A comma too far

I suppose I could write every day but I don’t. Partly because where in the name of God do you think I can find the time to write when there are bibs to wash and botties to wipe and bottles to be shoved in gaping mouths that now insist on smiling every time they eat thus spilling out most of the nourishing goodness I spend so much of my time trying to squeeze into them? That is one reason but the other is that as they pass most of their every day doing the same thing over and over again, I fear I might run out of things to say. One thing I would like to say, or a question I would like to ask and will not stop asking until I get a satisfactory response is – (and am happy for either baby to answer) ‘for Christ’s sake, when are ye going to sleep through the night?’ To give you a hint, babies, an answer like “tonight” would suit me just fine.

My older daughter slept through the night at six weeks but as she was on her own and not being throttled by a vastly bigger sister at every opportunity, that would be too much to expect from little boy Joe. I could separate him from sister Rose but I feel that that would be wrong. I’m still going with the theory that twins should sleep in the same cot but I imagine that three or four more nights of awake at four thirty then at six fifteen and then again at eight will change my approach. I’m already wondering how I can squash a travel cot plus a little boy into our already stuffed bedroom thus leaving the two girls to snore and grunt the night away to their hearts content.

So, the days pass with each day much the same as the day before. I get older but no wiser and they get older and even lovelier. Then I get sadder ‘cos they’re getting older so then I hug them even harder. Then older daughter gets more convinced that I love them more than her and she gets madder which makes me even sadder and by the end of the day what with one thing and another, we’re all crying and then we sleep. And then? Then we wake up smiling and it starts all over again.

By the way, if any Professors of English are reading this, I would just like to say that ‘Yes, I know my punctuation and grammar and spelling is (are?) appalling.’

Twins do that sort of thing to a person.

Lunch?

Today, Joe noticed his sister and I don’t think he liked what he saw. I can understand his fear as Rose is about twice his size and expanding by the day and if I was sharing a cot, which allows access to all areas including me, I too would be scared. Rosie is very fond of her grub and although she still only enjoys the delights of formula milk, solid food is not far off and once she notices Joe, probably closer than we think.

It was the first time that he really looked at her, really took in the reality of what lies beside him on a daily and nightly basis. Up until this point he had seemingly ignored her, his gaze focussed somewhere off in the middle distance. He is a pensive boy and we often ruminate on what he thinks about. Rose is not so complex. We agree that all Rose thinks about is food. Now it is clear what Joe is thinking. Since realising that the out of focus pink mound beside him that he took to be a huge pillow is actually his sister, he is worrying for his life. As we place her to the furthest extreme in the cot, we reassure him that she can’t yet crawl and he is safe. We have not mentioned that as each day passes she is managing to shuffle closer and closer. Apparently extreme hunger will drive humans to pursue the physically impossible to find food and this obviously extends to twelve-week-old babies. We could get another cot but I’m not ready for that yet. It would mean that my babies are already growing up and it’s just too soon for that. But I am also not ready to wake up one morning to find that Rose has eaten her brother.

It is a dilemma and one to which I think I should resolve in a speedy fashion as this morning when Rose gave me her usual gummy smile; I fear I spotted a tooth.

The Things

The babies are now twelve weeks old and to celebrate this I have decided to list the twelve most valuable things I have learned since their arrival.

Thing 1 – Your life as you knew it is dead and gone forever. You thought this had already happened when elder daughter arrived five years ago but you now realise that you were totally kidding yourself when you thought you had it hard.

Thing 2 – I have worked out, using a complex system of pie charts, set squares and a theorem I remember from my final year at school that out of the next eighteen years I will spend eleven months folding bibs, sixteen months wiping pukey mouths and pooey bottoms and seventeen weeks trying to remember how many scoops of formula I have already put in the bottle.

Thing 3 - Babies are unable to keep socks on and I wager that most will have shed at least one sock within three minutes of putting it on him/her/them so when will we learn not to bother?

Thing 4 – The answer is of course ‘Never’ as it is impossible to pass a rack of newborn baby socks without buying at least two pairs.

Thing 5 - You may have managed to order ‘Rosie and Joe, thank you’ cards and they arrived eight weeks ago and are sitting on a shelf but will probably be still there in five years time. As you write this you are hoping that all the people on your list of ‘thankyous’ are reading it so will then stop thinking what a rude cow you are for not thanking them for their lovely and thoughtful gift in the first place.

