No Content, Just Cuteness

The kids seem to be feeling better as a result of switching from dairy to soy. I have to refrain from dairy too, of course. Nora shows off her happy smile here, and Milo is perfecting his gleeful crazed mad scientist look.

In Which I am a Lousy Advisor

Things are not going well.

Nora is not getting better. She is still eating very small amounts, and a few days ago she gagged and threw up a little bit while eating solids. Since that time she hasn't wanted much at all to do with solids. That was her one eating strength, the solid foods. So now Nora isn't drinking much, and she's eating next to nothing, and yet she is still vomiting. Last night she threw up all over everything, and this was after almost two vomit-free days. It isn't still the shots, and she doesn't have a virus any more, and yet she is still vomiting.

So today it's back to the doctor. I originally had a meeting with one of my doctoral students this afternoon. He scheduled this meeting with me about a month ago, and he probably did so because I've been sort of slow this summer. Slow to read and comment on his work, which isn't the way I typically operate, but I've been slow with everything. I have a book chapter due in 5 weeks and I haven't even started it.

I had to change his meeting time from this afternoon to late this morning, because I need to take off from work and drive Jake to and from the doctor as he needs to have his own medical procedure, one that involves drugs good enough to prevent him from driving. I hate moving meetings like that and inconveniencing my students, but I had no choice. And now, of course, Nora needs to go to the doctor this morning. So I have to cancel my appointment with my student yet again. I'm becoming that type of advisor. The one you can't count on to keep her meetings, or to get your draft read in a timely manner. I hate this. My first doctoral student, who graduated a year ago, wrote a letter to my department chair and the dean about what a fabulous advisor I was. Now half of those things that prompted him to write that letter have probably gone down the tubes. How do you remain reliable when you have kids who get sick on their own schedules and not yours?

Plus, what on earth are we going to do about poor Nora?

Hot Time, Summer in the City

Milo and Nora still aren't eating much, but there isn't a whole lot we can do about that. They had half of their 6 month shots and spent the day after that vomiting. Then yesterday and today Nora has also been vomiting, and Milo has been unhappy, so they seem to have a bug. So much for weight gain; right now we just need to get through this. I've decided that I can't spend every day freaked out about how little they are eating. I can't make them eat when they don't want to eat.

Nora's sleep is getting a little bit better in the sense that she can once again put herself to sleep instead of being rocked to sleep. She is still waking at night but I've decided I need to slowly wean her off her night feeding before trying to do any sleep training. It seems a little harsh to just cut her off from eating at night all at once. This is probably my way of procrastinating. When I feed her earlier in the night (or a little less), she does eat much, much better in the morning. When she has a solid night feeding, or eats at 2 a.m. or later, she doesn't want to eat in the morning.

One time I took her in to bed with me to see if that could perhaps be a solution to this sleep stuff. I think Nora might sleep fine with us if she had to. She woke a lot, but went back to sleep very easily, probably because I was right there to give her a pacifier before she even fully woke up. The problem is that I didn't sleep a wink with her glommed on to me, stuck to my side like a barnacle, her little fist constantly reaching out and grabbing my hair, twisting it in her vice-like grip. Or, alternatively, she'd scrape her razor-sharp fingernails across my face, pinching my lips, hooking her thumb into my nose. I don't know if she slept better than she sleeps in her room with Milo, it's hard to tell.

Both babies have coughs.

Milo spent some time sitting up like a big boy in his booster seat this evening. They aren't sitting up on their own yet, but it's only a matter of time. Milo seemed to enjoy his booster seat experience.

It's summer, thank God. Summer means the scent of barbecue in the air when we walk through the neighborhood in the evening. Summer means watermelon and lemonade. Playing outside on the grass under the dappled shade of the maple tree. Jogging on the bike path through tufts of dandelion slowly drifting in the air.

Summer means lunch outdoors at the union terrace, watching the sailboats on the lake. Softball games every Wednesday evening at the park in front of our house. The sharp scent of freshly cut grass, the drone of a lawnmower in the distance, and fireflies lighting up in the yard at dusk. Summer means the low rumble of thunder in the distance, and the sweet relief of a rainstorm bringing the temperatures down for a while.

Here in the city, summer means humid days and warm nights. When we travel up north, summer is a different animal. It means walks through the shaded woods, long afternoons on the boat, cold dips in the lake, bonfires at night, and card games with cocktails. Summer means exciting nighttime boat rides, bundled up in our warmest clothes. This summer will bring a lot of firsts for Nora and Milo: first boat ride, first time playing in the water, first time playing with a dog, first long car trip, first time sleeping away from home.

Some day, we'll get to see their first time fishing with Grandpa, first ride in the speedboat with Uncle Ken, first time waterskiing, first night in a tent. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

No baby pictures this time because they're too sick and miserable, and we're too busy cleaning up soiled sheets to use the camera. Instead I'll post a picture that Jake recently took in our garden.

In the Grand Scheme of Things

So Milo has fallen off of his growth curve too, but not in a way that is as dramatic as Nora's slowed growth. Part of me thinks, this is just genetics. Jake and I are pretty small people, I was a small baby, and we were both small kids. So Milo and Nora aren't going to be huge people. On the other hand, given that both babies have slowed their growth a little too much (according to those evil charts), the other part of me thinks, "Great. It's not just a fluke, like it was with Nora, instead it must be the fact that Jake and I totally suck at parents and we can't even feed our babies right!"

