Twins
I once asked twins' mothers to write me how they learned to cope with their problems so that I could share their experiences with readers. I received 200 wonderful encouraging letters. As might be expected, the authors of the letters on one issue sharply disagree on opinions, on others show surprising unanimity.
Help! All mothers of twins agree that it is difficult at first to be incredible, but the reward for the labors is enormous.
You will need any help that you can get. If possible, hire someone, even if you have to get into debt for this. Or ask your mother or one of your relatives to come for a month or two. If there is not enough space in the house, in a suitable climate, you can turn the garage into an assistant's room. Part of the help is better than the lack of any help: a high school student who comes for several hours after classes, a woman who is cleaning the apartment, someone who will sit with your children once or twice a week. Ask neighbors to help during some feeding. It's amazing how much benefit there can be even from a three-year-old older sister of twins. Of course, the most important thing is the help of the father of the twins - he can change his mother during night feeding( one night father, another mother), bathe the children, prepare the mixture, do housework, which the mother now lacks time for. More important than this help, moral support from the father - patience, gratitude, sympathy, love. The father of the twins has the most favorable opportunities to prove his devotion to his wife.
Washing. In this situation, the washing machine becomes priceless. You will need an automatic washing machine and dryer, more than anyone else, especially if there is no washing diaper service nearby. Machines save many hours of work and produce dozens of clean dry diapers, sheets, bedding, shirts, raspashonok even in rainy weather.
You can wash diapers and other children's clothes every day or every other day - as comfortable as the mother. You can less often change sheets and diapers, if you put small extra oilcloth under your thighs to kids.
A diaper service for parents of twins is especially necessary. It is also important to use laundry services for the rest of the family - this saves time and energy.
The dimensions of washing can be reduced if you change diapers only at each feeding - before or after it.
Abbreviation of the work at home. Each mother of twins has to reduce time for homework. It is better to go around the apartment in advance, room by room, and remove everything that can be dispensed with, everything that requires care. You can clean up twice as often as before. You can choose for all members of the family clothes that do not get dirty, which is easier to wash and that does not need ironing. You can cook food that requires minimum time and attention when cooking, do not wash dishes, but immerse it in soapy water, rinse and leave to dry.
The correct selection of items for the care of twins is exceptional. For example, one cradle for two, with a partition in the middle, can be very comfortable in the first months, until the twins become too large and mobile. Crib on the springs, which raise it and lower it, relieve parents of energy and back pain, it can also serve as a table for changing and dressing. An additional cradle in which you can take one twin into another room will help the second to sleep peacefully. In a two-story house, a great help will be cots and clothes on each floor, so as not to run all the time up and down. Most care items can be borrowed or bought second-hand.
The hospital table on wheels or a tea table is very useful for placing stocks of diapers, sheets, clothes and other things. Such tables can be carried from the crib to the crib or from the room to the room.
The double stroller is too wide for most doors, and two children sleeping so close to each other will always worry each other. On the other hand, a double stroller for walking can serve many months. It is useful to have two cradles for the machine.
Bathing can be significantly reduced if you try. The face can be wiped with wet napkins. Buttocks should be washed daily with a soaped napkin, twice washing off soap with clean water. Then, if the skin of children is in good condition, they can be bathed every other day, twice a week or even once a week. If convenient, you can wash the children on an oilcloth with a damp cloth. It is difficult to buy out twins and at the same time avoid crying - one or both. There are several solutions. The assistant can begin to feed the child who was bought first. You can bathe the children on different days or at different hours. If children are bathed in a bath and they are patient enough, you can save time by bathing one after another in the same water. All that is needed for bathing, clothes, bottles of milk, basking in a saucepan - all this should be ready and be at hand before bathing.
Breastfeeding is practical and affordable. From the letters I received, I know that twins are breastfed for several months as often as one child.(This proves once again that there is no limit to the production of breast milk.) The breast will give as much milk as the baby needs or children if the mother has the right attitude and methods.) If the twins are too small to suck, or are long in the hospital, the mother must manuallyexpress milk. But as soon as the children can suck, they can be brought to the breast at the same time. The mother should have a comfortable chair with armrests, on which you can lean. There are at least three possible poses. If the mother can lean back or lie down in a chair, the twins lie in her arms. If the mother sits straight, with the pillows on both sides, the twins lie on these cushions on the sides, facing the mother;the mother hands her head to her chest. You can put the twins on your knees to your mother, one partially on top of the other, but your heads in different directions. Lying underneath in such circumstances usually does not object.