Thing 6 - To plan is to fail. You must never plan anything ever again. Even planning to plan when they finish school in eighteen years time is a mistake and you may make that twenty-one years plus if one or more of them decides to pursue further education. God help us but the idea of it would put years on you except for the fact that I am so old already.

Thing 7 - Whoever came up with the idea of heating the bottle of milk/formula before feeding clearly did not have twins. Anyone out there who does have twins and does manage to heat their bottles is welcome to immediately dump their current partner/husband and come marry me. Man, Woman, no questions asked.

Thing 8 – A baby, no matter how happy and well fed and dry and clean he is will always start whinging as soon as he hears a fork scrape a plate. They are programmed not to let any person within 20 yards of them eat a meal in peace.

Thing 8 ½ - This doesn’t really matter as you have no time to cook anyway.

Thing 9 – There is no point whatsoever in putting on clean clothes and then lifting up a baby. They will immediately puke on you even if nothing has passed their lips in forty-eight hours. Like lemmings (or is it prairie dogs?) they have a hidden pouch somewhere in their cheeks where they can store curdled milk for days and that is why babies’ cheeks are so chubby.

Thing 10 – If no food has passed your baby’s lips in forty eight hours it means you are being a very bad parent and should hold back on those four bottles of whiskey you must be drinking every day.

Thing 11 – Your two babies will never wake at the same time to feed in the middle of the night. One will wake and you will feed him whilst in a total sleep deprived stupor (you, not the baby.) He will inexplicably refuse to burp so you will walk the boards for what seems like hours patting his back whilst also thinking of all your single friends who are currently snoring/shagging their brains out like what normal people should be doing. The other baby meanwhile sleeps through all of this like a log and you will find yourself for the umpteenth time seduced into thinking that perhaps tonight is the night when other baby sleeps right through so, you go back to bed. You will get to lie down for approximately four minutes before other baby starts screaming as though she hasn’t eaten in a week.

Thing 12 – One baby is a blessing but challenging as it is, all babies should come in twos.

Excuses

I could say that the reason you have not heard from me in some time is because having twins takes up all my time and until such time as some person somewhere shoves some more time into the day then I will probably never have much time to write.

However, the truth is that that is not strictly the truth.

I had discovered that between the hours of 9.30pm when the rest of the house had begun to snore (including the babies) and 11.00pm when the babies had what we in 'baby advice book' world call the 'dream feed,' there was a free hour and a half of perfect 'must write blog' time.

And it was motoring along quite nicely and regularly until, I discovered 'The Wire."

This box set of five seasons of utterly incomprehensible yet addictive adventures of cops and robbers in Baltimore, USA has taken over my life. I now know that I am using the fact that the babies have to eat as an excuse to watch two episodes a night. I take the babies out of their bed (a complete no-no when it comes to dream feed advocates) and we plonk ourselves on the couch, me, babies, bottles, bibs, those muslin clothes to catch the puke, a cup of tea and whoever else is doing the feed with me. We press ‘PLAY,’ sit back, shove respective bottles in respective mouths and as the theme music begins, all the day’s tension simply flows away.

We have come to ignore the fact that after fifteen minutes the babies have finished their grub and are ready for bed. We throw them over our shoulders and gently pat their backs in a vague effort to get a burp. Sometimes it comes and sometimes it doesn’t. We never know because we are far too busy being seduced by sexy cops with sexier drawls or hooded criminals hauling shed loads of class ‘A’ drugs from one ‘crib’ to another. The language is so profoundly foul that we have accepted that the babies first words are likely to be ‘c*ck sucking mother f*cker’ and not the standard “Dada.” I figure it’s a small price to pay.

The other reason why I may now find myself with a little more time to write is because the new Au Pair has arrived. It’s her first time being an Au Pair and it’s our first time having one so it’s early days.

One word of advice though and you don’t have to be a parent of multiples to listen up.

Do not sit on your couch clutching your baby (or in my case babies) in front of the new Au Pair within hours of her arrival, balling your eyes out at ‘Wife Swap USA’ on the TV. This sort of behaviour does not give a good impression and she will realise way too early in her tenure that you are stone mad.