lives and am so excited at their potential.

It is going to be the most remarkable journey now to observe as they grow and develop into their own little people...what a blessing for us to be part of this miracle.

                                              Finn and Rebecca - about a week ago...

34 Weeks old today!

Today the twins are 34 weeks old!!! They would have been born in 2 weeks time.  Instead they have been in the world for 3 weeks on Sunday and are doing their growing in NICU. I have been so bad at blogging their NICU story...but do not give up on me...I will be loading a photo journal of their journey soon and tell the story as best as I can.

In summary, they are both doing so very well. Finn weighs 2.1kg already and is in an open cot, wearing his own clothes. I gave him his second bath yesterday.  He is being nose tube fed and his next hurdle is mastering the suck, swallow, breathe skill - they start with bottle feeding soon and then I introduce him to breastfeeding! He sucks on my finger quite well already, but this ability only kicks in at 34-35 weeks...Once he has mastered this, he can go home! Rebecca needs to grow some more as she weighs about 1.7kg now.  She is a smaller baby, but at the same developmental age as Finn, so while she is a little behind with feeding, she also has to master the feeding skill better and put on at least 300g before she can also go home. They are both on breastmilk with a little top-up of formula if I don't make enough. We are hoping that they get to go home at the same time. They are beyond precious and I cry every time I think of how special they both are.

Life in NICU has been interesting and emotional and scary and incredible all in one.  I have not been myself and it has taken me quite some time to recuperate. The physical toil has been quite extreme and I think I have under-estimated the impact the birth has had on me. I have been so very very tired with extremely low energy. My muscle tone from lying in hospital for almost 4 weeks is poor. Having lost 32kg in 2 weeks has really been a shock for my system I think.  My blood pressure which is only stabilising now has also contributed to poor energy levels. My body has been sore, my mind exhausted and I really have not had the energy to blog as I should have been.

I have been expressing every two and a half hours as they are drinking all I produce so I live from express to express.  I have had to drop the 2am expressing though as it was killing me! So I express all day long from 5am to 11pm. I have also been getting up at 5am to catch a lift with DH to the hospital and then getting back late afternoon, so this has been exhausting....I usually run around like superwoman, so it has been a strange experience for me having to admit this...

There has been so much to say.  I am completely in awe of this miracle and the fact that I am a mother and have two babies.A mother...with two beautiful perfect babes...and a very special DH who has just blown me away with his remarkable strength and love. What a blessing I have been given. My heart has swelled with so much love for these 3 special people in my life - I didn't know it could ever feel like this. Words are simply not enough.

Finn and Rebecca have arrived...

Our birth story…

Well…they didn’t stick to the plan and our precious little miracles chose their own time to arrive into our lives…

 

                                        The last belly shot taken in hospital before the twins arrived.

On Sunday, I woke up with a bad headache after a really awful night with little sleep. I felt as if I was literally drowning in fluid. My sinuses were swollen, I was struggling to breathe properly and I couldn’t believe that my body could swell any more than it was already. I had put on about 18kg just in the 3 weeks in hospital - all fluid! My thighs were stretched beyond belief.  I couldn’t cross my legs or even sit on the loo properly. Walking was difficult and I could barely fit into a wheelchair. I remember lying in bed during the night crying, thinking to myself that my body couldn’t do this anymore. My Dr called me into her practice rooms which are just down the passage from the maternity ward to do a scan to double check our little girl’s doppler and their weights before the planned caeser on Monday. I could barely climb onto the table. The scan showed that her doppler had actually improved a bit! Their estimated weights were 2kg and 1.6kg. So we were all set for our big day…or so we thought.

By mid-morning, my headache had become so bad I could barely think straight. I tried taking Panados, putting ice against my forehead, lying with a cloth over my eyes. It just got worse and worse. The Sister in charge called my Dr who asked them to take into the labour ward and a quiet dark room to rest. She came in to see me, checked my blood test results and looked at my BP which was about 160/106 at that time. She said to just keep quiet and rest and we would go ahead as planned on Monday morning. By 2pm, I had not improved and my BP had continued to rise. It was around 180/115. At 14h30, the Sister came in and told me that my Dr had called to say we were doing an emergency caeser straight away at 3pm. They had already called my DH and he was on his way.

I was immediately put onto a line and a drip and a nurse shaved me dry!!! No baby powder even! We couldn’t use the theatre we had planned to next to NICU as there was a leak – so next thing I knew I was being wheeled at great haste off to the main surgical theatre floor. Alongside me were the neonatal sisters with the incubator that would carry our babies back down to NICU immediately after the birth. It was such a surreal experience. The theatres were all empty, as no planned surgeries are done on a Sunday. It was eerily quiet. We were met at the entrance by the scrub sister and then I was in pre-op while the Dr’s and DH got into scrubs. The anaesthetist arrived and explained to me that the spinal block may be tricky due to all my swelling and fluid on my back. He said I may have to be put out completely and I asked him please to make sure he got it right as I really wanted to be awake to see my babies being born. I was quite calm at this point, but extremely anxious at the same time. I moved onto the delivery table and bent over to begin the spinal block. It was incredibly scary and painful as the Dr tried to get the local anaesthetic into my spine first.  I could feel the needle hitting bone.  After about 5 attempts, he finally slid the proper needle into place and the spinal block was done. I lay down until it took effect.

