Breaking the Feeding Pattern

My husband and I meet with a counselor to deal with parenting stress. Her goal is make my day as stress free as possible. Before the holiday break, I was having issues with dinner time. I don't know why exactly, since the moment has not repeated itself in these past 2 weeks. I was trying to explain what exactly was causing the stress, but I couldn't. She was thinking that I was trying to have them do something (she offered and example of getting ready to go somewhere), but that's not it. I tried saying that its not what I'm doing to them, it's what they are doing to me. If you are a twin mom reading this, then I am sure you know what I mean. The counselor is not a twin mom so she didn't follow my thinking, but she did understand that I was feeling overwhelmed. She then proposed something that would never have occurred to me; seperating them at dinner time.

Seperating them during feeding time! From the moment they were born, it has proven that feeding them at the same time is the only way to go. Otherwise, you are left with no sleep at all and you'll be in an endless feeding cycle. Even after the feeding intervals space out to longer than 2 hours, it is easier to get them on the same feeding schedule. The thought of seperating them during feeding time is shocking.

The suggestion has merit and would allow me to accomplish two things; give one twin individual attention (specifically be able to focus on one baby while they figure out how to use utensils and not getting food on their hair), and give one twin a non-twin/individual experience. Things that really never happen, but is what all parents of multiple children (not just twins, triplets, etc) strive for. On rare occasions one twin will be asleep while the other one is awake and that is nice and simple.

Only one problem: how to occupy the other child while the other one is eating? She suggested putting one in a playyard with a toy or put on a DVD. We are wary about exposing them to TV, but we are willing to give it a try. I was thinking of just dumping a bunch of balls in the playyard and then throw it about, but that might make a mess. But they might enjoy putting the balls away. We'll see...

P the Moocher

I guess a mooching twin was bound to appear, I just thought it would appear later on. It has come to our attention that P is the mooching twin. E is the vocal one who "asks" for things and when P sees it she just joins in and gets whatever E gets. On occasion P has "asked" for a drink from her cup, but not usually.

Mooching has become an issue during cleanup/last bottle time. Cleanup time is where they put away their pots and pans in the play kitchen and put their toys in the basket before getting their bottle at the end of the day. E immediately begins cleaning up, while P hangs about and whines. Consequently, E does 99% of the work and then P still gets the bottle because we end up placing her down and handing her a toy to put away in the basket next to her. Not fair!

We just started this so hopefully enforcing it longer will let P get the hang of it. P has gotten the hang of helping put away dishes from the dishwasher so there is hope!

Phase 2 of Twin Parenting

My identical twin girls, P and E, are now 15 months old and I have held out on creating a blog until now. There is no question that the first year of parenting twins is TOUGH, and now I think I am entering the second phase of Twin Tough Parenting; Teaching them how to interact with you and others. The topic of which I find lacking on the internet. The Mother of Multiples club that I am in helps alot, but everyone's situation is still a little different. If anyone has tips, please let me know. So, I am posting this for my sake and others.

You know that iconic twin symbol of a mother with two toddlers in each hand pulling the mother every which way? Well, that was me a few weeks ago. I was leaving Gymboree and trying to get them to walk with me back to the car. (They were early walkers). After a bit of a struggle (it was really quite comical to onlookers) I kneeled and trapped them against me. I then pointed to where we were going and said that we going to the car and that the car was around the corner; All of which I am pretty sure they didn't understand, but at least I said it in a stern voice and helped me refocus on the goal as oppposed to focusing on containing them. I think that it helped focus them as well, since they both started walking in the right direction. One of them would get distracted and want to check out the newstand or something, but I kept talking to them and reminding them to "walk with Mommy" and encouraging them when they did a good job. I almost lost them when some people walked by and exclaimed the usual "are they twins?" comments, but I kept talking to them and just gave the people a nod. Ever since then, it's been all right. At least, to and from Gymboree. They still resist holding my hand most of them time.

My current problem is keeping one of them by the car while I take or put one of them in the carseat while the other one is waiting. One time, P stood by for a moment and then thought it would be fun to run around the parking lot! That was quite a fright! I used to keep the nonseated one in the minivan, but then she climbed over stuff (they are very adept at moving at this age) and I had a hard time trying to get her out since she thought that we were playing. A leash for that particular situation would be good, but not for all others.