Manufacture of and storage of a milk mixture for twins is associated with difficulties. Twins are usually small at birth and need to be fed every three hours, which means 16 bottles every 24 hours. To avoid doing this work twice, you need two.casseroles for sterilization. If there is not enough space in the refrigerator, the mixture can be sterilized in two standard 1 liter milk bottles, which are stored in the refrigerator. Then, with each feeding, two sterilized bottles are filled with the right amount of milk formula. Bottles for feeding can be sterilized once a day by boiling or roasting in the oven. Nipples are boiling, but not calcined.
Some mothers like disposable thin plastic bottles. They are sold whole packs, they are already sterilized, take up little space in the refrigerator and easily get warm. In this case, you need to sterilize only the nipples.
Feeding regimen. Most mothers of twins have learned from their own experience that you need to develop a regular feeding regimen and feed babies as soon as possible, one after another. Otherwise, the feeding will continue for hours at night and day.(Some mothers find a comfortable modified mode on demand, they wait for the first child to wake up and cry, but as soon as he finishes eating, the second one wakes up.) Most newborns get used to the regime in a few days. If the twins wake up and start crying ahead of time, wait a little in the hope that they will fall asleep again. If they continue to cry heavily, you will have to compromise and feed them ahead of time, but every day become more severe, counting on the fact that the children's digestive system gets used to the feeding schedule. A large help is provided by a pacifier: it allows children to wait for the feeding time. In some cases, it is rare enough if, twins are restless, the regime is not being developed. Then in the first few weeks it is better to feed on demand, albeit irregularly, than to listen to how children cry for a long time..
Twins are usually premature and small. Then they can switch to a three-hour feeding, at least in the afternoon, until they reach a weight of 2.7-3.1 kg. If one of the twins is much smaller, he may need a three-hour treatment for several weeks longer;the second at this time will be already on the four-hour mode;However, at the same time, a smaller one at night can switch to four-hour feeding.
How to feed from the nipple. How to feed two children from the nipple at the same time? There are several ways. If you have a permanent assistant, everyone can feed one child. Some mothers manage to accustom one of the children to wake up half an hour later than the other. But most children wake up at the same time, and there is no more nervous occupation than feeding one baby while another is crying at the same time. One way in the first weeks is to put the twins on a bed or sofa on either side of the mother, kicking to her back;in this position she can simultaneously feed both of the bottles with the nipples. Another way: to feed one with a special holder, the other;at each feeding the children change.
But many mothers believe that the bottle holder( or when the bottle is supported with a diaper or pillow) does not help, at least in the first weeks. The baby either loses the pacifier and begins to cry, or suffocates. Then the mother has to hastily throw the second child and save the first, and at this time the second one cries. Such mothers believe that it is much more practical to use two bottle holders or to prop up both bottles. The mother herself sits between the children, she has both hands free, and she can immediately help any child. As such mothers correctly point out, they have more time to caress the twins in a relaxed environment.
If the feeding( by time and by number) is very irregular, you need to record how much the milk mixture and at what time each child ate, and also specify the dates of weighing and bathing. Otherwise, you will forget a lot or try to feed one twice, and the other with an empty stomach - make the air vomit. A notebook or a writing board helps. You can put a cardboard dial from each cradle with ribbons marking hours and minutes.
Many twins, like the non-like, regurgitate themselves if placed on their stomach after feeding. Remember also: to one children the air in the stomach is in the way, but others seem not to experience unpleasant sensations - in this case, there is nothing to be done.
Solid food can also learn how to feed without problems. While children are not used yet, many mothers of one child are fed from a spoon;at this time another sucks from the bottle;then vice versa. There are two ways to save time. To give all solid food not in three feedings, but in two. It is also possible to give solid food( eg porridge and fruit) at one feeding through a nipple with a pinhead-sized orifice. And during the second feeding to teach the twins is from the spoon. When they learn to eat solid food, they can sit in the corners of a crib, stroller or chair and feed from a spoon at the same time. There are special tables for twins;children who are not yet able to sit, are in them in a semi-oblique position;mothers of twins believe that such a device is very convenient.
When you feed children with a spoon at the same time, it is very time-saving. One just has time to swallow the food while the mother picks it up in the spoon and gives the second. You may find it unhygienic to use one plate and one spoon, but it is very practical.
If you have twins, you have a sense to try to start giving them solid food( breadcrumbs, bread, crackers, chopped vegetables, pieces of meat) and generally rely more on children's independence. They also need to be taught by the year to eat yourself with a spoon.
