Visit from the Wray's

My brother Jason and his family were in town for 6 days during the middle of October.  As usual, Alena and Addie had a great time playing together.  Kelsey tried to keep up, but for the most part she had fun playing with grandpa and grandma. 

 

Uncle Jason and Aunt Jessica

Best Buds!

The twins had their first road trip while they were here. We took the family truckster (aka our new mini van!) up to Ames for the afternoon and then to the Center Grove Orchard/Pumpkin Patch in Cambridge, IA.  It was a beautiful day and the girls had a fun time.  We just wished they lived closer so we could see them more often. It will be fun watching all of the kids as they grow up...

Grandma and Papa with their 5 grandkids (the twins are in the stroller :))

               Kelsey wasn't too excited about her baby (oops, looks like Lauren lost a sock)

                                                     Addie wanted to "switch babies"

Twins - 1 Month

It's hard to believe the twins are one month old already!  So far, we have been blessed with two really good babies.  Thanks to the NICU, they have been on a nice three hour schedule during the day and at night we usually get one 4 hour stretch.  We have also been lucky that they go right back to sleep after their nighttime feedings.  I know many moms do the night feedings alone, but I'm so lucky that Justin helps with the midnight feeding. I do the 4:00 feeding by myself so he can get some sleep before work. It takes about 40 minutes to change, feed, and pump (we save the cleaning up for the morning).  I've become pretty good at feeding two babies bottles and pumping!  Sometimes I feel like I have triplets because I have to pay so much attention to my friend, Medela (my pump).  At times I think about how much easier it would be to just give them formula, but then I remember the many, many benefits of breastmilk (and the cost of formula!) and I remember why I'm doing this.  Plus it is the best weight loss plan ever! 

The twins are starting to have more awake time and their personality differences are already becoming evident.  Lauren has a sassy, "you won't sleep through this," cry, while Caleb's cry starts out as more of a whimper and then escalates.  Lauren is so observant when she is awake and doesn't miss a thing.  I rememeber one of the neonatologists in the NICU noticing this and speculated that she would make a good journalist one day.  Caleb is more of a snuggler and is very laid back.  However, before they were even born, I knew Caleb would be the calmer of the two-Lauren spent the last two months kicking my left ribs (I swear she bruised them!). 

We haven't ventured out too much with the exception of a doctor's appointment to check their weights.  With them being preemies we are trying to keep them out of public as much as possible with flu and RSV season here.  Our double stroller will work great when we do decide to go for a walk or hit the grocery store or mall. 

Alena's 3rd Birthday

Wow, it's hard to believe we became parents for the first time three years ago and now we are a family of 5.  October 5th, 2009 was definitely a special day...

Alena Jane-10/5/2009

For her birthday, Alena took popsicles to school.  Daddy picked her up early in the afternoon and we all went to Monkey Joes for a little fun. She had a great time.  We celebrated her birthday the following weekend when my brother and his family were in town from Colorado.  Alena specifically asked for a green tractor and a small ambulance for her birthday.  We had a great party and were glad so many people could help us celebrate. 

10/5/2012

Dear Alena,
    You have grown into a beautiful little girl!  You have so much energy and love to run.  We will be surprised if you do not follow in your mom and dad's footprints and become a runner (hopefully a hurdler).  You love all sports, and are especially good at dribbling a basketball.  Your teachers comment on how athletic you are.  They also comment on how bright you are-by now you nearly know all of the letters of the alphabet and can spell your first name.  You can count to 20 easily and can sometimes count higher-you are so excited to start preschool next month.  Lately, your new favorite word is "actually," and you know exactly when to use it.  Unfortunately you are a picky eater, like your mom was, and meal times can be challenging sometimes.  You love to read and have memorized many parts of books.  You continue to love music, probably because we have listened to music since the day you were born.  You know so many songs!  We love listening to you sing at night after we have put you to bed.  Sometimes these singing sessions can last up to 45 minutes!  One of our favorites is "Take Me Out To The Ballgame."  You have become a great big sister and have adjusted well to having two new infants in the house.  You are fascinated when they poop and help entertain them when they cry.  You've even helped with a couple 4 AM feedings!  We know you love your brother and sister very much and are always excited to see them when you get home from school (especially Caleb :)).  Happy 3rd Birthday!
                                                                                         Love, Mom and Dad


20 Birthday Questions:
1.  What is your favorite color?  Purple
2.  What is your favorite toy?  Elmo
3.  What is your favorite fruit?  Applesauce
4.  What is your favorite movie?  Tinkerbell
5.  What is your favorite TV show?  Blue's Clues
6.  What is your favorite thing to wear?  A dress
7.  What is your favorite animal?  Giraffe
8.  What is your favorite song? ABC's
9.  What is your favorite book? Cliffords First Valentine's Day
10.  Who is your best friend? Gavin
11.  What is your favorite snack?  Fruit Snacks
12.  What is your favorite drink?  Milk
13.  What is your favorite breakfast?  Toast with peanut butter
14.  What is your favorite dinner?  Cheeseburger
15.   Where is your favorite place to go?  Papa's house
16.  What is your favorite game?  Candy Land
17.  What is your favorite thing to play outside?  Ride tricycle
18.  What is your favorite holiday?  Christmas
19.  What do you sleep with at night?  Eeyore and Piggy
20.  What do you want to be when you grow up?  A teacher