My Dr started cutting and discovered that I had masses of scar tissue from the previous laporotomy after my ruptured ectopic. She explained that there are pristine uteruses and then there are some that are not…I was the latter, but a really tricky case as she battled to cut through all the layers of scar tissue. This took quite some time. Then one of my muscles started bleeding, which is also unusual. She had to put in a drain for the muscle. Finally she reached the uterus and the next thing I knew after feeling much tugging and pulling, our little girl was pulled out head and arms first as if she has been waiting all along to make her big arrival.  Rebecca was born at 16h06, crying with a lusty yell and a red face. My Dr showed her to me and I was in floods of tears. I couldn’t believe that this tiny precious little human being had been growing in my womb for 31 weeks and 3 days. She was whisked off by the paediatrician and the neonatal sisters. Then, our little boy was pushed down reluctantly.  He stuck a leg out as if to say, I am not ready to come out thanks. But he was pulled out by the legs and also arrived yelling. Finn followed his sister one minute later at 16h07. I recognised him immediately as he was shown to me. It was too much to process and I remember turning my head towards the table where they were being worked on desperate for another glance.  They were wrapped up and brought to me again and I got to kiss each one on their heads, before they were wheeled away straight to the NICU.

                                          Rebecca's arrival into the world...

                                          Seeing her for the first time...

                                                        Finn legs first...

 

                                                        Finn arrives a minute later...

 

                                                      Seeing him for the first time.  I recognised him from the 4D scan!

 

                                                       The NICU team working on the babies...

                                         Kissing Rebecca on her head...also kissed Finn but no pic...

Then I started struggling to breathe and my heart started beating incredibly fast.  My BP shot up and I was put onto oxygen. It took another 30 minutes or so to stitch me up and then I was wheeled to recovery. I started shaking quite badly. I remember thanking the anaesthetist, who replied saying he really thought it was touch and go at one point and was now so stressed he was off to have a large drink…..great!  My BP was still extremely high so I was wheeled down to high care in the labour ward. It got worse. And worse. I was not really completely conscious at this point so I only remember some of what happened. But by 8pm or so, I think my BP had shot up to 225/125, which is apparently really extreme.

I recall glimpses of my Dr sitting on one chair monitoring me and my DH on another just watching me.  I was shaking and slipping in and out of consciousness. I remember my Dr saying, we are taking her to ICU now. Then we were off, all action stations when we got there. I remember the anaesthetist arriving again to put in an A-line (a line straight into my artery to monitor BP directly and constantly). I was hooked up to a full monitor system and two more lines were put into my arms for other drips. I was also put onto magnesium sulphate to prevent seizures. By this time I was completely zoned on pethadine and the effect of the mag sulph drip which apparently has horrendous side effects.  I had a self administering pump, but I was too out of it to use it so the ICU sisters kept pushing it for me. Then I was out.  

I spent 3 nights in ICU. The hospital kidney ICU physician became my primary Dr during this time as he handles any GPH cases.  Essentially pre-eclampsia is a disease of the kidneys primarily and mine was pretty bad apparently. I had critical levels of protein in my body, hence the oedema and blood pressure complications. The disease is a response to the placenta and becomes life threatening. My Dr had been monitoring me so closely to allow me as long as possible to nurture our babies, but the critical point had arrived and she made the decision not to wait a minute longer – so she had made the call to do an emergency caeser. It was the right call, as I cut it really fine apparently. I was in reality, really really sick even though my blood results did not indicate organ failure yet…we were close. Both Drs now tell me that I was one of the worse cases they have seen in a while. The ICU staff also said that they hadn’t seen a maternity case in so long.

 

                                          Day three in ICU...

                                          Finn in the beginning, in NICU...

                                          Rebecca in NICU...

                                          Finn with his incubator mascot...

                                          Rebecca with hers...

ICU is another ball game completely. I felt like I was in a real life episode of Grey’s Anatomy. It was really impressive though seeing the skill of the ICU staff – a seriously slick operation. It was so humbling being completely helpless and essentially strapped down to monitors, unable to do anything for myself. They had to do everything including washing me, helping me to eat, move…It was incredibly frustrating too and I had many hours of weeping to myself as I couldn’t see my babies. I couldn’t do anything for myself. It was really hard. I was losing about 8 litres of fluid a day via the catheter - can you imagine if I hadn't been on one how hectic it would have been getting to the loo every 15 minutes! On the Tuesday, I begged the Dr to let me go down to see my babies.  He agreed. We strapped the catheter to the wheel chair and they unplugged all the monitors and DH wheeled me down to NICU to meet Rebecca and Finn face to face again. I will never forget this moment. I could just see them from the wheelchair, and was so overtaken by emotion that all I could do was weep. They are beyond the most precious things I have ever ever seen in all my life. There they were. Real little (and I mean so very very small) live, perfect, complete babies. They were here. Our little miracles had finally arrived and how absolutely perfect they are.

