Feeding twins...as in TWO people

I'm not one to write about my boobs and feeding people with them...but I was always looking for a blog post on feeding twins, what worked for people and what happened when it didn't work! The result: hardly found any at all and the ones I did find either were basically telling you that you were horrible if you couldn't feed them both for a year...or until they were 20...or apparently no one could do it.

I'm here to tell you that it can happen AND not to feel guilty when it is time to close shop. We are closing in on 5 months and I won't lie, I'm over it. I said it. It's out there. I'm over feeding two people every three hours. I'm over pumping after every feeding, which just causes more stress and less time. So we are transitioning to formula.

Heres our story...

Feeding tiny humans no matter if they are born early, on time or late is a challenge. Feeding them breast milk or formula is another can of worms I'm not willing to argue about. {A friend and fellow twin mommy of cute little boys wrote on her blog "formula is not poison". Amen and thanks for that reminder!} All three of the girls started off with breast milk and transitioned to formula for one reason or another.

Claire refused a bottle of anything until about 8 months {literally we were together for every single feeding for 8 months} and didn't know what a pacifier really was until the girls came along. At that point she knew it made them be quiet and she referred to it as a "plinkley". It was fine at that time because there was one of her and one of me. Plenty of time for us to eat and play all day long.

Fear not! I will not be posting pictures of anyone feeding from me- not that I'm against that!- just ain't happenin'

I knew with K&K I wanted to give breastfeeding them a shot. It wasn't the easiest of starts with them being born at 33 weeks and initially drinking 5 mL per feeding or 1 teaspoon! Geez that seems like a joke now!

In the NICU the girls were fed through a tube for the first couple weeks. They weren't mature enough to even try feeding and it honestly scared me to think about it. They were so tiny. The tube started off in the mouth and when all their CPAP machines came off the tube moved to their noses. A few hours after the girls were born and I was settled in my room the lactation lady came around with a bag full of pump supplies. The hospital was outfitted with a pump in each room and in every NICU room. I don't remember this with Claire, but I think I heard they were moving to be a more breastfeeding friendly hospital. They even arranged a hospital grade pump at home for 3 months!

I would pump, pump and pump some more until I thought I was going to start mooing. Justin did moo for me and my postpartum hormones wanted to punch him, but I just had to laugh. Claire would stare at me like I had 5 heads {or weird cones attached to me} and ask "what you doing, mommy?". Hope she isn't traumatized.

Our fridges in the NICU rooms were overflowing, the NICU freezer was full and so we moved on to storing hundreds of bags of milk in our deep freeze. We joked with the NICU nurses about selling milk {glad we didn't!} and I kept pumping. Every day we would wait to hear the new amount the girls would be eating. At that point we were measuring their intake in mL. Such a small amount looking back!

A couple weeks into our stay we decided it was time to try the bottle and actual breast. Kinley started off as the rockstar eater while Kennedy was more content just waiting for someone to come fill up her tube straight to her tummy with milk. I was going up to the hospital a couple times a day to try and get feeding under control so we could get them both home and still pumping. All the time. Finally, Kennedy turned the corner and decided to listen to the doctors, nurses and me. Home sounded like a fun place to her. The week leading up to Christmas she started getting really great and by December 22nd it was time for her to come home. Kinley decided she wanted to hang out with our favorite nurses a little longer and stay on the easy path of eating with a tube. I think she wanted a little one on one attention. She threw in a few choking episodes for good measure and about scared me off from bringing her home. She continued to choke once we got home but eventually got that straightened out.

Until I ended up getting sent home with mastitis {holy shit it hurt} when I was supposed to be spending the night in the NICU with the girls to get Kennedy home. All I needed. I cried, our nurse Amy just hugged me and told me it would be okay that they would keep her another couple nights until I was better and sent me home with a fever. The next morning I met the lactation lady in the NICU and she sent me to the ER because no clinic was open on December 23rd. I ended up getting medicine and going home to sleep.