So we're feeding them the highest-calorie solid foods we can think of, and we have to fortify their bottles (both breastmilk and formula) so that they are drinking something that's higher in calories than normal breastmilk or formula. I don't even want to nurse them anymore because I know that they're not getting a calorically-dense enough meal from breastmilk alone. But...I am still nursing them when they want to, basically in the middle of the night or the early morning.

The hardest part about all of this is that Milo and especially Nora just don't want to eat sometimes. It's bedtime, and they will both refuse to nurse, and then when I give in and give them a bottle sometimes one or the other will only drink an ounce or two and then just stop. They'll push the bottle away, turn their heads, cry if I try to give it to them, and basically give me every clear signal possible that they are not hungry. It feels cruel to force somebody to eat when they don't want to. It feels wrong. I cheer and cajole and soothe them into near sleep so that they practically eat in their sleep, and do whatever I can to convince them to eat because I know they have to in order to grow properly, but it all just feels wrong, wrong, wrong. I mean, way to set up a lifetime of eating issues here! Way to teach a kid to keep eating even when she's full! Gah!

I know that some day I'll be worrying about things like breaking into the liquor cabinet, or driving recklessly late at night with their friends, and this eating thing will seem like no big deal.

I'll be 50 with Teenagers

A weird thing happened to me when I was taking a walk with the kids. A guy passed me going the other way on his bike, and his bike was pulling one of those carts that carry kids in them. He took a look at the stroller and started laughing and said "ha ha ha ha ha, twins! Twins!" I said "Ha, yep, twins" and he stopped and said "I have twins too," and gestured into the bike cart. Indeed there were two girls in there.

So this guy gets off his bike and turns around so that he's going the same direction as me, and starts walking with me, talking about twins. Turns out he is a stay at home dad, so maybe he was feeling isolated or something, but he stuck with me for the entire rest of my walk.

I learned a lot of things about this guy in the next 20 minutes: his twins are 3 and a half, they are not identical, they are not potty trained, they don't talk much, he dropped out of art school when they were born because it was too hard to deal with them and be in school, his wife is a nurse, they live on the far east side, they only planned to have one child, they use disposable diapers, and oh, yeah -- his twins are "natural". None of that weird reproductive technology for him and his wife!

"Have you checked out that multiples club in town?", he said. "They are all a bunch of weirdos. They all had to use reproductive technology to get pregnant. Yeah, most of them definitely took advantage of pharmaceuticals. If you ask me, if you need to use reproductive technology to get pregnant, then you have no business having kids." I asked him "how do you know that they needed help to get pregnant?" He said "Well, most people won't admit it, of course. But you can tell. Most of them are really old. I sure wouldn't want to be 50 and still dealing with teenagers!"

Huh. This guy had a real thing for the phrase "reproductive technology". I guess enough people have asked him whether his kids were "natural" (as if my kids aren't?) that he now feels like he has to let new people know right away. They were natural all right. None of that fishy reproductive technology for him! He just had extra special manly sperm!

I told him that I'll be 50 and dealing with teenagers, and he seemed surprised. At one point I said that whenever I feel overwhelmed, I think about people who have triplets or quadruplets. He said "yeah, well when there are higher order multiples involved, you know they used reproductive technology. It's practically a given. If you ask me, they dug their own grave."

My weird walk with this tool reminded me of a couple of things. One, never assume. When you meet new people, you don't know much about their personal history. So it's probably smarter not to, I don't know, go off on some weird religion X or some pyramid scheme Y because the person you're talking to might end up being part of that group. But the more important thing is to try to have compassion for points of view that differ from your own. This guy's rant about people who use reproductive technology is probably something that I would have vaguely agreed with a few years ago. Until, you know, I became one of those people. One thing that taught me is that you can't know what it's like to live through certain things until you actually do it. And you might not know how you'll react until you're actually faced with making the hard decisions. It is so, so easy to judge other people and say "I would never do xyz." I distinctly remember saying that about IVF. Easy to say it, but we don't really know. We don't know what other people live through, we don't know what plagues them, we don't know their suffering, we don't know what drives their decisions. That's worth remembering the next time I might feel tempted to judge a decision that strikes me as stupid, petty, selfish, or unfathomable.

(Above -- when I was at work, Jake and the twin whisperer took this photo of the results of reproductive technology. Totally totally worth it, thank you very much).

On Worry

I remember one time when I was pregnant and worrying about the babies. I was so worried about something going wrong, and if I didn't feel any movement for a few hours I'd start to wonder if they were still alive. I remember doing that one night and thinking to myself that I couldn't wait until they were born, because once they were actually here then I'd no longer have to worry about that.

Then I realized, oh crap, once they're born I'm probably going to start worrying about different stuff. The worrying isn't going to stop when they're born. In fact, I'm probably going to worry about them for the rest of my life. It was a huge realization, that I had taken on this worry burden that I'd probably never truly put down until the day I died.

I have worried about the babies eating too little. I have worried when they fussed and refused to eat. I have worried about Milo's head. I have worried about Nora's weird hyperactivity during the night. I have worried when they got their shots, and I worried when they got rashes, and I worried when Milo had a fever, and now I am worried about Nora's size and her eating. I am more worried about this than anything else I've worried about so far. Last night I was awake, in bed, thinking about it and I actually broke into a cold sweat over it.

Suddenly it has occurred to me that how I deal with this is something of a choice.

Do I need to worry this much? Or am I choosing to indulge in that worry? I can see that some degree of concern is going to be helpful because it will spur me and Jake to be extra careful and vigilant regarding the thing we're worried about. So in this case, focusing attention on Nora's size means we're pushing to get her seen by the doctor quickly, and we'll be highly proactive in doing whatever needs to be done to make sure that she is healthy. But is it possible to maintain that attention and vigilance without then indulging in all of that extra worry? Without focusing too much mental energy on it in a way that simply results in me spinning my wheels, creating more and more anxiety?

