Before this wild ride we're on screeches to a halt in the next week or so, I wanted to record a few things about my experience being pregnant with twins.
First Trimester:
So, so sick. Much sicker than I was with Theo, so much so that I vowed this was the last one. I would lay on the couch in the evenings, exhausted, shivering and nauseous. Several times, Ryan asked if I was sure I didn't just have a nasty flu bug. I was eating at least every two hours, extra calories by the thousands it seemed like, and could only stomach the least appalling sounding foods. Forget anything fresh or natural, it was nothing that I could mentally power through. It was like, "What kind of sicko eats bananas? But I might be able to manage those Cheezits." And even choking down the Cheezits was disgusting. And forget changing messy diapers. That was horrendous experience.
I was hosting a friend's baby shower right around my 12 week mark and would count every single day that brought us closer to that magical date, hoping that my nausea would be gone soon after. I finally felt more energetic around 14-15 weeks and the long bouts of nausea dissipated but it took a few more weeks before I felt anything but nausea as a cue to eat during the day.
One bright spot of the first trimester was of course, finding out that we were having twins (!!) and they were dichorionic and diamniotic (two placentas, two amniotic sacs). The first thing my doctor said to me after "There are two of them!" was, "Oh, Jessica, they look beautiful. Everything looks beautiful!" It was so reassuring. And so wonderfully exciting.
And then I felt them move at 12 weeks. Incredible.
Second Trimester:
I was counting on a grace period of feeling great and not showing much, like I had with my first pregnancy, but it was not to be. I started showing immediately and was horribly self conscious. I got lots of comments from beloved friends and family along the lines of, "I can't believe how much you're showing already!" If strangers congratulated me and asked how far along I was, their eyes would bug out at my response and the reactions to the news that it was twins ranged from horrified pity to manic excitement. People are cool.
I tried hard to regain a sense of control over my diet and body during the second trimester because the first trimester was so disorienting (and because I am a control freak) but really, it ended up just being a lot of readjusting of expectations. And then readjusting again when things progressed much faster or differently than I anticipated. And Ryan and I staring at each other blankly, wide-eyed, exclaiming, "We're going to have twins. Twins." for weeks after. It took a long time for me to feel like I regained some sense of equilibrium.
We bought a minivan did a lot of housework and projects during the second trimester, which satisfied my love of checking things off a list but fueled some crazy nesting urges. What started as, "Let's paint the nursery", ended with a freshly painted front door.
And then there were these crazy second trimester hormones. I went through a dark period that lasted for weeks/months where I felt listless and indifferent to everything. My pregnancy felt like a burden, my toddler felt like a chore, and getting out of bed every day seemed almost impossible. I would have crying fits because I felt so miserable and the sometimes the crying would help, as a way to vent stress and anxiety and sometimes it wouldn't. I talked to my doctor about it, and strangely, the next week, the fog seemed to lift.
Third Trimester:
Again, with the readjusting of expectations. It seemed like as soon as we became accustomed to the mere thought of two babies, we were heading into the home stretch and soon enough, we would actually have two babies. TWO BABIES.
Physically, I felt like my pregnancy was uneventful and pretty painless up until 30ish weeks when I suddenly had no more lung capacity and zero energy and the prenatal workout DVD that I had been doing to help with back and hip pain became impossibly difficult. Then I caught a vicious 24 hour bug at 31 weeks that landed me in the ER and maternity ward for overnight observation because I was contracting every 3 minutes from dehydration. Fortunately, rehydration stopped the contractions and the babies were moving and behaving normally, so we were able to go home the next day. Ryan was far sicker than I was and he had to stay home with Theo who was 98% recovered and intent on destroying everything he could get his hands on.
As I write this, I'm 37 weeks and feeling so fortunate to be here. The babies are big and healthy and could be born any day now. We're in that murky and beautiful time of truly and actively expecting.
Conclusion:
Being pregnant is hard. Even when it's easy, it's hard. I don't have diabetes,varicose veins or heartburn. I never threw up, I don't have any signs of preeclampsia, and I'm not on bed rest. Friends and family and the staff at my doctor's clinic tell me all the time that I'm amazing but I don't feel particularly amazing. I feel like I'm doing what any mother would do; the best she can under the circumstances. If things were more tenuous and medically uncertain and the babies were small and I was on bed rest and had a compromised cervix, no one would blame me. They would probably tell me all the more how amazing I was. So, I'm thankful, very thankful, for the strong web of love and support that has grown up around me and these twins that makes me feel so comforted and safe, but I can't take credit for anything. I'm not the first to do this and I won't be the last and I would never have been able to make it this far without my squad. This may be the hardest thing I've ever done but also, not so bad. Parenting is full of paradoxes like that. The worst/the best. I'd never choose to do this again/I want to do it a million more times. I'm terrified/I can't wait.
TLDR:
"O Lord, thou art my God; I will exalt thee, I will praise thy name; for thou hast done wonderful things... For thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat..." Isaiah 25:1, 4
That's real and I'm so thankful.
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