Solids
L&C are four and a half months now and yesterday they ate their first solids: rice and breast milk. YUMM! They really loved it!
For me it felt a bit sad on one hand: losing that dependence, that exclusiveness, the feeling they don't need me so much anymore. On the other hand it's a step towards a little more freedom for all of us.
I guess R loves it too. Finally he can feed the babies too. This morning when I was still asleep he gave Charlie another 'bowl of rice pudding' (one teaspoon) made with left over milk. When I came in both my men were beaming with happiness.
Reflux and sleep
My last post was a little too optimistic. The gaviscon didn't really do the trick. It even seemed to make things worse for Lola. Besides that it was very hard too make the babies swallow the medicin as each sachet needs to be dissolved in 15 ml of fluid. The recommended dose for their weight is 2 sachets. So how does one give small babies 30 ml of yukkie stuff without choking or total meltdown (6 teaspoons!)? I think I need a first aid course first as at some stage I thought Charlie was drowning. Very scary and traumatic for all of us.
I went to see a doctor. She seemed a nice and competent woman (after our very strange encounter with the last GP we visited who obviously knew nothing about thrush on nipples - but that's another story...) She pressed on Lola's belly and clearly squeezed some acid into her very sore oesophagus. She screamed like a little piglet, very sad, but also making the diagnosis very clear: Acid Reflux. The remedy: 4 weeks Losec for Lo and two weeks for Charlie.
Losec prevents the body from making stomack acid. Without the acid the irritated oesophagus gets the chance to heal. The meds don't improve the spilling, the babes need to grow over that. In time the valve between the stomack and oesophagus will close better. And starting solids in a while might help to keep the stomack contents down.
Problem remains: how to get (only 5ml of) medicin into the babies? We tried it in a bottle and in a syringe (without needle ofcourse) but it is a big drama every time. The kids get very upset and manage to spit out most of it. Sometimes it even comes out of Charlie's nose. Can you imagine the stress and the mess?!
Anyhow, the reflux seems to be getting better. The babies sleep longer and better and cry less and seem to be more settled. And the more they sleep during the day, the better they seem to sleep at night as well.
What also might help is that I lifted the head end of their beds a little. The reflux slowly started after the babies moved from their (slightly upright) baby hammocks (see photo) to their flat beds (next photo). That is perhaps no coincidence.
Co-sleeping like this in the livingroom (the only heated room) really worked for us in the winter. Now we have moved back to the bedroom and the babies sleep together like this (normally under blankets ofcourse and with a heavy pillow in the middle):
Talking about sleeping and crying. The nights are getting better! Usually at 7pm, after a bath and a last feed, the babies go to bed. I used to let them cry, just tucking them in every 5 minutes or so. The crying could last up to 20 minutes. Very frustrating because I hate leaving them to cry as the plunket nurses tell you to. Last night I read to them, they slept in a few minutes and didn't cry at all.
At 1.30 or 2 am they wake up for a feed and go straight back to sleep till 6, sometimes 7. I feel better now and look less like a junkie.
The daytime sleeps can still be difficult. I watch their sleepy signs: frowning, clenching fists, wingeing, crying, red face, rubbing eyes etc and put them in bed as soon as they show them. We tried to learn the babies to sooth themselves but letting them cry doesn't work, especially not with twins. Charlie cries longer and keeps Lo awake. If I let her sleep in another room I end up with him falling asleep by the time she wakes up. That seriously screws up the day because then everything gets out of sync, doubling the work.
Today I'm trying to read to make them go to sleep in the daytime and it works just great. They sleep after 3 pages in stead of crying for up to half an hour or sometimes not managing to get to sleep at all and ending up very tired and very upset.
I'm reading a very old Dutch book to them. I usually speak english to the babies and only a little dutch to my old dog and the horses. But I think it's nice if they get used to the sound.
From 2 cells to 6 and 7 kg
Today it's a year ago Charlie and Lola were two two cell embryos somewhere in a petri dish in a lab. And look at them now: beautiful kids, 6 and 7 kilos, smiling, grabbing, and turning from their bellies on their backs. I still feel blessed, although pretty tired and worn out at some days.
After my entry about the three months growth spurt I was expecting things to get better. They did a little for a short while, and then the babies started to cry even more. They don't want to sleep in the day, at least, not in their beds. They sometimes have a little powernap in a bouncychair, in the buggy or in the car. And they cry a lot. The only thing that seems to work is to carry them and walk around, but that's so hard when you have two babies! Sometimes I'd just leave them for a while. That would feel awful because I believe they don't scream for no reason.
I talked about the crying before at checkups. But the response was 'They'll grow over it', 'Babies just cry', 'Look at your own diet', 'It's a growth spurt' and 'Do you think you have enough milk?'. I think because the babies grow so well and look very healthy nobody took me very serious so far. At yesterdays checkup I talked about it again. The babies gave a perfect example of their normal behaviour: They smiled for 5 minutes and then started to spill a little and then scream. The nurse was very nice and took the time to listen to me and take me serious.
Her conclusion: Reflux, but even more so silent reflux. Lola seems to swallow most of it, Charlie is always wearing wet shirts or bibs from his continous spilling. The babes must be in a lot of pain and when they lie down it feels really bad. Poor babes! Overtired and in pain, surely that will make you scream!
Today the babies have had some gaviscon to neutralise the acid. Only on half a dose you can feel their little wriggely bodies relax. So everytime the babies show signs of tiredness I can put them in their beds to sleep. Up till now it works great and they want to sleep every one and a half or two hours. It's great I've got time to sit behind my computer, and it's so quiet! I hope this will work, because I was getting pretty down not being able to comfort my kids.
