Readers Write: Preparing for twins

by Denise

So you’re expecting twins…congratulations! Get ready for more laughter, fun, tears, and frustration than you have ever known. Not every day will be easy, but believe me when I tell you that there is more joy ahead than you have ever known. Times two.

But there are some things you should know. Some things that might help. A little…

1. Go sit on the couch. Do you hear me? Go to the couch right now and sit down. Stay there. Just sit. Do not, I repeat, do not get up. You will never be able to do this again. DON”T GET UP! Call me and remind me what its like.

2. Do you remember how your mother had those eyes in the back of her head? Mine did, and they were creepy. Well, get ready, because you are about to do her one better. Be prepared for having eyes all over your head. Your new eyes come home from the hospital with you, and they are quite handy. By the time your twins are toddlers, your head full of eyes will have laser vision. You’ll be proud.

3. Spend time with your spouse/partner and/or significant friends/family/pets/anyone you have ever met in your life and would like to ever see again. It won’t be impossible, but for at least a few months it will be pretty difficult to get together for a good chat. Juggling newborns and adult conversation at the same time is tricky. Not as tricky as, say, a space walk, but eerily close.

4. Get ready to communicate with the outside world almost exclusively via email. This is not a bad thing; in fact, make every effort to keep in touch with people after the babies come home. It helps with the sanity battle (you’ll know what I mean soon enough).When two infants live in your house, using email is just easier than getting to the telephone. Using smoke signals is easier than getting to the telephone.

5. Go to that enormous warehouse club that sells everything by the gross ton. Buy everything you think you may possibly want or need for the rest of your life. Toothpaste, deodorant, laundry detergent, forty-pound cans of tomatoes, whatever. Buy it now. Shopping with twins gets dicey.

6. Wake up on Saturday morning and just lie in bed. Remember this feeling. See couch argument under point 1. Don’t forget to call me.

7. Do everything you can to make your new life easier. Every little, and not so little, way you can make things easier on yourself, do it. Make sure its easy to do laundry, because you’ll do a lot of it. Get yourself set up so that diaper changes (you thought you were doing a lot of laundry?) are easy. Buy a lightweight stroller, so that lifting it in and out of your vehicle is easy.

8. Okay, now I really want you to listen. If you heed none of my other advice, which is the usual response I get, so I’m not offended, heed this advice: GET HELP. Get all the help you possibly can. If you can afford it, hire people. If not, call on every friend, relative, good neighbor, anyone you trust. Everyone who cares for you will be happy to help, and you will need them, at least at the beginning.

Now, all of that logistical stuff aside, here is my really most important point : one baby truly, literally, is a bundle of joy. You are going to have two. Always remember the joy. And the wine.

Denise Thomas lives in Western Massachusetts and is lucky
mother of three-year-old twins, son Cooper and daughter Casey, and a zany
beagle named Malcolm.

Comments

[Michelle]

Mine are almost eleven months now. This first year has been exhausting (I also have an almost three year old), but these two of mine are so much fun. And, I should add, that no one knows what it's like except us (not even those mothers who have babies less than a year apart).

[Zoe]

How true. I'm the proud and exhausted mother of ten month old twins. I don't think they've stopped moving since the day they were born. They rolled early. They crawled early. They're on the verge of letting go of the furniture and taking off across the well baby-proofed house.

I wish someone had given me this advice when I was pregnant. I would never have worked until my 36 week of pregnancy. I would have rented movies, read voraciously and vegged out as much as possible, even though finding a comfortable position would have been next to impossible.

Before twins I just rolled my eyes, now they really do see all sorts of things from every conceivable angle.

I'd add a point about having toys that make noise - the louder the better. If my tired eyes aren't quite focused on their play, I know where my kids are and what they're doing by the repetitive musack. I know these toys drive parents of singletons crazy, but I think they've saved my sanity!

Of course, I'd do it all again in a heartbeat. They really are double the fun!