The grass isn't always greener....

At some point in the last few weeks I had one of those ah-ha moments with regards to breastfeeding.  We all compare ourselves to other people, and I was constantly comparing my breastfeeding experiences with every Jane and Sally that I knew.  Well you know what?  Sometimes their experiences aren't all that great, and I finally realized that I was okay with and happy with where things are.

There were a few of my friends that I was comparing myself to and I guess this is what I think about it now.

• The friend I posted about not wanting to go see is 4 weeks in and pretty much exclusively breastfeeding!  I'm so proud of her!  But, guess what?  Her baby has pretty much ripped off both of her nipples because he has some type of bad latch.  She told me the other day that he had black stool all day one day so her doc had her get him checked out.  Black stool means there's blood in there... and guess where the blood came from? Her nipples.  Ouch.  She said she dreads every single feeding.  She has just now started to pump a couple times per day so that her husband can help her with feedings and to get her little one used to bottles.  She has to go back to work in about a month will hopefully be able to continue pumping.  She also says that her breasts leak all day long.... soaking through the disposable pads and she has no idea how to stop that!  
• I met up with a twin mom at our local MOMs regional meeting.  At the time she was 8 weeks into exclusive breastfeeding.  I was in such awe of her!! She had so much milk and was doing so well (or so I thought.)  She was completely sleep deprived from all of the feedings that her husband couldn't help with and just so overwhelmed with the whole thing.  Her plan was to breastfeed for a "really long time" she said, but ended up exclusively pumping for a while and switching to formula all together at 3 1/2 months.
• A couple of MOMs I know that have twins the same age as the girls are still breastfeeding, sometimes 3-4x during the night!  I just can't imagine getting up that many times for two years.

As of now (7 months) we finally have this thing down.  I breastfeed Elliott when I can.  Sometimes its after a bottle just to "top him off" and help him sleep, and I am completely fine with that.  I love just sitting, nursing him, and watching him fall asleep in my arms.  I still wish that Oliver wanted to nurse too, but he doesn't and that's perfectly fine.  I pump 5x/day and make somewhere between 35-40 oz every day.  Some sessions are better than others because I have more time to sit and pump for 45 minutes while the kids are napping or down for the night.  Most sessions, I only have 15-20 minutes to quickly pump while the kids are content and playing.  One o the benefits to pumping is that Brian (or anyone) can help me feed the boys.  While I try not to be away from my pump for 3-4 hours at a time, its nice if I can sneak out to the store, take the girls somewhere, or go out with a girlfriend for a while without having to rush home and feed a baby.  

I can't remember if I've talked about my "plan" but here it is.  I am really wanting to pump until the boys are 12 months or whenever they switch to whole milk.  After that, I will slowly stop pumping and cut out the dom.peridone that's helping me with my supply.  I will continue to breastfeed Elliott until the time is right to stop!  

Multiple Multiples

Today I am linking up with Kelly's Korner.  You can find her link here!  She is helping multiple mommies connect with each other!

If you are stopping by from KK, Welcome!! Here's our story in a nutshell:

We have not one, but TWO sets of twins!  They are an amazing 16.5 months apart.  Our girls will be two in just two short weeks and I almost cannot believe it!  My sweet boys are 7 months tomorrow.

When some people see that I have two sets, I get a couple reactions: 1.) Wow, you are a Fertile Myrtle! and 2.) "Are they natural?" Meaning are they from IVF.

We are quite the opposite of fertile which is why we ended up with multiple multiples.  Our infertility journey started out with 3 IUIs that were all unsuccessful.  We moved on to IVF and our first fresh cycle ended up with a canceled transfer due to OHSS (Ovarian Hyperstimulation Syndrome)  We had 8 good blastocysts, did two FETs, and both ended in miscarriage.  We were emotionally and financially drained, but decided to do just "one more" fresh cycle... and we conceived our beautiful girls!  They were born big and healthy via c-section at 38 weeks 1 day.

