The start of Motherhood

Having had our babies 6 weeks early the first 2 weeks of their lives were spent in the NICU (neonatal intensive care unit). These first few weeks were tough but looking back they were really useful with helping us transition from having no babies to two. The first night in hospital I slept for a few hours and then I woke up at about 5.30am and went to go and see our baby boy for the very first time. As mentioned in my previous post both babies were in different rooms in the NICU as our boy needed breathing assistance. James and I still hadn't confirmed their names so on the little name tags on their incubators it just said twin 1 and twin 2. We didn't want to confirm their names until I had really met our son properly.

By the morning I was able to sit up so I could look at our gorgeous boy and hold his hand whilst he was in the incubator. I was so desperate to hold him but still at this point I wasn't able to. James and I officially named the babies that day after they were born. We had a few options but once we met them we both decided on Blake and Ivy.

It was about 5pm when I could have my first cuddle with Blake. He was doing so well that at this point he was moved into the room where Ivy was. This was because he was now off the breathing ventilation and breathing on his own which was such a relief. Holding him for the first time was amazing. Pictures never show just how tiny they were. I still remember the noise all the machines they were wired up to made. I don't feel like that sound will ever leave my mind. As much as holding them was amazing I couldn't wait to be able to really hold them without having so many wires leaving different parts of their bodies. Blake and Ivy were being tube fed so I wasn't involved much with their feeds but I was still at this point hand expressing with the hope my milk would come through. The hospital were really helpful with this and wow do you need patience. I don't know if it was slow because they were so early or if this is the norm but it would take me anything up to half an hour to express as little as 0.5ml of colostrum. I continued to persevere with it and I hand expressed every 3 hours.

Sadly, the first few days were a bit of a blur. The hours flew by yet I felt like I didn't even do anything. Really I was just going back and forth from my room to the NICU, having some skin to skin with each of them and then heading back to have a nap or express or try to find the time to eat and then do it all again. I remember still finding the canula in my hand excruciating, more so than the pain of my scar. Being on the move really helped speed up the healing process following on from my c section. As I was constantly going back and forth from my ward to theirs I feel like I was moving around a lot more than I would have done at home. I did get sudden stinging pains where it felt like my scar was going to rip open which did bring me to tears but it was random occasions when it would hurt, rather than constant pain.

The hospital bed was a god send, as it helped me sit up and lie down easier. Some advice for anyone after a c section is try to move as much as you can but obviously without over doing it. They were also giving me regular painkillers which I would say are a must! Whilst I was still a patient the days were very much the same. On the Wednesday I got to hold both Blake and Ivy together. This was amazing. It was also the first time they were sort of back together. They were so little they could both fit comfortably on my chest. I also started breastfeeding on this day! I know it is not for everyone but I loved it. They both surprisingly latched on easily and that bonding time meant everything. I never got to have those moments of the instant skin to skin after you give birth and that does make me sad but knowing I was providing both my babies with something only I could give them made up for this and made me really feel a connection with them.

Now my milk had come through enough I continued to express regularly to get the consumption up as much as possible in order to provide two babies with enough breast milk. As they were still on feeding tubes and the amounts they were taking from me was minimal they were still topped up through their tubes with a mixture of my expressed milk and formula. I remember on the Wednesday my boobs became so painful and rock hard. The key was to massage them and make them softer to get rid of the pain as all my milk was coming through. This was also the day where the crying began. I don't think many people warn you of the emotions you will encounter after having a baby but I'm here to tell you..... they are all over the place. One minute I was beyond happy and the next I was in tears for no reason. This continued on and off every day for a few weeks. Nothing can prepare you for how you will feel when you become a mum. It's unbelievably overwhelming and it's hard to even understand why your crying half the time. No I didn't have postnatal depression, but so many people suffer from baby blues and I don't think it's spoken about openly enough.