When I think back throughout my life about all the thousands of things I've worried about, most of the time it's turned out fine. The worrying was just wasted energy in the end. Excessive worrying probably isn't helpful to Nora. It's not going to make her better sooner. It's just going to make me distracted and anxious and fearful. Maybe I could make a choice to not allow myself to perseverate on this. To not necessarily spend my life worrying about Milo and Nora all the time, as if I had no control over that.

It seems to me that worrying serves a purpose when it spurs us to action. If we're motivated to do whatever it takes to make us feel better about the thing that worries us, and if it's actually possible to do something about it, then that can be helpful. But if we worry about things we can't do anything about, things we have no control over, then the worrying serves no productive purpose and indeed is just harmful to our mental health. Over the past few years I have been pretty good at setting aside worry over things that were too distant or too out of my control to do much about. I can't believe it didn't occur to me before now that I could apply the same mindset to Nora and Milo.

(Above -- Milo looking worried, as he often does).

Finally

Couples tie the knot.

Petite Nora

So after I put Nora on the cat scale, I got worried about her weight and took her to the doctor. They weighed her and at 11 lbs 14 oz, she's fallen completely off the growth charts and her doctor referred us to a GI specialist. The doctor also suggested introducing meats and upping her solids to three meals a day. The nurse at the GI clinic was singing a somewhat different tune, telling me that they'll probably put her on a special high-calorie formula.

I think Nora and Milo must have both sensed our increased worry about their eating today, as neither baby has been interested in nursing or in taking a bottle. They both ate about half what they were supposed to during their afternoon feeding. An hour or so later, we gave them some solids, though, and Nora ate it right up. I had poached some chicken for the babies but hadn't gotten around to grinding it up in the blender, so I mixed some cereal with the broth and Nora absolutely loved it. She hates drinking, whether it be by breast or bottle, but she seems to love eating.

Of course we're super worried about Nora. But one consoling fact is that at 6.5 months, I only weighed 12 lbs 5 oz, and I grew up to be more or less normal. So hopefully she'll be okay.

Sleep Statistics Week 4

Day 22: Milo woke once and Nora woke twice, and we fed them, and Nora woke one more time early in the morning. So I guess that was 4 wake ups again.

Day 23: Nora woke once at 9 before we went to bed. Then there were 5 more wake ups, and an early (6:20) start to the day, so it was a messed up night, but the one shining beacon of light was the fact that Milo did not get up to eat. Other than waking a couple of times when Nora was screaming on the changing table, Milo slept through the night. For the first time. Oh, please let this be the start of something new!

Day 24: Well, it was a pretty good night! Nora woke once briefly at 12:30, then not again until 2:45 or so to eat. They both woke at 6 but both went back to sleep after getting pacifiers -- at least, as far as I know. There was no crying, but Milo has been known to play in his crib in the morning for quite a while.

Day 25: Nora woke 4 times and Milo woke once at 4 a.m. to eat, so I guess the sleeping-through-the-night thing isn't foolproof yet. As usual, the longest stretch I got in a row was 2 hours.

Day 26: Milo slept through again! Hooray! Nora woke 4 times, which I guess is her typical pattern these days although I hate to admit it.

Day 27: Nora woke 6 or 7 times, she cried, she woke Milo, it was a mess, the longest I slept was between 3 and 6 a.m.

Day 28: Nora only woke twice, I think, which is awesome. Milo woke once around 4:45 but went back to sleep with a pacifier.

So Nora's sleep doesn't really seem to be getting any better, and I don't think it's worth keeping track of it anymore. Milo is sleeping through the night more and more, which is encouraging. I just don't know what we're going to do about Nora yet. She also almost never naps for more than half an hour, so it's a mess. I don't know. I guess at some point we need to start letting her cry or else we'll probably end up with a 2-year old who is still waking every couple of hours, and that wouldn't be good for anybody. I'm just so afraid to do it.

I feel like maybe at some point, when they were 3 or 4 months old or so, I was somehow getting 4 and 5-hour stretches of sleep. I can't remember. For such a long time now it's been so much worse than that, and I never sleep more than 3 hours at a time. I really honestly feel like I'm at the end of my rope and I am going insane. It's got me so messed up that I am actually having insomnia. I have a terrible time sleeping when it's time to go to bed, because I'm so filled with anxiety about Nora waking. I often can't really fall asleep until after she wakes for the first time. Which is ridiculous, because the only other chance I have at a 2-3 hour stretch of sleep is when we first go to bed. My insomnia and anxiety ruins that chance.

This morning I weighed Nora on the cat scale and she only weighed 12 pounds. I hope the scale is wrong, because that would mean she's totally fallen off the growth charts. She's spending all of her calories on writhing around in the night not sleeping, and I know this can't be good for her. I'm kind of worried about her. Every information source I read says that all healthy 6-month olds don't need to eat at night and should be able to sleep through, so does that mean we should try to help her do that and let her cry? But if she is only 12 pounds and isn't even on the growth chart anymore, maybe she doesn't count as a normal, healthy 6-month old and I keep thinking she probably needs those extra calories in the night. Boy, it's a puzzle. A puzzle that is slowly driving us all mad.

Happy Father's Day to Jake

Jake is out taking the kids for a run, so this will have to be short as I need to use this uber-valuable time to also shower, put a load of laundry in, and do dishes.