The Birthday Girl

Best Attempt at a Cousin Picture

                                          

First Picture as a Family of 5

                                   

Alena Enjoying her Paint Set

                                                  

Homecoming

On October 1st, I was rounding at one of the dialysis centers when I got a call in the morning.  Caleb was being released that day!  I didn't even have his car seat base so I drove home quick and then went straight to the hospital before they could change their mind!  His nurse, Dianna, who had been caring for the twins over the last 4 days was amazing!  She showed us a different way to feed them which seemed to make it easier for them to finish their bottles.  Dianna walked us to our car and wished us good luck.  It was difficult leaving Lauren at the hospital, but I knew she wouldn't be far behind.  While I was busy taking care of Caleb at home, Justin would visit Lauren at least daily and my mom also spent an afternoon in the NICU with her.  It made it a lot easier knowing she would at least see a couple familiar faces.

Caleb's first night home

Lauren must have gotten lonely being in that "twin" room all by herself, because two days later I received the call that she could come home too!

                                                                      Proud Big Sister

We celebrated by taking the twins on their first stroller ride to the park!

Our NICU Journey

Alena called her sister Jelly and her brother Peanut Butter during my pregnancy, so those were their names until mom and dad officially named them

We were initially told that our babies would be in the NICU for 1-2 weeks.  They were on "room air" oxygen for less than 24 hours per protocol and also started on IV antibiotics as a precaution. Once their blood cultures came back negative, the antibiotics were stopped (I have no idea how they put an IV in those little veins!).  I was able to see them in the NICU a couple hours after delivery.  I was so shocked at how small they looked.  After being able to really see them for the first time, we decided on our names:  Baby B was going to be Caleb William no matter what, but we were between two names for Baby A.  After seeing her, we decided that she looked like a Lauren.  I really wanted to use my maiden name as one of the middle names and we thought it worked best with Lauren.  We chose William for Caleb's middle name after Justin's dad.  At first Alena wasn't too happy when we told her that their names were not going to be Peanut Butter and Jelly! 

After my two nights in the hospital I was discharged.  It was very hard leaving my babies in the hospital.  I picked up Alena from daycare (which I hadn't done in 10 weeks) and then went back to the hospital later that evening just in time for their first bath. 

The next week I spent about 10 hours a day at the hospital.  The babies continued to do great.  Their only complication was their bilirubin levels kept increasing.  Unfortunately, this caused them to be sleepy so they were not great eaters.  They both had to have a feeding tube placed so they could receive nutrition.  Every three hours, we would try to feed them a specific amount of breast milk from a bottle, but if they were too tired to finish it, it would be given down their feeding tube.  Finally after 5 days, they were placed under the bili lights to help decrease their bilirubin.  They spent two days soaking up the sun.  They both enjoyed their little Caribbean vacation under the lights (and that is as close as they will ever get to sun tanning!).  The next week they spent trying to finish all of their milk from the bottles.  It took a number of days before they finally figured it out and had enough stamina to drink everything that was required of them.  Caleb came home on day #15 and Lauren followed two days later. 




Grandma S and Caleb

                                                            Grandma Joyce and Papa

Those two weeks were very difficult for me and every day I left the hospital was hard. It was as if I had given birth to two babies and placed them up for adoption-they didn't feel like my children.  In fact, I ended up working during the second week because sitting in the NICU all day long was draining.  I would have done another 10 weeks of bed rest if it would have prevented them from having to stay in the NICU.  However, I had to keep reminding myself that we were blessed that they were healthy and had a relatively short stay in the NICU. 

A few pics from our NICU stay:

Lauren

Caleb

                                                                      
                                                                

Car seat test-almost ready to go home!

                                 

Delivery Day

Saturday night and early Sunday morning I had trouble sleeping thanks to my enemy, intrahepatic cholestasis.  I was up itching and couldn't sleep so I decided to go to the bedroom in the basement and read since I knew my free reading time was going to be non-existent once the twins arrived. 

I did happen to dose off and on for an hour and when I woke up at 4:00 AM, I felt weird. I noticed I was having contractions still, but they were happening more often than 4 an hour. I counted them during the next hour.  They started out being 7 minutes apart and quickly moved to 3-4 minutes apart.  YIKES!  I knew at my last appointment on Friday, I was dilated to 4 cm so I was worried I wouldn't have much time before I would be completely dilated.

I went upstairs and woke up Justin and we counted my contractions for another hour.  They remained every 3-4 minutes so we called my parents so they could come down and stay with Alena.  We showered up and waited for my parents in the driveway so we could leave as soon as they got there.  On the way, my contractions were right on top of each other so Justin picked up the speed a little bit (we both thought it was fun being able to stay at home and count contractions and then hurry to the hospital-I was induced with Alena so we missed out on all of that!). 