Because of this I also feel like if some people do cry and get upset or are feeling overwhelmed and emotional, they may feel embarrassed to discuss it if no one else has told them that's how they felt. Whenever anyone has asked me and did ask me how I was doing or how the first few weeks were, my reply has always been very honest. It was amazing but wow I cried so much. I wasn't necessary sad I just didn't really know what was going on half the time in my head and it was a lot to take in. I went from being just me to a mum of 2 little people and suddenly your world is never the same again.

On the Thursday when they were 3 days old they were moved out of the incubators into their own open cots. This was amazing to see! They were now able to wear clothes and could in theory regulate their own body temperature. They were put into a cot together for a while which was adorable and so lovely to see that they were finally reunited properly. I was also discharged as a patient but I told them I didn't want to be away from Blake and Ivy. Barnet hospital are the only hospital in the UK where they have special rooms in the NICU where parents can stay with their babies 24/7. Luckily for us they had a room available and now that Blake and Ivy were no longer in incubators they were allowed to move to this part of the ward.

At first I was so happy and excited but very quickly I became really anxious and worried. I was worried I had made a really bad and selfish decision because they were being moved out of the room they were in, which was completely monitored by the nurses, to going into a side room with myself and James and not constantly being monitored. I almost felt like they pushed the idea onto me as they said some new babies were going into their room and they now needed to be moved into our new room asap. This made me feel so guilty and again I cried most of this day! I was really worried they wouldn't get the care they needed but once we settled into this new room they made it very clear that Blake and Ivy were still set up on all the same machines and nurses would be checking in constantly.

Selfishly I was also really upset as I was moving from my own private room with an en suite and a window to a small pokey room with no window and no toilet. The no window part really affected me. Not being able to look outside and see daylight became pretty depressing. So I had gone from being a patient and in my own room having the nurses waiting on me, to being in a new room suddenly with 2 new babies and not having a clue what to do! The first night in our new room was tough. The nurses were feeding them every 2 hours so would come into the room and feed them through the tubes so our night was very disturbed due to that. They were quite unsettled until about 2am but we managed to get a bit of sleep.

Being in this room was almost like a trial. We were looking after them generally throughout the day and night but with nurses coming in and out to check on them and do the tube feeds. Looking back now it was amazing as we learnt so much and it helped us get into the swing of things. But in the moment I hated it. I went 3 days in a row without seeing sunlight. Although I wasn't actually a patient and I could actually leave or pop out if I wanted to, I just felt like there was not enough hours in the day to do anything for me. I guess welcome to motherhood. I would wake up in the morning and breastfeed each of them one at a time before they were then topped up through their feeding tubes. Then I would express to get more milk, for their next feed through their tubes. Then I would need to sterilise the breast pump and before I knew it they were due a feed again or a nappy change and then it would be midday and I would try and get some breakfast and then again I would need to breastfeed, express, change nappies. There were days I didn't even find the time to shower. I felt like in the spare moments I had, I had to pick whether I wanted to shower, eat or sleep. Sadly showering was the lowest priority. I think on the Friday I managed to pop home to shower and wash my hair which felt sooo good!!

The little things made the biggest difference. I tried to start making an effort to get outside and get some fresh air even for 10 minutes a day. Obviously with it being the height of winter it got dark by 4:30ish. After our first week in hospital James went back to work so he could take his second week off work once we were all home. I found this so hard even though my mum was with me and James stayed in the night. Blake and Ivy were actually really good in the night and didn't really cry. They also went onto 3 hourly feeds after a week which did make such a difference to my day as I had a little bit more extra time in between each feed. They were taken off their iv drips and the next step was to start weaning them off the feeding tubes. I needed to decide whether the tube feeding was going to be replaced by the breast alone or if we were going to introduce a bottle. I loved breastfeeding and at first this was what I wanted to do but James suggested we introduced a bottle. He felt that it would be too much for me to solely feed them both and he wouldn't be able to help at all and with their weights being low, knowing their milk consumption would make things a lot easier. Initially I was very reluctant to introduce a bottle as I didn't want them to reject the boob but I knew that sticking with breastfeeding alone would mean weeks and weeks of staying in hospital as they wouldn't gain weight very well or take as much milk with me feeding them. I then felt a sense of guilt giving a bottle and felt that my reasoning was selfish.

