Life with Twins: Birth Story

I guess it’s high time I posted about this! I actually wrote some of this several weeks ago before either baby was home from the hospital, but the blog has definitely been put on the back burner and I just never got around to finishing. I thought I’d share the twins birth story here, not just for you to read, but so that someday they can read about it too.

On August 29th, I went to the doctor for my weekly appointment and found out that I was in labor and  didn’t know it (this was kind of surprising since my due date was not until October 15th). I’d had a few signs of labor, but nothing that really made me think it was time. My doctor told my husband and I to go home and get our things, then head to the hospital. We knew twins usually come early, but this was a little too early. I was 33 weeks and 2 days. They were going to try to stop the labor, but I knew I wouldn’t be leaving the hospital until the babies were born (however long that might be). So after I got settled in a hospital bed, they started giving me meds. I won’t go into all of it here, but THAT part was miserable. Things slowed down for just a little while, then started back up. They tried another method which was 10 times worse than the first. I thought I was dying. Literally. Nothing worked, and they’d been giving me steroids to speed up lung development in the babies. I laid for almost 4 days in the hospital bed. We calculated that I was in labor for 60 hours!

 My doctor left town for the holiday (ahem…Labor Day) weekend. Another doctor I was familiar with but never met was on call. She came in on Saturday morning, September 1st and said I was in a dysfunctional labor and she recommended a c-section. I hadn’t planned on this, but to be honest, I was afraid of natural delivery after laying that long with no sleep and hardly anything to eat. I think it all worked out the way God intended. We asked how long before the c-section and she said 30 minutes! None of our family was there at the time, so we started making rushed phone calls. Everyone got there just in time. The sweet Little Loves made their grand debut at 10:15 & 10:16am on Sept 1st. Harrison Ellis was first, weighing in at 4lbs 10oz. Lyla Jean weighed 4lbs 8oz. They are just perfect!

Neither of them had much trouble to begin with and the doctor and the nurses were calling them “super babies” and saying “oh, you’re the one with the miracle babies”…The babies really could have had problems we didn’t have to deal with, but they spent several weeks in the hospital…It was so hard to be released without them! I cried on and off for two hours the day I went home. Their main problem was learning to eat and breathe at the same time. They also didn’t eat like they needed to in order to gain weight. They had a lot of tube feedings. With time, they learned and developed like they should and they hit the 5lb mark at 2 weeks. Now, at 8 weeks, they are both nearly a whopping 8lbs!

Lyla Jean came home first, at 4 weeks, not surprising to anyone. White males are labeled “wimpy white boys” in the medical realm and it proved to be true with Harrison. He finally got to come home at 6 weeks. We spent many, many hours sitting in the hospital feeding and rocking our little ones. It was heartbreaking to see them hooked to oxygen and feeding tubes, and listen to heart monitors sound their alarm when heart rates dropped, but it really could have been much worse. They are doing just fine now and we are learning that those steroids given for lung development really paid off! 🙂

We are so grateful to God for these precious babies He’s given us. They are a dream come true.

Til the next time,

The new mommy that’s really excited about being 5lbs away from pre-prego weight after gaining 45lbs! 🙂