Manege is especially needed for twins( it's impossible to keep track of two creeping children), and fortunately they can spend hours playing in each other's company.(On the road, the arena can even be used as a double bed.) Gemini must be placed in the arena from two or three months until they have become accustomed to freedom. Should be avoided toys heavy and with sharp edges, because twins can hit each other, not realizing that it hurts. Later, when they become bored in the arena, they can be put in turn in a rocking chair. Such a change will entertain them.
After a year it is very convenient to take away for the twins one room in which they would play;in the door to put a partition. The room needs to be furnished so that children can not hurt themselves or each other( the twins are inventive, they help each other and quickly get into trouble).In such a room they will be happy to play much longer than one child.
Clothes and toys: the same or different? Some mothers indicate that, for example, there is only one children's overalls in the store that they like and is suitable for;therefore it is difficult to dress the twins in different ways. And the twins, say such mothers, themselves ask to be dressed in the same way. Others, on the contrary, say that it is difficult to buy, for example, two identical dresses;so twins have to dress differently. And some say that twins often have to wear second-hand clothes, so you need to wear them from the very beginning in different ways so that they know their colors.
Some mothers write that they had to buy the same clothes so that the children did not argue or be jealous of each other. Others say that they consciously buy children different toys( except for particularly expensive and necessary ones like tricycles or dolls), and children from the very beginning learn to share and play together.
I believe that the most important thing here is the attitude of the parents. If parents believe that children should dress differently and share toys - if necessary or out of principle, the children agree with this. But if parents themselves accustom children to the same clothing and toys and especially if they give up whenever the twins insist, they will eventually become more demanding. Of course, the same principle applies to one child: if the parents are strong, the children make their decision;if parents show indecisiveness, children argue.
If twins have separate boxes for clothes or if their clothes are marked with names or some signs, it helps them to develop a consciousness of their own personality. Equal clothing of different colors helps distinguish between twins and emphasizes their individuality. When one twin is always in yellow, and the other always in green, they are not confused.
Individuality. Here we come to the philosophical problem: how much to emphasize the similarity of twins and how much their individuality, especially in the case of identical( identical) twins. The whole world is fascinated by twins, raises them because of them, likes to make them look and dress the same way, asks parents stupid questions( "Which one is smarter?", "Which one do you like the most?").It is difficult for parents to not play up to this sentimental and unhealthy interest. Why not? The trouble is that twins can come to a conclusion: their attractiveness is based only on their curious similarity, identity. In three years, this is really an attractive sight. But if it goes on like this - and often it happens - then two thirty-year-old women, trying to attract attention with the same clothes and so dependent on each other that they can not fall in love or get married, are not an amusing, but a sad sight.
This does not mean that parents should be afraid to dress children the same way or enjoy the attention of others to their children. The similarity of the twins amuses the twins themselves, and their parents.
Of twins, as a rule, strong personalities are developed: they early gain independence from their parents, learn to cooperate early, play together, they are faithful and attached to each other.
But in order not to overdo it in emphasizing their identity, especially with identical or very similar twins, it's better to refrain from similar names( it is difficult to distinguish one twin from another without similar names);call them by name, not "twins";dressing is not always the same;before they get used to playing only with each other, introduce them to other children;allow them to be friends with different children if they want;encourage friends and neighbors from time to time to invite only one of the twins( the other at this time will enjoy the full attention of parents).
Occasionally, one of the twins becomes so dependent on the other in the performance of school assignments that they are reasonably separated. But it is foolish and cruel to separate the twins when there is no need.
Do not think about pets. Another tip. Some conscientious parents from the very beginning are very worried, as if one twin did not become their favorite: they can give him more attention, because he, for example, is less or more responsive. Absolute impartiality is not necessary - it is actually a manifestation of unnecessarily mechanical and forced attention. Every child needs to be loved naturally and sincerely. He is happy if he knows that there is a place for him in the heart of his parents, and does not think about how much his parents love his brothers and sisters. Eventually, he will feel insincere towards himself or compelled attention. Absolutely identical treatment of twins will sharpen his attention to his own rights, and he will begin to argue like a lawyer. Avoid these phrases: "Mom will first put on A.'s shirt, but she will put the pants on B." or "Today it's A.'s turn to sit next to Dad."
The language of twins. Twins often have something like a secret language - glances, humbles, unusually pronounced words. This can delay the mastering of their common language and even lead to a backlog in school. Some parents do not fulfill the requests of the twins until they express them in the right language.