I think so many mums feel this way and it's such a shame!! After a bit of a battle with myself I decided to introduce a bottle. To my delight it didn't put them off the boob so I did both which I was so happy about. The downfall to this was my days consisted of breastfeeding, bottle feeding, expressing, sterilising bottles and sterilising pumps times two! Intense to say the least. Blake and Ivy needed to be able to feed without using the tube for 48hours before it could be removed. This was one of three things that needed to be successful in order for us to take them home. They also needed to gain weight and regulate their own temperature. Now that they were being fed without the tubes James and I were able to do the feeds ourselves. We also had to start winding them after every feed as before they didn't require winding as the milk was going straight into their stomach. Again this was all such great practice, especially for James as he had never really changed a nappy or winded a baby before, so having nurses around all the time was great. I cannot fault the staff in the hospital. Had I had the babies anywhere else we would have had to be at home and I would have had to go in every 3 hours to breastfeed them.

They both took to the bottle really well and Ivy actually pulled out her feeding tube as she finished her bottle. She clearly didn't want it anymore. They kept it out with the hope she would no longer need it and a day later Blake's was removed. As the days went on their consumptions were increasing really well and they started feeding every 3 and half to 4 hours. One of the things I found really difficult when we were staying in the hospital was the change of staff. Every day and night we had a different nurse and they literally all had a different opinion and advice on everything with the babies. I remember it was really cold in the hospital and one nurse in the day told us to swaddle Blake and Ivy and then another nurse came in the evening and said to use a cellular blanket and not swaddle them and then the next day the next nurse said something different. It was a nightmare because the minute you got used to one member of staff and decided to take their advice, 12 hours later you were fed different information and it confused the hell out of me.

Eventually I had to decide myself and go with my gut as I felt like it just showed there was clearly no right or wrong, but when you're a new mum you're so worried and unsure on everything you just want someone to tell you what is best.

After a few days of Blake and Ivy not being fed through their tubes we were told we would be able to go home. I was sooo excited. The head nurse did the rounds that morning but sadly Blake's temperatures dropped and we were told we couldn't leave. I was absolutely gutted. I remember just bursting into tears in front of the staff that were doing the rounds. They must have thought I was so unstable! Selfishly I wanted to go home. I knew if Blake couldn't keep his temperature up then this was the best place for him but still I was so desperate to leave the hospital. It had nearly been two weeks and just the thought of getting them home was all I could think about. Blake needed his temperature to stay at a certain level for 24 hours before we could leave. The hospital was actually so cold so I wondered if it was because it was just really chilly. I tried to keep him really warm but then again the different opinions of the staff confused me. Some would tell me to layer him and keep him warm and others would say that I was trying to get his temperature up in the wrong way and it wouldn't be accurate and we would be going home when we shouldn't.

The next day we were told we should be able to go but then another head nurse came to say we couldn't again as they felt his temperature still was a bit too low. It was so hard constantly being told we could go and then that we couldn't. The day before we actually got to go home, instead of Blake and Ivy having separate blankets in their cot I used one larger blanket which actually allowed Ivy to help bring Blakes temperate up. Really cute to think she helped him regulate his temperature. So on 2nd December 12 days later we were ready to leave the hospital as a family of 4. Looking back on the first 12 days it was an absolute rollercoaster. I want all the new mums out there to never hold back on any of the emotions they are feeling in those early stages of motherhood. I cried loads. I couldn't tell you half the time why I cried but I just did and crying helped me. Don't be ashamed of any of the thoughts you had either. I had my days where I would suddenly think oh my gosh what have I done, this is my life now, there is no going back. I am not ashamed to say I thought these things. I'm absolutely besotted with my babies and wouldn't change them for the world!!! It doesn't mean you can't feel down or low at times.

Also I have such admiration and respect for NICU nurses. They were amazing and helped us so much. Blake and Ivy were so well looked after and they were given all the help they needed to get home!

My gorgeous babies were finally coming home and the real adventure was beginning!!!

Tiny but tough x