Rebecca was born weighing just 1.430g and Finn 1.940g. She did not even need oxygen at all and her agpar was 8/10 and 9/10. I believe she was clearly ready to be born and knew to put her energy into developing her lungs. She is small but feisty already.  Finn was a little more reluctant, putting his energy into growing instead of developing his lungs, so while he weighs more, he needed some help with breathing and was on a c-pap for a while and then just a nose-tube. His agpar was 8/10 and 8/10.  So impressive for prem babies! They are doing so well, and both are off oxygen already. They are getting the hang of oral feeding and their digestive systems are getting stronger. Their umbilical lines have also been removed and this means we can start kangaroo care sessions with our babies…can’t wait.

I got back to the maternity ward on Wednesday evening and now am just a walk down the passage from NICU. I get to visit them whenever I want to. I am expressing milk every 3 hours during the day, but until my BP stabilises we cannot use the milk due to the meds I am on.  This has made me really sad, but I am hopeful that I get taken off the nasty BP drugs soon so we can start feeding them my breast milk. Then the next step is to move to kangaroo care and breastfeeding, when their suck reflex kicks in at about 34 weeks or so. Today they are 5 days old or 32 weeks and 1 day. We are praying that their stay in NICU is only another 3 or 4 weeks tops, so we may get to take them home at 36 / 37 weeks, which is when they would have been born.

                                          Holding our babies for the first time...

I cannot put into words what the babies do to my heart.

It simply takes my breath away every time I look at them.

When I see how my DH looks at our babies, I can hardly contain the emotion I feel.

It has changed my life irrevocably and forever.

                                          Finn's foot.

                                          Rebecca's hand.

31 Weeks and my last 4 days...

How far along?  We have reached the incredible 31 week mark today!!! And we won't be going very much further.  In 4 days time, we will be welcoming our miracles into our lives at last.

Symptoms?  Severe pre-eclampsia with protein count sitting dangerously over 6. 5 Is considered cut-off point. Hypertension being treated with meds. Severe lymphoedema. Headaches. Unbelieveable water retention - legs, feet, thighs, butt, face, hands. My belly is measuring 39cm from top to bottom - equivalent of a full term pregnancy. I can't bend over or cross my legs.  My knees are filled with water so if I kneel it feels like a gel pad. Have to wear special support stocking to prevent DVT. Can't sleep lying down as my sinuses are swollen so I make the strangest whistling noises keeping me awake and I also cannot breathe properly due to diminished lung capacity and fluid. Gosh...I sound like a moaner, but I realise now how serious pre-eclampsia really is...not a walk in the park! Let alone a twin pregnancy!!! All worth it though. I may need to stay in for longer than the normal 3 nights after the caeser however to stabilise my blood pressure etc.

Stretch marks? No new ones...using tissue oil morning and night. Existing stretch marks look more stretched but haven't started getting longer...

Weight gain? I have put on about 10kg now of water retention and my weight has increased by 13kg since I was admitted to hospital.  The good news is that it is completely reversible and I will lose up to 15kg immediately.

Sleep?  Despite the hectic issues...I am still managing about 6 hours during the night and day combined - good training for when the babbas come home!!!

Movement?  Still love feeling them so much.  I am going to miss having them inside me so so very much and I am trying to embrace and enjoy the last 4 days of being pregnant.

Best moment this week? Banking almost 3 weeks of time keeping our twins inside me in their cozy little nest so they can grow grow grow!!!

Food cravings?  Can't really eat very much at all....no real cravings....

What I am looking forward to? To seeing our babes faces at last. To seeing them hold my liitle finger. To looking into their eyes. To finally having these two precious miracles a reality...my heart can almost not handle the love I already feel for them.

Milestones?  The precious time we have gained.  Both Obgyns really thought I wouldn't make the week...and I made almost 3!!!

Emotions? A mixture of sadness that I won't experience my last 4 weeks of pregnancy.  Relief that we will have reached 31 weeks and 4 days. Excitement at knowing we will meet our babies in 4 days time.

General... I met our paediatrician, Dr W today.  He is so awesome and seems quite chilled and pleased about the twin's weights. He said we will only know more once we evaluate them after being born, but if just the basics, he would say we could even be looking ahead to about a 4-5 weeks NICU stay!!! The quicker they can suck, breathe, self regulate and do all together...and get over 2kg, the faster they get to come home! He also said the smaller twin sometimes progresses faster as they are more stressed and reactive. How amazing it would be to have them home in 4 weeks! That is something to look so forward to. All in all, I am so blessed to have had this time to prepare properly. I am at peace.