When the girls were a few months old we started thinking about "one more."  Since it took so long to conceive the girls, never in our wildest dreams did we think we would conceive again so easily.  We transferred two perfect embryos via FET when the girls were just 8 months old and to our surprise we were expecting twins again.  Our boys were born at 37 weeks 2 days via VBAC.

Since having the boys, I have quit my job teaching to be a stay at home mommy. Having four children under two is a wild ride!!

Thanks for stopping by, leave me a comment and I would be happy to come check out your blog!!!

Tough Days

I'm not going to lie, its been rough around here lately.  Brian started a new semester at school just recently and that leaves me home by myself Monday nights, Tues/Thurs 7a-7p, and part of the day on Fridays.  That basically means that I have to do wake up to bedtime by myself.  It probably wouldn't be as challenging if I were getting a good night's sleep.  We've had some sleep regression in the past few weeks (and even worse the last few nights) which is leaving me completely exhausted and drained.

Two nights ago, Oliver was up 5 times between 7pm and 6 am when he got up for the day.  Elliott also got up at 6am!  The night before that, Evy was up at 1am (Oliver was also up a few times that night.)  I feel like we have gone back to the newborn days.  When the boys were newborns, it was predictable.  I KNEW they would be awake and had mentally prepared myself to get up a bunch of times.  Now I expect them to sleep.  I do a few things before bed and go to sleep a little later.

Oliver's behavior was not normal for him, so I called the Pedi and talked to a nurse.  After chatting for a few minutes, she thought he should come in and get his belly checked out.  I couldn't get in with our regular doc, so I saw the one that was available.  She checked him out to make sure he wasn't sick, that the acid reflux wasn't bothering him, and that he didn't have any weird infections.  She concluded that he had gotten into the habit of waking and that he needed me to help him get back to sleep and that perhaps I should let him cry it out.

I think we all have our own mommy gut feelings, and my gut feeling is that "something" is going on.  Not sure what, but the cry in the middle of the night is not just one of "please give me an ounce so I can sleep."  I've tried just giving him a pacifier, so if he just needed to suck, that should do the trick, right?  He spits it back out at me, drinks a couple ounces and eventually goes back to sleep.  I really think his tummy is hurting, so hopefully the swallow study next week will tell me something.  Until then, I'm just going to hope he doesn't wake up so much so that I can get some sleep!  We have all come down with colds too, so that isn't helping anything either.

The Anti-Nap

Lately I have been taking what I would like to call the anti-nap.

This is what happens: I put the girls down for their nap at 11 a.m. very predictable.  Sometimes they chat for a few minutes but they eventually fall asleep without much of a fight.

I feed Oliver, put him in his car seat, bottle feed Elliott and then finish him off at the breast. While I am breastfeeding Elliott I rock Ollie in his seat with my foot. At this point I'm not really sure who is rocking who because I'm falling asleep too.

I set Elliott down, make sure Oliver is asleep and then go pump. Its usually about 12:00-12:30 by the time all of this happens. I finish pumping, lay down, maybe fall asleep and what do I hear? Someone crying.  Its usually Oliver because he likes to take cat naps.

I now not only did not get to nap or really even rest and its time to start getting kids up. I call this the anti-nap because it actually makes you feel even worse than you did before. We will just say that I have been drinking coffee in the afternoon just to stay awake. Sleep hasn't been good lately but I will save that for another post!

Two year old ramblings

Everything the girls say these days is just downright funny!  They are picking up new things right and left and I just can't get enough of their toddler talk.  Evy still talks a lot more than Char and strings words together a lot more!  Char says mostly one word at a time, but she always gets her point across.  I know she understands everything we say and I'm sure her speech will come with time.  Just today, she spilled some water on the floor in the living room and I told her to go get a towel.  She came out of her room with a blanket and wiped up the water!  I'd call that close enough.

Here's a bunch of things they say!