This New York Times piece on shared parenting is excellent and worth a read. There's so much to say, much of it already said by others, about the journey towards having an equal marriage. It's a goal almost nobody achieves, us included, as we're still not at 50% when it comes to career work, housework, and parenting work. Yesterday when I read this article I got all worked up and started tallying up for Jake all of the kid-related jobs I do that he doesn't, even though I'm also our wage earner now. We're both just so conditioned to let me do all of the little things like researching all things baby, buying their clothes and toys, figuring out how to feed them solids, making their doctor's appointments, figuring out which bottles are BPA-free, being the first to rush in and grab a baby who wakes from a nap, noticing that their laundry basket is full, and so on, and so on, and so on. Jake has been socially conditioned to not even see this work, and I have been socially conditioned to automatically take responsibility for it -- to be the CEO of the family. So, we're like couples everywhere when it comes to that, and that's despite our deliberate intention to live differently, to parent equally, to show Nora and Milo that domestic chores are women's work and men's work, to show them that achieving success in a career is an aspiration that belongs to both men and women. Our desire is not just to tell them these things, but to show them, by living it ourselves.

So of course we're not perfect, but what I was going to say was that Jake's response to my little spontaneous rant about all of this was incredibly admirable and part of what I respect about him. He listened without being defensive, and then said "I can see your point. Things would probably be different if I were the one working towards tenure and you were the one staying home this summer. I'm willing to make changes. I'm willing to do things differently." And then he did the laundry.

I knew Jake was a guy to marry when I realized that if we had a son, I would be proud if that son grew up to be just like his dad. Confident, kind, gentle, smart, thoughtful, and open.

Six Months

Well, babies, we've all made it to 6 months. Let's raise a glass to that, then down it and ask for another. After all, this is Make it a Double.

Milo and Nora have kind of a crummy birthday, being born in mid-December and all, but they have a rocking half birthday. The night before they turned 6 months old, our neighborhood held a giant party and movie screening in the park across the street from our house. Friday the 13th was the last day of school, so that was a day worth celebrating. There was a sound system and pizza and picnic blankets and kids practicing their dance moves and basketball and cocktails. Everything you could ask for in a half-birthday celebration. Did I mention the cocktails? Maybe we'll have to make a tradition of celebrating the kids' half birthday, because June 14 is a lovely time to celebrate.











So we've really reached the land of milk and honey when it comes to all things baby. I wish I could go back 6 months and tell myself that it's going to be just fine. That although I was incredibly overwhelmed and secretly afraid that I had just destroyed our lives, I hadn't really. That I would one day cease to live my life in 3-hour chunks of time. That those wailing, peeing, pooping lumpy human beings were going to turn into delightful, giggly, interesting people. People who I would not only love because they were my children and I had to love them, but people who I would also like just because they were cool.

Jake just told me that he's glad we had kids. "Who else will we go camping with?", he asked. "Who else are we going to mold in our own images?" He definitely wasn't saying that kind of thing 6 months ago. So, sarcasm aside, we've made it a long way.

We've had a lot of milestones in the past month. Milo and Nora started eating solid foods, and this is really exciting for Nora. Every time I start feeding her, the first few spoonfuls elicit a hilariously sour face, as if to say "what are you doing to me, woman?" Then she warms up to it, then she starts to open her mouth in anticipation, then she starts doing the bulldog head shake as she tears into that spoonful, then she starts laughing. Given what a crappy eater Nora has been up until now, I'm absolutely delighted at the way she has taken to solids. Maybe she just doesn't like the taste of the stuff we put into bottles. I can't blame her, I've never been able to enjoy milk of any kind. Who wouldn't choose squash over milk? Even sweet potatoes take on their own starchy charm in contrast to bottles of milk.


Milo has taken to solids the way he takes to most things; he's cool. He can handle it. It's new, it's a little weird, it's worth a bug-eyed look or two, but he'll take it in stride. I stick him in his bouncy chair, throw that bib on him, and he looks at me like it's all old hat. "Bring it," he tells me.

This has been the month of grabbing anything within reach and shoving it into mouths. The other day, I swear, Milo shoved his entire fist into his mouth. Like, up to his wrist. Granted, not having any teeth to get in the way probably helps, but I'm pretty sure he has to unhinge his jaw to fit that meaty paw of his so far in. Milo pretty regularly gags himself on his own fingers, and I have to tell him to slow down, buddy, hold back.

Hands aren't the only thing going in mouths, of course. Both babies also like to shove burp cloths, toys, our fingers, my watch, placemats, books, newspapers, clothes, diapers, camera straps, and the cat's tail into their mouths. Basically, if it can be moved, it can fit into the mouth.

Speaking of the cats, Nora and Milo are both noticing them a lot more these days. They're fascinated by these creatures, so conveniently painted black and white, who lazily amble past their fields of vision a dozen times a day. Sam and Caspian more or less tolerate the babies at this point. I'm not exactly sure why those corpulent creatures are so interesting. I mean, Nora can be on the floor and I'll try to catch her gaze, I'll smile and wave at her, I'll make funny faces and funny noises, I'll break out the dance moves, and she'll give me a brief, polite glance before returning her intense, loving gaze to the cat. The cat, who isn't doing anything other than sitting there licking its own butt.


This has also been the month of rolling. Both babies are rolling from front to back and back to front now, and this provides endless hours of entertainment. We can just set them in the middle of a giant blanket, scatter a few toys down there, and watch them roll all over the place. Sure, they might roll off the blanket onto the hardwood floor, and sure, Milo's head tends to clunk a little bit when he rolls from front to back, but he doesn't seem to mind. Every now and then a baby will get stuck under the couch, or something, and we'll re-set them in the middle of the blanket. They're getting so active that I decided that we had better get a big area rug so that they'll have a softer spot to play and fall. I mean, the alternative would be actually watching them all the time, and frankly that would interfere with my valuable wine-drinking time.

