Just Found Out I Am Pregnant with TWINS!

Congratualations! Here is a Mom, not a Mom of twins, comment.

It is really hard for any child to wait out a pregnanacy. Even a fve year old doesn't conceive of time well enough to "get it." I would wait as long as possisble to tell him, certainly into the safe period, and maybe until you are really really showing and others are starting to mention it in front of him. Look at it this way, it is a gift for you to just be HIS Mommy a little bit longer. This will be really hard on him, and he needs you so much now. He'll love his siblings, eventually, but he really won't get it for awhile, and not really until after they are born.

Once the babies come, keep up some main part of routine with him. If you put him to bed every night, do tha tafter the babies. Give him the alone itme he will crave, even if it is exhausting. At the hospital, don't be holding the babies when he arrives to visit. Let him see you as HIS Mommy adn get a hug, and then introduce the babies to the mix.

Before the birth, my daughter made a handprint collage that I framed for her sister's wall. It communicated that it was the baby's room, but she got to put her mark on it. YOu could do TWO! She also helped pack HER hospital bag - toys and books while for when she visited me. It was her "Baby bag."

Good luck.

ah yes, here you go....! I have a toddler who is 20 mos older than my twins. the twins are just over a year now. it's been a looooong year, but we've made it, and things are indeed, in general, getting easier.

if you're in Montgomery County, you can join MCPOM, the Mont. Co. Parents of Multiples group (http://www.mcpom.org), which I highly recommend. you didn't say if you're having fraternal or identical twins (if you know), but that ~can~ (doesn't have to) make a difference in terms of how high risk your pregnancy is (identicals ~can~ be higher risk, but even if you're having identicals, don't get too caught up in the risk factors, it's not worth it). I'm happy to talk more about that stuff if it's even an issue for you (I carried my mono-di ID boys for 39weeks +1 and delivered naturally after being monitored very closely the whole time, which will make sense to you if it needs to and if it doesn't then don't worry about it... :) ). if you're carrying fraternals, then you're really not at a higher risk than any other pregnancy (absent other risk factors, of course). seriously.

I am happy to talk to you about anything as you head down this road. my biggest piece of advice is to take help where and when it is offered. seriously. start a list now of things that people can do for you, so that when someone offers (and they will, but some will only offer once, so take the offers when and where they come. you need them!) you can point to your list and say "sure, could you mow my lawn? how about groceries, can you pick up some groceries? diapers? do laundry? clean the bathrooms? change kitty litter? change a baby? hang out with the kids while I take my first shower in 4 days? take your pick!"

learn to say "yes, thank you, that would be lovely." take help. don't try to do this alone. it is too much for even Superwoman. trust me on this. figure out the maximum help you can afford and tolerate and go for it. that's different for everyone, but making sure that you carve out time for your first born and time for yourself and time for your spouse are really hard to do, on top of everything else, and the hormones and guilt aren't going to make it easier, so plan now to need more help than you think. you can always pare stuff down. I found that after a couple of weeks I actually asked my mom to leave (nicely, lovingly, gratefully) b/c we were ready to go it without the full-time, live-in assistance of my mother. but shortly thereafter we had to hire someone part-time b/c I still needed a lot of help. she's still with us and I would not have survived this year without her.

as for introducing your son, we waited until I was about 20 weeks to start talking about it, by which time I was already pretty huge (people started the comments about being due any day now at about 22 or 23 weeks.... made me crazy.... I look at the pictures now and think good god, how the hell did I do that?!?! :) ). we let him feel the babies kicking, we talked about them being his brothers (I have 3 boys now), we talked about what a great big brother he was going to be, how they were going to be his special babies, they were going to love him and look up to him, but he was still always going to be mommy's special little guy, too. I dunno, we just talked about them a lot. we named them so that they would seem more real to our older son, I don't know if that helped or not, but it made us feel better. he didn't understand really, but he was very sweet and loving to the belly, and equally so once the babes were here. don't get too caught up in forcing it; when he's interested, talk about them. and when he's not interested, let it go. our kids have been really close, our oldest has always been so gentle and loving with his brothers (not necessarily with us, though; do prepare yourself for him to lash out at you when his whole world comes crashing down.... and it's really really hard to get through, but it only lasts a few weeks.... during that time, you have to do everything in your power to show him that he still matters, that he's still important, and don't prioritize the babies over him, even though that sounds like an impossible task.....).

this is a crazy long post.... if you want to talk about it more, I'm happy to. I exclusively BFed the twins as well (and am still nursing now), so if you want to talk about that I can help. anything you want to talk about, if I can help you I will. so will the moms and dads in a POM group like MCPOM (if you don't live in Mont Co).

it's a scary journey, but also a great one. I wouldn't do this past year over again for any amount of money, but I did survive it, we all did, and you will too. that's important to remember....

good luck!

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As a Baltimore native and local childcare coordinator for Cultural Care Au Pair, E. Moss knows how to find the best childcare for you. She has a degree in Sociology and Anthropology with a concentration in Cultural Anthropology. She loves to travel, meet new people and looks to the future by “digging” in the past at archeological sites in Maryland. Find out more about her at http://emoss.aupairnews.com or contact her at ____@____.com or ###-###-####.

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First of all...Congrats on the twins!!!! I too have twins, their 6 1/2 y/o now but I do remember feeling that it was going to be crazy dealing with two infants! Early in my pregnancy, I heard about a mothers of multiples club in my area. A support group specifically for moms with twins, triplets, or more. I immediately joined and am still a member today. I'm not sure what area you live in, but you can go to the http://www.nomotc.org/ to find one near you or you can always google it as well.