There is Amy :)

The next morning, December 24th, I bounced up to the NICU to get Kennedy! She was coming home, but leaving Kinley. It was sad and I was worried how on earth was I going to feed one at home and one in the NICU?!?! Looking back it was so nice not having them come home on the same day. It didn't seem as crazy and it was a transition period. I continued to feed and pump then do it again. We were also supplementing bottles for Kennedy at that point. I would feed her on one side and then she would get a bottle of 60 mL with a 1/2 tsp of NeoSure, a high calorie formula.

Kinley followed a few days later and our INSANE schedule started. Luckily both girls were on a 3 hour schedule for eating. It was always on the dot!

We tried tandem feeding but no one was a fan of that. They were still so small that it was hard to hold them, the pillow and get comfortable. So I always needed assistance. Someone would feed one of the girls a 60 mL bottle of breast milk (no formula was needed except a 1/2 teaspoon the first month and a half due to my insane pumping to keep the supply going!) while I would breastfeed the other baby, change diapers and switch! Lucky for us they would always go back to sleep very quickly.

After awhile of feeding at 8, 11, 2, 5, 8, 11, 2, 5.....people started getting crazy. People meaning the adults. We were tired. I was delirious from then having to pump after every feeding. I realized that since they took a bottle I didn't have to feed every single time. My mom made a schedule because we started "calling" who would get to go to bed with Claire at 8 and who would have to feed at the dreaded times of 11pm or 2am! What was so awful about those feedings is that by the time we fed them, it took about an hour, would get only about an hour to an hour and a half of sleep before they woke up again! Justin mainly won the bedtime with Claire until my mom got smart, thanks mom!

**I'll take a second and let it be known that my mom is the reason we are still functioning and I'm able to write about this without crying! Don't be scared to ask for help...or in our case, move in**

Whoever went to bed with Claire at 8 didn't feed and got to sleep through the 11 pm feeding until 2. That would mean every 3 nights someone got to sleep a solid 6 hours. We lived for our night. After a few weeks of being home we noticed they didn't want to wake up for the 11 pm feeding. They were probably about 9 or 10 weeks old or about a month adjusted age. At that point we decided we weren't waking sleeping babies, and we didn't. They would go down around 9 pm and sleep until around 2 am. Sweet slumber.

They were still eating 7 times a day and I was still pumping. Eventually my dad felt the need to contribute from China. Thanks Pop! He made us a new feeding schedule and we used it for a few weeks until they decided to move their normal 2 am feeding to between 3 and 4 and eventually to 5. Moving to 5 am was good for me because I went back to work and getting up at 3 to feed then pump- there was no point in going back to sleep which just made me super tired.

At almost 5 months {this week, what!} both girls are able to take 5 ounces from a bottle when I'm not home. When I am home they breastfeed and then take a supplemental bottle of only breast milk. They've come so far from the original 5 mL they were getting every 3 hours. These bottles consisted of  only breast milk until last week when I got over my mom guilt, asked Dr. Woods if they needed any special formula {no thank the Lord! and he told me that he wanted to tell me at their 4 month appointment not to cry, because he figured I would} and bought some formula. I'm not making enough for them to be full and happy. They won't tandem feed and I'm okay with that. They like their space. So we are making the transition and it's going great. Replacing a bottle or feeding of breast milk for formula every couple days. I still have frozen milk and we are using that too, but it's been going fast since I'm back at work full-time. 

My thoughts are this:

1. It's been 5 months of ONLY breast milk. Thats technically 10 months of feeding little humans.
2. The girls are thriving and gaining weight like "normal/term" babies.
3. Get on a schedule and fast. It does make life easier. Thankfully my mom is OCD and so am I and that is very helpful.
4. At the end of the day all that matters is that the girls are fed, happy and growing. And they are that! I will keep repeating that to myself for a few weeks I'm sure. I'm actually starting to enjoy my new found freedom from the pump every 3 hours.
5. My bank account will soon take a hit with formula...can they eat solids yet?!? The answer is no and I'm kidding. I'm happy to support their formula habit.
6. We are breastfeeding ROCKSTARS. End of story.

A few weeks old

Nice and plump at 4 1/2 months with only breast milk! 

I have the crazy feeding schedule on my Instagram, but can't find it on my desktop anymore. I must have removed it so I was no longer living in fear of never sleeping again.

That was a legitimate fear.