I adapted the methods found in "happiest baby on the block", a book recommended by another new mom and it saved my sanity. I have since used these methods for my other kids as well.
Samuel was attached to me day and night (I believe in the attachment parenting methods as well.) For the first 18 months of his life, we were rarely apart. I believe this has helped shape him into the incredible, independent, confident, friendly and smart 3 year old he is today and will forever impact his life.
We cloth diapered Samuel. He nursed until he was 11 months when he weaned himself.
Samuel started walking at 8 months and could talk very clearly pretty early on. He has always had an amazing internal clock. He never slept through the night. Woke consistently ever four hours to nurse for the first year of this life. To this day, it doesn't matter what time he goes to sleep, he always wakes at 6:30. And when the time changes, it's consistently 5:30. People would tell us we put him to bed to early, we should let him take a nap, lots of ways they believed he would sleep longer. We tried it all and the truth is, the kid has a sincere zest for life and can't wait to be awake.
In October of 2010, sleep deprived, still nursing and trying to get back down to my pre-pregnancy weight I broke the news to Curtis, through tears, we were unexpectedly pregnant again. We were undoubtably thankfully and blessed by this surprise, but not at all ready- emotionally, mentally, physically, financially. We were finally having time for each other again. How was I supposed to take care of a toddler, who didn't sleep through the night and wouldn't even be two, AND a newborn? If the new baby was anything like my first, who nursed for 1 and 1/2 hours at a time, how would I be able to give either of them sufficient attention, or cook meals? What about cleaning!?
When I was five months pregnant with Josie, I went back to work. It was a hard transition, but a lot easier then it could have been considering I could work from home often, and when I couldn't Curtis was home with Samuel (I am pretty skeptical of babysitters). It was also a lot easier because I loved my job and what I did. (A year after I started working I began to feel like myself again, I realized I need to get out of the house and remember to take care of myself, grow and challenge my mind. I think I was starting to lose myself and get depressed a little because i thought i needed to be a super faithful mom who gave up myself entirely to take care of my son. Which simply isn't true. Or healthy. Motherhood is awesome but it can wear on you and steal your happiness (as weird as that may sound) if you're not careful. I needed to find a healthy balance. But more on this later).
Needless to say, July of 2011 we welcomed the sweetest, most patient little girl into our family. Josie, whose personality is very different then Samuels, slept 5, 6, sometime 7 hour stretches at night, only nursed for 10 minutes at a time and was always so content and happy. What a blessing when I already had a super energetic toddler. Josie was a much less emotional stressing experience then Samuel was. She seemed easier. Maybe because she was my second. Or maybe because she simply was easier.
We didn't cloth diaper with Josie. She nursed until she was 7 month. Josie weaned a lot earlier then Samuel, not because she wanted too, but because that's just how our life at the time was. I was still working, only worked 5-10 minutes from the house, and would come home and nurse every couple of hours. I would pump too, so Curtis would have milk on hand incase I couldn't make it. Soon I dried up so Josie had no choice but to start drinking formula. Being away from my sweet little girl was one of the hardest times in my life. I don't think it's natural or how we were made. I cried nearly everyday and still do when I think about that time in our lives. I know Josie needed me and missed me as much as I did her.
But we made it through, and it was an amazing experience for Curtis to be able to spend that time with Josie during those tender days. He was working a lot and going to school when Samuel was an infant, so this was special to him. He did a great job too.
When Josie was 7 months old I started working part time again which helped with my feelings of lost time with her. She started walking at 9 months and is my little shadow.
Around Josie's year birthday, 2012, I started working full time again. It was easier because she wasn't nursing, she was walking and enjoyed playing with her brother. My job was still very flexible so that also helped a lot.
All of the stress and emotion was really hard on Curtis and me.We had two amazing kids but our life since moving back from China, wasn't really playing out the way we had thought. But we kept pressing on, kept praying, and kept trying to keep our priorities focused on our goals. And at the time, it was to become financially stable for our family of four, start working hard and getting a good saving built, and start refocusing our lives on serving others and getting into a position to move back overseas and help with orphans in some capacity.
Fast forward a few months, Josie was 14 months old, Samuel was 2 years and
I was ready for some consistency and at least a year of no changes. I loved the place we lived, our routine was good for now. We had good reliable cars. And were starting to find "us" again. (to understand the importance of this, since moving back from China we had moved five times, and traded in/sold 6 cars. In three years. Oh and had two babies). No change for a brief time was soooo needed.
September of 2012- our lives were, again in for a surprise. This time, crying, and barely able to say it, I gave Curtis the news, again. We were pregnant. Please understand when you read this, I wasn't crying cause I was sad. Pregnancies/babies are an incredible gift that I will never take for granted. It was the timing that was difficult. Samuel was two, Josie wasn't even a year and a half old. And well, you read all of the above. This news was hard. Another baby. Soon. We hadn't full recovered our relationship from the first two. And now another on. 3 under 4 years old. What was going on!?
We took it in stride and trusted everything would be okay. We've done two, we can do another one. As hard as it would be the next year or two, our kids would be so close in age they will be best friends. We can do this.
I started at one mid wife. Everything was fine. Heard the heart beat. Normal Was a bit more emotional (I attributed to more stress), couldn't fit into my normal clothes a lot earlier then the previous pregnancies, but I attributed that to just having two kids, and being "stretched out" all ready.
We decided it would be best to transition back to part time. So I had to find another mid wife practice. Out of the first trimester, I was feeling good. Still tired a lot more, which I attributed to having two toddlers. Heard the heart beat, measured normal, everything was going as planned. My first ultrasound was scheduled for shortly after Christmas and we were very excited to find out the gender of the baby. Were we going to have another boy? Another girl ? I found a babysitter during the appointment so Curtis could come too, I couldn't find out such exciting news by my self!
We started the ultrasound, nervous and excited, of course. The nurse squirted one side of my belly and moved the wand around, because we were such pro's having done this twice recently we saw the little head right away. The nurse squirted the other side of my belly and used the wand to move the jelly all over in preparation for the ultrasound. As she is moving the jelly around we watched the screen we saw the baby completely flip over, almost like there were two. The nurse starts the ultrasound and is looking at the screen now. "sooooo, " she said " how many we're you guys expecting"? Sure enough, there were two. An hour later we learned the genders, fraternal twins, one boy and one girl.
You're probably wondering what our reaction was. Happy, excited, SHOCKED, scared, nervous, unbelievable, numb. Everything.
We didn't know what to think. All of our future plans disappeared, again. We were gonna have to move into a bigger place then we planned, good thing we had gone with the bigger Yukon Denali XL when trading in our car a couple weeks prior. We were going to have to choose two names, cancel our trip to China, that was planned a couple weeks later. I would have to change physicians again because midwives can't attend to twins legally in the state of Colorado. EVERYTHING was going to be different.
And that bring us to today. Five and a half months pregnant with twins, chasing two toddlers, a new suv, a new home, moving to Kansas in a month, leaving my job, which I love. So much for a year of no change.
But- I must say. Today. We are ready. We are excited. We know it will be okay. I can't wait for these two little ones. I actually am very excited to move to Kansas. Curtis and I are tough and we love our family. We will have four under four. But I know they will be the most awesome kids ever.
And another adventure begins......
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:Grays Peak Dr,Loveland,United States
No comments:
Post a Comment