During my pregnancy, I did nothing but ask the other moms what it was like to have the twins. Since these were my first children, I had no idea what to expect. Since you have one already, that makes a big difference in your experience level, etc. Many of the moms told me that they were soooo overwelmed and never slept, and could barely even remember the first 6 months since it was so crazy. So after all this 'research' I truly expected it to be an almost horrible experience based on the reports I got. So I decided that I would be fine since I now knew it was going to be really hard and getting the babies on a schedule was the absolute most important thing...I was determined.

Bottom line, it was no biggie at all. Yes, there were moments when you wanted to chuck one or both out the window :-) but all in all, I think I was expecting it to be so bad that I pushed through, immediately got them on the same schedule and it simply wasn't that big of a deal.

The support I've gotten over the years has been invaluable and I simply can't recommend joining a Mothers of Multiples so you can mix with moms in your same boat. There are over 200 moms in my club now and many have had singles then multiples like you, heck, several have more than one set of multiples!!

Anyway, don't stress it. It's a challange to adjust especially with the 1.5 y/o in the mix, but be calm and be determined and you'll truly be fine.

Good luck
Jules

I was pregnant w/ twins 2 years ago - it was a very difficult pregnancy - i would recommend not telling him until you are further along - we told our 7 year old right before the ultra sound to determine the sex - we brought him with us - it was really special for him knowing he was a big brother, although your little guy is definately too small to understand all of that at this point. I would recommend being sure that you are with a doctor that is very informed about twin pregnancies. do you know if they are sharing a sac? this is VERY important - at 8 weeks my dr could tell that mine were and that they were sharing a placenta - this is bad - we were diagnosed with twin to twin transfusion syndrome (TTTS) - we had emergency fetal surgery in maryland (6 hours away) at 19 weeks - i was on bed rest after that and then at 25 weeks put in the hospital - delivered at 28 weeks - we lost one at 4 days old and the other had heart surgery from complications of the TTTS at 4 days old (he was the smallest baby they have ever done the proceedure on - only 960 grams!) he went on to have another heart surgery at 3 months old - just after coming home from the NICU.

Having twins is an exciting thing and can be very scary - i would suggest finding out if they are identical (share a sac) or fraternal as soon as possible - ask your dr if they deal with high risk pregnancies. do everything to protect your babies (as i'm sure you would anyway but sometimes we don't know that they are in danger.)

Please if you have any questions - i am available - its a wonderful and special journey - that only a few parents get to take enjoy it!

A. Haddigan
www.BabysitEase.com

Congrats! I know you are feeling overwhelmed, but try not to stress, its not healthy for you or the babies (I know, easier said than done).

I'm a nanny and have worked for families who have a young toddler and then a set of twins. Its definitely manageable. The first couple months are the hardest part, but once the twins are on a routine, things get easier.

As for introducing your toddler to the idea, I would hold off until he 'notices'. They don't have a concept of time at this age.

There are books out there about becoming a big brother.

Congratulations!! First, the general thought about pregnancy is don't tell anyone until you in or near your second trimester. This may be hard cuz your tummy will get bigger faster, not just cuz you are having twins, but also it's your second pregnancy. I don't want to scare you, but more women are pregnant with twins than have them.

As far as introducing your son to the idea of twins, when you get further along, past 12 weeks, let him know about the babies. There are great books at the library, or the book store, for new big brothers. There are even some about how to introduce multiples.

Overwhelemd doesn't last as long as you think. It is actually easier than you think.

YAY congrats mama! ive always wanted twins... two birds with one stone, so to speak. i understand your anxiety but im also super excited for you! ANYWAY first off i just want to tell you that one of my very close girlfriends was in the same situation... except her husband left her pretty much as soon as she found out she was pregnant. she managed to raise 3 kids, (a toddler and twin infants) into AMAZING young men by herself. im not saying it was easy, bc there were MANY nights of frustrated phone calls and crying and cursing... but its do-able. if she can do it solo you can certainly manage too :) HOWEVER if you still think you may need the extra set of hands, i do know a girl in the richmond /glen allen area that i can recommend... im not sure if shes still actively doing the au pair thing but she did it for years for one family and they can give her an excellent reference! CONGRATS AGAIN!!

Having twins is the scariest and most thrilling thing ever! As a mother of two boys (7 and 5)already, I was both shocked and overwhelmed when I found out I was having twin boys! I also discovered as an older mom, that it is more common to have twins than one thinks...anyway, I thought I could do it all and leap tall buildings since I'd had such easy pregnancies before but the twins and my Dr. let me know differently when I was put on bed rest at 31 weeks. Lucky for me (but not my husband who had to do all the car pool, lunch packing, play date coordination, bathing, etc. for my older boys) I was able to finish work on a major project from my recliner and had two healthy babies at 37 weeks: 6.8 lbs and 5.13 lbs.

What I have also been fortunate enough to have is my Mom staying with us to help out. She came to the rescue during bed rest and she's still here and they just turned 6 weeks old! I could NOT be doing this without her help...it is almost impossible to manage both together without someone else to hold one while changing the other or trying to position them when trying to tandem breast feed. I'm so happy and blessed but the feeding schedule is grueling and you only get maybe two hours sleep, even when you try to feed them at the same time (good thing we can survive on adrenaline and hormones!)

So, while this is the most wonderful time in your life, you AND your husband will be overwhelmed even with help, so by all means, take any help anyone gives you, sign up for free diapers (you'll go thru 8-10 EACH per day) and get a friend to sign up others for meals. Now is not the time to be prideful...you WILL need the help.

Congrats and good luck to you!