I got checked into the triage room and was hooked to the monitor.  Both babies looked great and I was 6cm dilated so I was moved over to labor and delivery. Today would be the day! 


In Labor and Delivery

I continued to have contractions every 3-4 minutes while my nurse put in my IV and drew labs.  I was 7cm when she checked me an hour later and feeling pretty good.  Because I was having twins, it is hospital policy to delivery in the OR in case an emergency c-section is needed.  I decided to get an epidural just in case a c-section would be needed.  Having this would prevent me from having to be put asleep for delivery if a c-section was warranted.  Unfortunately this turned out to be a big mistake.  15 minutes after getting the epidural, my blood pressure dropped and I nearly passed out.  This caused my contractions to slow down significantly.  They then had to use Pitocin to get them going again.  My epidural numbed part of my mid-section, but that was it.  Before I knew it, I needed to push.  So the nurses checked me and I was full dilated.  They threw scrubs at Justin and told him to put them on, and put two baby bracelets on my wrist before being rushed rather quickly to the OR. I had to wait another 5 minutes for my OB to get there. 

A few pushes later, out came Baby A (girl).  She looked just like Alena and cried like her too.  She was quickly evaluated by the NICU team with daddy by her side.  11 minutes, and a couple pushes later, Baby B (boy), was born.  He seemed much bigger than his sister and also cried right away.  Daddy followed him across the hall where he was assessed by the NICU team.  I was able to see both of them briefly before they went upstairs to the NICU.  They were both doing well.  As I recovered from my unmedicated delivery of twins, Justin went out to tell our families the great news and then went up to the NICU.  It was difficult not being able to hold my babies right away, but I knew that because they were younger than 35 weeks gestation (by 1 day!) they would automatically go to the NICU. 

More Complications

I ended up staying in the hospital for 3 weeks.  Originally, my OB practice wanted to keep me in the hospital until I was 32 weeks gestation, but in the end decided to keep me until 34 weeks gestation (although I did ask to be released a couple days early so I could enjoy the Iowa/Iowa State football game at home).  A baby born at 34 weeks gestation is pretty close to having a baby born at full term so this was a great goal to make.  I don't believe when I started my bed rest at 25 weeks that my physicians thought I would make it to 34 weeks.  I know we had a lot of people praying for us which made all the difference.

6 Days Before Delivery

At the end of my hospitalization, I started having intense itching, primarily of my feet and palms of my hands (odd places to itch, huh?).  It was always worse at night and would keep me up for hours.  The next morning I would have lesions on my legs where I had been itching.  I tried everything: three different lotions, benadryl, a humidifier, but nothing helped.   I discussed my itching with a few of my physicians and no one had an explanation.  One physician thought it was because of the sheets used in the hospital and the dryness of the hospital so I went ahead and accepted that explanation.  However, after I was discharged and was sleeping in my own bed with my own sheets, the itching persisted.  The evening of the football game, I had had enough. I started doing some research online and came across Intrahepatic Cholestasis of Pregnancy.  Pregnant moms who had this suffered from itching of their feet and hands and it was primarily worse at night.  Well, that described me to a T, so I called the physician on call and told her I thought I had this (thankfully she knew I was a nurse practitioner or she probably would have thought I was crazy by trying to diagnose myself).  She had me come in to the office on Monday for lab work.  The labs took 5 days to get back, but they did show I had this condition.  Just one more thing to add to the pile...At least I didn't have pre-eclampsia and gestational diabetes or I probably would have had every single pregnancy complication...

Intrahepatic cholestasis is usually not problematic for the mother (besides the I-would-not-wish-this-on-anybody itchiness), but it can cause still birth.  Of course I was very alarmed when I read this and until I had my official diagnosis, my OB had me come into the office twice a week to monitor the babies closely.  My OB practice sees about 1 or 2 patients a year with this diagnosis and my particular OB had never had a twin mom with this condition (I'm sure she'll never forget me now!).  I received the diagnosis on a Friday.  She spoke with a high risk OB who recommended the babies be delivered at 35 weeks, which was in 3 days, to prevent the risk of still birth.  So after trying to keep these babies inside for nearly 10 weeks, now I was being told that I would be INDUCED!  It was bittersweet hearing that because although I was pretty comfortable throughout the entire pregnancy, the last couple weeks had been horrible because of the itching and lack of sleep.  I was ready for the pregnancy to be over, but I was really hoping to make it to 36 weeks.  My bed rest restrictions were removed for the weekend, but I had to go into the hospital on Saturday and Sunday for an ultrasound and monitoring of the babies. 

That Friday night I did what I had been wanting to do for 10 weeks-I went shopping!  That night Justin, Alena, and I went to Target.  I rode in the electric cart while we shopped around (I'm sure that was a sight).  To this day whenever we go to Target, Alena asks me if I'm going to ride in the electric cart...

Since my bed rest restrictions were removed, I was also told to stop the Procardia (the medication which was helping to keep my contractions under control).  So it was no surprise when early Sunday morning, my contractions picked up.

This was our last picture as a family of 3!