I was really anxious to get the babies to roll so I spent a lot of time placing toys just out of their reach, in hopes that they would roll towards the toys. This never really worked, it just pissed them off. So then I switched to convincing Jake to place the toys directly out of their reach, and then after they struggled and got mad for a while, I would swoop in and provide the toy. Lesson learned; daddy is mean, placing toys out of reach. Mama is nice, providing toys. Who do you love better, babies? That's right. Thaaaaaat's right.

Both Milo and Nora have found their feet. This is an incredible delight for Milo especially. He discovered his feet for the first time when he was on the changing table, and he gave me a look as if to say, holy shit, why have you been hiding these from me all this time? These are the greatest toys of all time. Forget that crinkly cube thing with the handles, I've already seen that today. Forget that firefly that jingles, don't you know I've already put every square inch of it in my mouth? What about the feet? I want the feet. Where are those feet -- ahhh, here they are. Ahhhhhh, yes. Feet, we meet again.



Milo has also started saying "da da da da", just in time for Father's Day. He likes to say it loudly, and then when he gets really excited, he likes to whisper it, "da da da da da". I honestly don't think that I have ever, ever witnessed anything as adorable as that baby whispering "da da da da". Why is a whisper so cute? I don't really know. I mean, first they yank this baby boy out of my belly, and then he stares at me with a giant wrinkled forehead, and the next thing I know, he has mastered the whisper. Where does he get this stuff? Who is this kid? It's like he's got his own personality or something. I can't wait to find out what he comes up with next.

Both babies are also doing a lot of laughing now. Nora has a social, flirtatious laugh. She laughs just looking across the room at daddy, for no discernible reason. Sometimes, she laughs at the ceiling. Jake is convinced that Nora sees things we can't see. Milo's laugh is a little more deliberate. Sometimes he laughs politely, a few chuckles, like he's humoring us. It's like he's saying "okay, you're going to all this trouble to pretend to eat my belly, I'll give you a couple of pity laughs. Heh. heh. heh." But other times, something will really crack Milo up, like when his dad blows raspberries, and then he breaks into a low, rumbling belly laugh.


One of the biggest milestones just occurred this week: Milo started sleeping through the night. He hasn't done it every night, but he's doing it more and more often now, and I can't even begin to describe how incredible this is. Two nights ago Jake actually slept 9 hours in a row for the first time since the babies were born. And me, all I had to do was get up 4 times with Nora, but that's a different story. Milo, you're the king of sleep. I can put you in your crib, awake, and leave the room, and you'll talk to yourself for a minute or two, sigh, roll onto your side, and fall asleep. Just like that. We've never had to let you cry, we've never had to do much of anything to get you to fall asleep. When Nora is screaming in the middle of the night, you'll either sleep through it, or even more impressively, you'll wake, grumble for a second, sigh, roll onto your other side, and go back to sleep. All. by. yourself. Milo, I can't tell you how impressed I am by that. You must have your dad's constitution, you must have inherited his ability to fall asleep because it's midnight, darn it, and wake-up time is 8 a.m., therefore in order to get the recommended 8 hours of sleep it is necessary to fall asleep riiiiiight....NOW. In your case, you're out by 7:30, and for the past few nights you've been sleeping until almost 7 a.m.

Now things aren't quite that easy for Nora. I know that my obsession with sleep has been going on more or less constantly for the past six months, and maybe this blog should actually be called "The Chronicles of Nora Not Sleeping". Nora, you don't seem to enjoy going to sleep. In fact, you fight it. You fight it with every inch of your being. I think that you know, somehow, that when you go to sleep you'll no longer be with mama and daddy, and you're just not all that thrilled about being alone. So your eyes will get heavy, and you'll start to nod off, and then you'll forcibly jerk yourself awake again. Nora, this will serve you well in college. When you're working on that physics problem set, the one that you swore you'd start right after it was handed out and not leave until the last minute, the one that you left until the last minute, when it's 4 a.m. and you have 6 hours to finish that problem set, your ability to stay awake under pressure is going to come through for you. It's going to allow you to soldier through, to get those problems completed, to get a good grade in physics even though you spent most of your nights last week partying over at the Kappa Sigma house.

But now, Nora, as a baby, your ability to stay awake despite our best attempts to help you fall asleep is driving us crazy. This is extra true now that you can roll, because you spend a fair amount of time in the middle of the night rolling yourself into a terribly uncomfortable position, scaring the daylights out of me because you're on your belly and you face is smashed into the crib mattress, and you get stuck and start to cry. Nora, you have a really hard time sleeping, and maybe you're just one of those babies who doesn't need a lot of sleep, because you don't enjoy napping for longer than half an hour either. So to recap, sleep at night? Lousy. Sleep during the day? Lousy. Have we let you cry yet? No way. We're way too chicken to do it, because when you cry even for just a couple of minutes, you get so worked up that the effects last several hours. So we're currently stuck in this limbo where you don't sleep, and so I don't sleep, and you get cranky and you hurl your tiny little body into all sorts of weird contortions, and I get cranky and go seek out that bottle of wine. Hah! I kid.

