gracey Posted October 22, 2006 Posted October 22, 2006 I am sleep deprived.. My twins are 5mths. Some nights they are up 3 to 6 times. I am going crazy.. All my other children slept through the night by 3 mth. I must be doing something wrong. I am completely exhausted. And if one more person tells me "you have your hands full" I'll scream. Advice anyone.
magichands Posted October 22, 2006 Posted October 22, 2006 Wow, you have your...work cut out for you! What do you do - if anything - to relax?
amerikajin Posted October 23, 2006 Posted October 23, 2006 Nah, it's not their year, hon! Johan Santana didn't have his stuff when he needed it most, and what happened to Mauer and Morneau?
Roo Posted October 23, 2006 Posted October 23, 2006 gracey with two it's VERY hard if you aren't organized to get them into a routine ahve you read any of the baby whisperers books.. when my kids get off track I implement hersystem to get them going on a routine agaain EASY Eat, Activity, Sleep, Your time at 5 mo (I have a 5 mo old myself right now) it's more like Eat, Activity, Eat Activty, Sleep sometimes but that might help When we are really off track I try taking notes of when they do these things for a day or two sometimes I realize I'm feeding when they should be sleeping etc and thus it confuses and musses up the works. The concept is pretty basic once they are fed if they are fussin they are ususally soiled or tired. Are they sleeping long stretches at other times or do they just not like to sleep. and how old are your other children?
Guest Posted October 23, 2006 Posted October 23, 2006 I'm in the same boat as you, and I think my wife is as tired as you are - but we are lucky to have found a situation that semi works. My wife breast feeds 100%, our boys don't do a bottle. They eat a little baby food each day, but it's more for adjusting them to the food than keeping them satisfied. Our boys usually get on a slightly different schedule during the night, so they wake up to eat at different times - which just means more waking up for us. One or both of our boys are up every one to two hours at night. The boys start out in a bed together (which we have moved into our room), and usually pull a good two hour stint of sleep to start the night. That is when we get our 3.5 year old to sleep and spend a little alone time with her reading books, etc... Once she is asleep and we get ready for bed, we'll get an hour or so of sleep before the boys start waking up. Once they start getting up, we usually just leave them in bed with us. My wife will roll to one side to feed the first one that wakes up and then go back to sleep while he's eating. We'll sleep like that until the other one wakes up hungry, which is when I'll get him out of his bed and lay him down on my wife's other side. The boys sleep much more sound (and for longer amounts of time) in our bed, I guess it's just the comfort and warmth of being close to us. Every hour or so when one fusses to the point he wakes up and starts to cry, my wife will just roll over in his direction and let him nurse. Once we get through to the morning, at some point after each boy has recently nursed again - I will take both of them downstairs with me for a few hours while my wife sleeps in the bed by herself. She usually gets anywhere from two to three hours of good hard sleep each morning, and I get some alone time with the boys and also get some work done on my laptop. Since our older daughter goes to bed later, she actually sleeps later in the morning which makes it easier on us. Some how this crazy schedule at night works for us. I've asked my wife if she want's me to try and rock the boys back to sleep more often rather than just her nursing them back to sleep every time - or if she wants me to start working on getting them to take a bottle and she does not want to do either. She wants to nurse them until they are ready to stop and thinks it would be a huge ordeal to start messing with bottles in the middle of the night. She also thinks it's easier for her to nurse, because she can lay on her side and get some sleep while they eat. I get more sleep this way too, which makes it easier for me to get up in the morning and take the boys for a few hours while she get's to catch up on sleep a little bit. We know we are prohibiting a schedule this way, but we don't care. We know by a year or year and a half that they'll all be in their own beds and sleeping well. The first six months have flown by for us with the boys, and we also realized how fast time goes with our daughter almost being four already. Since we don't believe in letting the kids "cry it out" to help them sleep better and our crazy routine somehow works for us right now, we can find solace in the fact that this isn't so bad and it will be a lot easier in another six to twelve months. I think it's a little bit of a catch 22, because you have to take things one day at a time with twins (especially if you have other kids to care for too), but you also can't let yourself get pulled down by thought that this is how it's always going to be. You have to do what works now to get by and keep your thoughts pinned on the knowledge that things get easier... I'm good right now with our caring for the twins and how they are doing, I'm also very impressed with how well our daughter has adjusted to everything. The biggest problem I have right now is that my wife and I have no time together for anything - no watching any movies together (besides Disney movies with our daughter), no playing cards or a game, eating a nice meal together or any intimate time. I know this too will pass, but I'm afraid that we are forgetting how to be a couple right now and it'll be hard process to come back to once our kids get older and we actually get a little free time. I don't want to get stuck in a rut now and not be able to get out of it for the next 18 years until our kids are all off at college. One thing that makes stuff more difficult for us too is that my wife has major anxiety, and can't take the medicine that actually makes her feel better again until she stops nursing. She never wants to go anywhere alone incase something happens to us, or incase the babysitters can't handle the kids the way we would and they'll have an emergency they can't deal with. She's also constantly worried about the boys being at different stages and if they are alright. Like when one was rolling over and the other wasn't yet, she was spending energy worrying that something was wrong with the one that didn't roll over yet. There's no doubt about it, it's definitely a challenge to raise twins...
Guest Posted October 27, 2006 Posted October 27, 2006 gracie no matter what you do preserve your sanity. get someone, anyone to help. come up with ways to satisfy your own desires and needs. my twins are going to be 19 years old i raised them as a single working mom. at the age of 18 my daughter told me to go bite myself. i have been devastated for over 6 weeks now. she has also done some underhanded things. i feel like my whole life has been a waste. thank god i have my son. get involved with church they have strong community ties and will offer to help if you just ask. good luck and it doesn't get any better.
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