• Evy wash the dishes
• Mama wash the dishes
• Evy wash your arm (leg, head, hair, etc.)
• Evy wash your mama (She proceeds to wash my arm with the puff)
• Chip
• Bye-Bye
• Urza side (Urza is outside)
• sa-wa (Sandwich- which is what they call bread)
• Evy dink wa-wa (Evy drinks water)
• Evy a bite
• bite (Char)
• mote (remote)
• Watch Gabba
• Sha-shi (What Evy calls Char)
• Eby (what both of the girls call Evy)
• Kitty..... NO
• Cracker
• Cookie
• Evy Cry
• Ollie
• Elliott
• ungy (hungry)
• bow  (bottle)
• Ewwwwww
• Boopy (poopy) Evy
• Boppy (poopy) Char
• bro bro
• Watch the kia (watch Puss in Boots)
• Meow!
• Mama kissy
• You alright? 
• Alright
• I gotcha babe

Oliver's follow up

I took Oliver to go see the ENT again last week ws a follow up to the scope he had last month. It wasn't a very eventful appointment but it ended with getting referred to a GI doctor. He is now resisting solids by not opening his mouth at all and because of that we are going to get a swallow study done here in a couple weeks. They are calling it an oral aversion.   Yesterday though he loved his solids! I put some cinnamon in his baby oatmeal and he lived it!! Perhaps he just doesn't like my cooking.  I'm hoping that we just started too soon and he is now ready for them!

What's going on lately... a list!

As I'm sure you can imagine, there really hasn't been much time for blogging lately.  Brian is back to school/teaching which leaves me home alone on Tues/Thurs from 7am-7pm, and Monday nights as well.  Today is the first "real" day of me being on my own from wake up to bedtime, and I'm just so thankful that the boys decided to nap while the girls nap today.  I have a lot on my mind lately, and I figured I would just make a list to get things out of my head.  If there's something you are dying for me to expand upon, please let me know and I will!

• Oliver had a follow up with the ENT about his reflux, and since he now has an oral aversion (doesn't like to eat solids) he is being referred to a GI doctor
• Elliott is now rolling all over the place and is basically crawling!!  I swear I heard a "mama" out of him as well on Monday night, but I want to hear it again before calling it his "official" first word.
• Evy is talking up a storm lately and I just LOVE it.  She likes to say, "Mama wash the dishes" "Evy wash the dishes" "Baby cry" "and lots more,  but those are just cute
• Char is the sweetest girl.  If she sees her bro bro sitting in his car seat crying while I am attending the other one, she will go and rock him.  Love it.
• The other morning Char said to me when I got her out of bed, "Mama, monkey!" (pointing to her monkey picture at the wall)  I swear she had been thinking about telling me that all night.  So cute.
• The girls love to say, "Kissy" and give me a kiss!
• Before bed, the girls like to give "Kissies, Hugs, (ugs), and back" where they pat me on the back.  Silly little ladies.
• I am finally in a good place with the breastfeeding/pumping scenario.  It only took 6.5 months, but I think I'm there.  I BF Elliott every morning and nurse him to sleep.  I try not to dwell on how many ounces are dripping out of the pump, and focus on what makes me happiest which is the actual act of breastfeeding.  The doc says its a no-no to nurse him to sleep for bedtime and naps but I don't care!
• The boys are so smiley and love to laugh!!
• The girls will be TWO next month.  How did that happen?  They adore Yo Gabba Gabba and that will be the theme of their party.  Nothing extravagant though.... cake, dresses in Gabba fabric, and their gifts are Gabba themed.  
• This week we had to deal with Indian Pantry Moths.  Don't know what those are?  Do a quick google search.  ICK.  Apparently they are IN grains when you buy them... in our case it was the brown rice.  We had to throw out 75% of our pantry food, clean the whole thing out, and basically start from scratch.
• I'm trying to get out more with the kids.  I took them to story time at the library last week and we had major meltdowns... the girls drank the boys' bottles (10 ounces of breastmilk!) and it just wasn't good.  We will go back, but not for a little while.
• Family pictures are being taken this weekend!! I have our outfits mostly picked out and I think its going to be great.   
• Its been raining for 48 hours and the kids are going stir crazy!!! There's even a lot of flooding across the state.  
• I LOVE being a stay at home mommy!!!!!