But in all honesty, Nora, there is something I want you to know. I want you to understand that I wouldn't have it any other way. Your current non-sleeping ways are clearly just a part of who you are. You are a determined little person. You have a lot of energy. You are a fighter. I love that spark in you, I just love it. So if it means that we have to wait a while before you start sleeping more, that's okay, it's a trade I'll take in order to have a baby girl who is so fiery and sure of herself. I wouldn't want you to be any different from exactly how you are.

Tonight, on the babies' half birthday, Jake and I are celebrating by getting the hell out of here. The twin whisperer is coming over, Jake and I are donning our fancy clothes, and we're going to a wedding reception. Two of my graduate students have married each other (awwww), and the occasion is giving us a chance to go on our first real date since the babies were born. We're going to hop into our car and race away, tires squealing as we drive into the sunset. It is going to be magnificent. As the evening wears on, my thoughts will turn more and more often to Nora and Milo, just as they do when I am away at the office. By the end of the evening I'll be ready to call it a night, and as we return home I'll steal into their room and kiss their sweet little heads, and breathe in their sweet baby scents, and thank the stars that they are in our lives.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

The little ones turn 6 months old tomorrow. My how they've changed in just half a year:

Is Twice Significant?

Last night, for the second time in a row, Milo slept through the night.

Slept. Through. From 7:30 p.m. until 6 a.m., and then after a pacifier plug, again until 7:10 a.m.

This is totally blowing my mind. To just have to feed and deal with ONE baby at nighttime, that would be incredible! Oh please please please let this be real.

Our Girls Are Not Our Little Princesses

Nora, so many good people have been fighting so hard for things you will hopefully be lucky enough to take for granted when you get older. But we still have a long way to go.

Sleep Statistics Week 3

Day 15: 3 wake ups, all Nora. She woke at 10:30 but went back down quickly, woke at 2:45 at which point we fed them, and again at 5:20 and needed some rocking to go back to sleep. Could be worse.

Day 16: 4 wake ups, you guessed it, Nora. 11, 11:15, 1:30, and 2 something to eat. The kids slept until about 6:45.

Um, I've read somewhere that most babies "settle", i.e., sleep all the way through the night, between 4 and 6 months. You hear that, kids? You only have a week left to settle!

Day 17: 4 wake ups, all Nora, 11, 1, 2 (we fed them then), and 4:30. Let's not let 4 become a pattern, okay? Nora?

Day 18: 4 wake ups, half and half. Nora woke sometime, I can't remember, and then again at 1:30, and I fed her just because I needed to feed somebody due to having plugged duct, then Milo woke at 3 and we fed both of them, and then Milo woke again an hour or two later because we were having a huge thunderstorm. He seemed scared. But Jake comforted him and he went back to sleep.

Day 19: Only 2 wake ups, Nora at 2 and Milo at 3:30 when we fed them! So Nora didn't go to sleep until 8 p.m. because she spent a lot of time crying as Jake held her before bedtime. She just had a hard time settling down. I know this has happened before when there were other good nights. So I hope this doesn't mean Nora needs to cry before having a good sleep night!

Day 20: 3 wake ups, Nora at 11:36, Nora at 2:30 when we fed them, and Nora sometime early in the morning, but Jake convinced her to go back to sleep until 7:15. So, 2, 3, 4 wake ups isn't perfect, but better than the numbers we were seeing in week 1.

Day 21: Nora had a couple of wake ups before we went to bed, then after bed she woke 4 times, I think. It's already a little hazy. Yes, I remember now, it was 4 times.

So what have I learned from 3 weeks of keeping track? The most important thing is that things are objectively getting better even if it doesn't feel like that. Although it's hard to make accurate calculations when I sometimes used numbers like "4 or 7", or "a hundred thousand", roughly in the first week the babies woke an average of about 7 times a night. In the second week, they woke an average of a little over 3 and a half times a night, and this week it was a little under 3 and a half times a night. So maybe we've plateaued here, but at least things are heading in the right direction.

Photo Essay

Invert

Today Nora rolled from back to front, and back again! Then she did it three more times. Way to go Nora!

I'm currently listening to her on the monitor. She's been talking and banging things around and generally refusing to go down for her nap for the last half hour. Holding her just gets her even more riled up, if that's possible. Ah -- and she just woke Milo. At least her non-napping time is providing lots of valuable rolling practice!

End of the Road

Before Nora and Milo were born, their pediatrician told me that women can't make enough colostrum to feed two babies, so they would need formula supplementation in the beginning. I didn't like what I heard, and challenged it, and she reassured me a number of times that the goal was to get both babies breastfeeding exclusively. That was a goal she supported, a goal that the hospital supported, and one that formula supplementation should enable because otherwise, she explained, the babies would not get the calories they needed, and they would get too sleepy to eat, thus interfering with breastfeeding.

I wanted a supplemental nursing system for the formula supplementation because I wanted the babies to focus on nursing. After all, I was going to nurse both of them, simultaneously. Throughout their infancy. That was the plan.

HA.

So Milo and Nora were born and all of that flew out the window because neither baby could even nurse at all in the beginning. They couldn't suck. The lactation consultants came in and visited me a couple of times a day and they wrote little instructions onto the white board in the hospital room. The instructions said something like "1. 10-15 cc in a bottle. 2. Put to breast if alert and interested. 3. Pump 15 minutes. 4. Complete within 45 minutes." Getting them to drink even 10 cc (1/3 of an ounce) was an enormous challenge in the beginning. The babies had a hard enough time staying awake long enough to suck from a bottle, much less try to nurse. The whole process usually took between an hour and a half to two hours. I was never able to finish in 45 minutes.

So bottles it was, from the day they were born. My concern with exclusive breastfeeding moved to the back burner because I was so concerned with getting them to eat anything, period.

