My twin boys make life so busy it seems to be blurring by and there are days when I really do feel like crawling under my doona and hiding from the world. It's on those days that I forget to stop and enjoy what I have. If nothing else I hope this blog will serve as a reminder for all the good, bad and bizarre in my days and maybe help someone else through theirs.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

The last 12 months

This time last year we had just returned from a holiday in Beijing and Hong Kong. We'd hiked on the Great Wall of China, experienced Hong Kong Disneyland and suffered some pretty nasty food poisoning.

Until just recently there hadn't been 12 months go by when we didn't travel somewhere different. Our holidays included Europe, East Africa, South America, Antarctica and local adventures like four wheel driving to the tip of Cape York and swimming with Whale Sharks off Exmouth in Western Australia.

Everything changed in February when we were told we were expecting two additions to the family. It had taken us 12 months to fall pregnant and now here we were with two at once... "instant family" as I would hear many many times from almost everyone I told.

Of all the experiences I have had, being told there were two heart beats was by far the most surreal. We had joked about the possibility and how awesome it would be, but never expected it to actually happen. Lying in bed that night I couldn't sleep. I was amazed, excited and terrified all at the same time.

The next 6 weeks would prove difficult not telling anyone (until the 12 week scan) and being told to take it easy, exercise should be restricted to light walking only. For an active person, this was really difficult. The weekend after we found out I attended the hens weekend of one of my very good friends... the main feature of which was at one of my favourite wineries... it wasn't suspicious at all when I volunteered to drive and didn't drink anything. We did get to take a couple of small trips while I was pregnant: Jenolan Caves over winter, although I wasn't allowed in the caves and a road trip to South West Rocks and back over Easter - On this trip I got to swim with a giant sting ray at the Australian Shark and Ray Centre, which was awesome!

I think I was lucky with my pregnancy. We attended an expecting parents evening with the multiple births association where I found most people had been very very ill (as is common with multiples due to the extra hormones), but I'd been lucky and pretty much escaped that. We had tonnes more appointments and scans than you would normally as there's a greater chance of complications with monochorionic twins. You can read more about it here. It wasn't till the very end that I ended up with some issues. Link
Knowing that many twins are born early, we were prepared to meet our sons from 28 weeks, although we were to wait another 8 and by the time they arrived I was exhausted. The night before they were born I could barely move off the couch, not even to go to bed. I'd had a scan done that morning where we were advised to move our scheduled cesarian from 38 weeks to 37 weeks. That afternoon the obsterician agreed and sent me for blood tests and a steroid shot with another to follow early the next morning. On our way to the hospital bright and early the following day I received a phone call from the obsterician: "you won't be going home." We'd be meeting our boys that afternoon.

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