To quote Ricky Bobby, “That just happened.”
Damn right it did.
Alexandra and Meredith, and more miraculously Jess and I, have survived a whole year. I can scarcely believe it.
One year. 12 months. 52 weeks. 365 days. 8760 hours. Let’s break this down a little. Doing some quick calculations, I’ve come up with the following facts and figures. A glimpse into the first year with twins.
Diapers. Roughly 4,380 diaper changes averaging 6 per kid per day. However, that might be conservative. I know there were days were I changed 6 diapers by 10am. We performed 2/3 of those (the others were at day care), dividing by two of us, means we have each changed roughly 1,500 diapers. Also, we’ve probably spent about $800 on just diapers. That’s a lot of money to just shit on…
Feedings. We did finger feedings for them for the first month. Every three hours. Total of 240 times, give or take. I don’t even know how we did that that many times. Seriously. Brutal.
Breast feeding. Jess breastfed them as many times as we finger fed them. Which is even more remarkable. Sure, we switched to bottles about a  month in, but Jess was still pumping after every meal until about month 4.5. She fed and/or pumped easily 1100+ times. Filling gallons of bags.
Formula. They go through about a can a week, give or take. Cans cost us $25 each. They breastfed for 3 1/2 months. Starting about 3 months in they started with formula, so, that’s 40 weeks give or take. Upwards of $1000, and we ain’t done. Not to mention having filled and mixed all of those bottles 4 or 8oz at a time.
Baby food. They average maybe 3 or 4 containers a day since month 4. We’ve bought pallets of that stuff. It is quite amusing when we go to the grocery store and Jess piles 50 or 60 containers in the cart.
Sleep. They started reliably sleeping through the night around month 9. So, that’s approximately 240 nights in a row of interrupted sleep where we got up to tend to them. Over half of those entailed getting up more than once. The first 100 days or so, neither of us slept for longer than 3 hours at any one stretch.
Rounds of teething. At least 6 separate times, they’ve simultaneously begun teething. These episodes last about a week, and really really suck.
Photographs. I’ve taken somewhere in the neighborhood of 13,000 pictures. That seems like a lot, but I think I could have easily taken more.
Daycare. Jess went back to work start of month 4. Girls have been in daycare for 9 months. $700 per kid, per month. $12,600 on day care. Excuse me while I vomit into my shoes.
The girls have been moving non stop since they were born. They were army crawling by month 5. Standing by month 7. Alex started walking before 10 months. Meri not far behind. They currently both have multiple bumps bruises on their heads from their wacking their melons into things. Looks like they were in a prize fight or something.
On Sunday we had a big shindig to get all the friends and family together to celebrate. The girls were really good all day. Jess and I were amazed. They couldn’t have been better. They had a blast digging into their cakes. Whipped cream everywhere. Then the gifts… wow… everyone was way too generous to us and the girls. They got tons of new books, new toys, new clothes. They really cleaned up. We can’t thank everyone enough. Photos will be coming. Watch this space.
Today was their actual birthday and that didn’t go quite as smoothly. After rousting them and getting them ready for the day, I was holding Alex. Just about to put her in her car seat when she proceeds to projectile vomit. Ever been puked on so much that you had to change every article of clothing you were wearing? Including socks and underwear? Yeah, that was me. We got her cleaned up, thinking maybe she just choked on something. Get them in the car to go to work and not 3 minutes down the road, Meri pukes all over herself in her car seat. That seals it. We turned the car around and came home. Clean everyone up and then put them down for a nap.
They slept for almost 2 hours, and I was able to work from home. The got up, had a little bit of bottle, played some. Seemed to be much happier. Not long after that they went back down for another 2 hour nap, which was great. When the got up, we tried a little cereal which they ate. They were really thirsty so they did drink quite a bit. All systems looked like we were good. They went down for one more 50 minute nap at 4pm and we thought we might be in the clear.
We did some bath time, since they both smelled like vomit. Half way through we saw something floating in the water. Green and stringy. Still don’t know if this was puke or poop. I didn’t see anyone yak, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. Drain the tub and use the shower head to rinse them off well, which made them cry. Finally get them calmed down and Jess is rocking Alex… I’m in the other room with Meri when I hear “Um… she just puked all over me.” Re-clean her up as Jess strips off puke filled clothes. Meri is still fussing and starts to make that sound like she is going to puke. I hold her near the kitchen sink, hoping that if it comes I can angle her correctly. Despite many false alarms, she never pukes. We finally put them down after giving them a little water to drink and Alex crashes. Meri cries herself to sleep. Luckily they are both down now. Whew. Happy Birthday indeed. I thought this much puking was reserved for your twenty-first, not your first… I can’t wait to tell them about this someday. For the record, not one drop of puke landed anywhere near the hardwood floors. Every single bit was on carpet somewhere. Nice aim, girls.
Raising twin babies, you quickly become immune to things that would have horrified you previously. You think getting barfed on is as traumatic a thing as can happen. Meh… no biggie. Poop shooting out the side of a diaper? So what? Snot running down their faces? Whatever. Parents just learn to be bulletproof.
When well, the girls are infinitely more fun then they’ve ever been. Alex is into pointing at things. Everything. They love eating Cheerios. Just today, when we were in the office, Alex had a post card and Jess said, “go give that to daddy!” and she walked right over to me with it outstretched in her hand. We haven’t tried to teach her anything like that. She did it all on her own. Amazing.
I will say, that just about the highlight of my day is when we walk into day care to pick them up. They will be playing, walking, or doing whatever. Then they stop, look up at the door at us and both get the biggest smiles on their faces. Now, they will toddle over and grab our legs. Sorta makes everything else worth it.
This past year has been rough. But the payoff is incredible. I love those crazy little girls.
I’m never doing this again.