Over the next few weeks the doctor, the lactation consultants, and the lactation nurses worked with me to transition Milo and Nora to nursing. When I first started nursing each baby exclusively for a feeding (without giving a bottle afterwards), I was terrified that they weren't getting enough to eat. But they were, and eventually we reached the point at which for each feeding, I nursed one baby exclusively and the other baby got a bottle from Jake. We traded off babies each time. Thus we entered the successful phase in which I no longer had to give anybody a bottle, ever. I just nursed them. I was able to nourish both of my babies, and it was beautiful, because it was something I was able to do for them, finally. Something my body was able to do right, after so many things going wrong.

I never made enough milk to feed them breastmilk exclusively. At my peak, when I was taking both Fenugreek and Domperidone, I made enough for about 1 and a half, maybe 1 and 2/3 babies. I spent a lot of time frustrated about my supply, and pumping around the clock, but I learned to accept that formula was part of the picture.

Then reflux came our way, then a nursing strike, then mastitis, then a respite in which things rebounded again, and then, and then, they just decided to...stop.

Not all at once, so it's not a clean break. But 9 times out of 10, if it's daylight, Nora and Milo won't nurse. They behave the same way. They'll latch on and nurse for about a minute, maybe two, and then break the latch, turn away, twist their body away from me, and cry if I try to reintroduce the breast. I'll switch them to the other side, and they'll cry. I'll give them a break, burp them, put them to the breast again, and they'll cry. And cry, and cry, if I keep trying. They'll just refuse, and cry. Then I get mad, and then I make a bottle, and give it to them, and they drink it down as if they've been starving.

This has been going on for a long time.

Longer than it should have been, I think. I'm starting to see that now. It's not healthy for every feeding to be a power struggle. I keep saying I'm going to quit, and then I keep trying, and pumping, struggling to keep up a supply that is dwindling every week. What keeps me trying is that 10th time. Every now and then, for some reason, once every couple of days, one of them will actually nurse. And that small margin of success has kept me going. But most of the time, it doesn't work, and I'm tired of fighting with Nora, and I'm tired of fighting with Milo. I'm tired of being so mad and sad about it. I'm tired of not being able to accept that we've reached some sort of impasse here.

I don't know exactly why it is so hard for me to just give up. If I give up, we can all move on. Feedings can cease to be a negative experience. I get my body back. I get my time back, time I can spend with the babies instead of pumping every day. I get to go back to bed in the middle of the night 20 minutes earlier, because I'll no longer be pumping after the 2 a.m. feeding. There are so many things that would be, will be, nice about giving up. So why is it so hard to just give up already?

Aside from my natural stubbornness I guess it's just hard to admit defeat on this one. Public service announcements aside, it was just...lovely...to be able to feed Nora and Milo the way they were supposed to be fed. It felt like a gift I was giving them. This somehow reached such heights of importance in my mind that I have let it overcome other issues, like the fact that it's not healthy to try to force them to nurse all the time when they don't want to, and it's not healthy for me to get mad about it all the time. So they're going to be 6 months old soon, and I think at that time, unless something drastic changes, I'm going to stop trying. I'll still nurse them in the middle of the night, when for some reason they seem to accept it, but otherwise, I'm going to stop fighting them. I'm ready to spend more time just enjoying my babies. And I need to remember that there is more to parenthood than how I feed them. A lot more. I'm really looking forward to moving into the stage in which parenting has nothing to do with my body.

[Update since I wrote this: Aaaaaand now I have mastitis. Again. That's a real supply killer.]

Rice Cereal

So the avocado met with mixed reactions, but the kids liked the rice cereal, especially Nora. She really started to go for it and I think she got the hang of eating it. Milo sort of tolerated it but didn't seem overly enthusiastic. I think he was eating it, though. Nora, on the other hand, started to open her mouth and enthusiastically chomp on the spoon, and by the end of the feeding session she was just cracking up. Laughing and laughing, about what I don't know, the joy that is rice cereal?

I love how she shakes her head before chomping down on the spoon.

Bird versus Bird

What a hard day Sunday was. Nora and Milo both didn't want to go down for their morning nap, and we only got them to sleep an entire hour after they were supposed to sleep. There is just something about TWO crying, fussy babies at the same time to make you go nuts. I had to leave the room at one point, I was just so frustrated. For the afternoon nap, Milo went down fine and Nora wouldn't go down at all. I took her into bed with me and that didn't work either. I was so tired, and Jake took her. I fell asleep and 20 minutes later woke to her screaming her head off. Turns out Jake hadn't put her down at all, he'd just put her in a bouncy seat to play for 20 minutes until she finally got so tired that she was going ballistic. I took Nora into bed and she fell asleep immediately. For the evening nap, Nora just skipped it entirely. She wouldn't go down at all. After more than half an hour, we gave up. On top of all that, neither baby would nurse all day long. I wasn't able to have any successful nursing sessions and it seems that we're down to middle-of-the-night and early morning as far as successful nursing goes.

On the bright side, summer seems to have arrived, and Sunday was wonderfully, delightfuly warm and humid. Exercise is good for anger management, so I took them out in the jogger in the late afternoon. As I was plodding along I went under a tree and felt a gentle "plop" on the top of my head. A bird had taken a crap on my head. Fortunately, I was wearing a hat.

When I take the babies out I always get a lot of remarks from people. Yesterday I heard lots of "oh how cute!", and "look Taylor/Madison/Jayden/Niko, two babies!", and "You've got a full house", and "Congratulations!". Lots of smiles, which is lovely. Also, I passed one older lady and she took a look at me and the babies and said "they're going to get some red toes out like that!"

Oh my gosh, it was my first mommy drive by!

The funny thing is that I had actually been worrying about their feet. It was a hot day, and it was late in the day (5 p.m.) and the sun was low in the sky. The jogger has a good canopy but it's not good enough to cover them 100% when the sun is so low. So their feet were poking out into the sun, and the path I was on was about half shaded and half in the sun as we ran in and out of trees. I was concerned about their little feet poking out, but the problem is that they don't keep socks on. They kick them right off, and shoes too, and blankets as well, plus it was hot out. So the old lady's comment bothered me since I'd already been feeling concerned about their feet in the sun. (They can't wear sunscreen before 6 months).

Then I figured oh well, it's 5 p.m., for crying out loud, in a northern state, and we're in the shade half the time anyway, they'll be okay. It's funny how much that busybody's comment bugged me. Their feet are fine, of course. And if I had to choose whether to take shit from a bird versus an old lady, I'd choose the bird.

Professor Belly-Pat Strikes Again

Professor Belly-Pat, wandering into my office: Where are the kids?

Me: They're at home.

Professor Belly-Pat: What kind of mother are you, here without your babies?

Me: Ah, hah hah hah! (Look how cheerful and good natured I am about your ribbing, please remember how nice I am come tenure time!)

My internal response: A mother trying to get tenure so she can keep her job and continue to feed and clothe her children, asshat.

Sleep Statistics Week 2

Night 8: Holy cow! The babies only woke up twice! Milo woke at 1:36 and I gave him a pacifier, and then Nora woke up at 3 and that's when we fed them. How did that happen? What was the magic thing that we did differently? They napped very well that day, so maybe it was a "sleep begets sleep" issue. Or maybe it's because they had sleeveless sleep sacks on so they weren't too hot. Who knows. Can we repeat this magic?

Night 9: 5 wake-ups, the first at 1:17. We fed them at 3:30 which was late, but that's when they woke to eat. All of the non-eating wake-ups were Nora. Ah, Nora. Nora, Nora, Nora.

Night 10: 7 wake-ups, I think, 6 Nora and 1 Milo. Nore woke first at 11:36. Between about 11:30 and 1 she seemed to be suffering in some way, or something was bothering her sleep but we couldn't figure out what it was. We changed her and held her and she finally fell asleep at around 1:10 and they both slept until 3:10 at which point they woke and we fed them. The only thing I've learned so far is that if the first wake-up happens early, like before 12:30 or 1 a.m., then that means a bad night is coming. Then our twin whisperer came and told us that her other baby (her Tu/Thurs baby) now sleeps from 7:30 p.m. until 6 or 6:30 a.m. and this kid is only 3 months old! (Although he already weighs more than Nora and Milo). There is no justice in the world of baby sleep.

Night 11: 3 wake-ups, the first around 12:30. Nora woke up and needed to be nursed back to sleep, and then she woke up again at 2 and Jake was in there with her. I was in bed listening to her fuss, and then cry, and then scream, as if Jake was poking her with a sharp stick or something. So I finally gave up and got out of bed and stormed into the nursery saying "WHAT is the problem? Why don't you just feed her?" "It's too early," he retorted, "I don't think she's hungry." So I took her and rocked her until she was juuuust about asleep, and then Milo woke up and started fussing. I thought I could lay Nora down and pick up Milo and feed him, but of course she started to scream the minute her body hit the crib mattress. So Jake came in and we fed them. Milo woke once in the early morning, but went back to sleep fairly easily.

Night 12: 4 wake-ups, the first at 11. Nora woke 3 times before the feeding and twice had to be held and rocked to go back to sleep. I fed Milo at 2:45 and Jake fed Nora at 3:20. Milo woke at 6:30 but I convinced him to go back to sleep for another 45 minutes.

Night 13: We have attained the holy grail. Just one wake-up. Nora woke at 2:15, we fed them at 2:20, and they slept until 7. How do we do that again? Did it happen because Nora went to sleep a little later than usual (8 p.m.)? Did it happen because she had a hard time and cried for about 15 minutes that evening while Jake tried to soothe her? Or was it just a coincidence?

Night 14: 3 wake-ups, the first at 12:41. First it was Nora, who needed to be rocked back to sleep, then it was Milo, then they both fell asleep and didn't wake up again until 3:15 at which point we fed them. Not too terrible.

Last night I went to bed late because we had friends over for dinner. It is awkward to do that because we have to spend the hour between 6:30 and about 7:45 feeding the babies and putting them down. So we can either eat a super-early dinner, which we tend to do, or eat a super-late dinner that I can't even start cooking until 7:45, which we did last night. Then our friends (who are great) wanted to stay for a long time but did eventually leave after I took out my contacts and put on my glasses, and brought my water jug down to fill up, among other various hints. But anyway, we still went to bed about an hour and a half late so this morning when Milo woke up and started talking at 6:40 I thought, no way, it is WAY too early to get up. I need another 20 minutes! I tried to give Milo a pacifier but he wanted none of it, he just wanted to talk and play, so I left him alone and went back to bed for 20 minutes. Except I fell into a deep sleep and 20 minutes turned into 45 minutes, at which point Nora started making noise and woke me up. I came into the nursery to see that Milo had turned himself 90 degrees and had fallen back asleep, which made me a little sad. Jerky mama was too tired to get up so she abandoned her baby to play by himself, at which point he gave up waiting and went back to sleep. Oh well -- it's not like he cried or anything.