weight loss during pregnancy miscarriage | Terrible Twos

weight loss during pregnancy miscarriage

"The terrible twos are a terrible misnomer. 

They imply a finite time frame for behavior that doesnt necessarily have one."

-What to Expect: The Toddler Years, page 446

I dont know how scientific this is, but I really think it is confusing being a two-year old. I dont think they understand why they cant have their cake and eat it too. Yesterday I had a multiples playdate at my house. There were a lot of two-year olds running around and many of them were overwhelmed, including one of mine. He wanted to get down and play, but was intimidated by the noise and the amount of children suddenly appearing in "his" playroom. As I was chatting with another mom, he grabbed my legs and said, "Up! Up!" I picked him up to which he said, "Down! Down!" He wanted to play with the toys on the ground and be held by Momma. After picking him up and putting him down a few times, I told him he had to choose up or down. The poor child looked at the toy, only a few steps out of reach, and looked at his Momma; he couldnt figure out a way to do both.

The things my toddlers are interested in now are so different than the things they were interested in even weeks ago. Their vocabulary is jumping by leaps and bounds. Their dexterity is growing. They are imitating absolutely everything their older brother does (much to his dismay). They imitate everything I do. I catch them feeding the dog-- many times a day-- just because they saw me do it. They want to help with everything and they dont want me to help them do it.

It has to be hard to take so much in. It has to be confusing to suddenly become more aware of the world around you. My last blog post mentioned how I feel about parenting this time around compared to how I felt the first time around (read, "First time mom"). I knew my oldest was hitting age appropriate behaviors, but I felt that he knew better. With C and O, I much more feel they need to be guided towards the appropriate behavior instead of strictly expecting the appropriate behavior. For instance, at two-years old, I would tell my oldest, "You need to sit." He would stand or crouch at the correct spot, say, a park bench, yet I said "sit" so I expected him to sit on his bottom where I told him to. With C and O, not only would it be tiring to enforce that level of obedience as a mother of three children, but they are two! How can I expect a two-year old to sit on the park bench while the other kids are running around with balls, trucks, bubbles, and the like? I expect them to stay near me, standing or sitting. I try to give commands that I know are in the realm of things they can follow.

In many ways, it reminds me of our puppy training classes we took with our dog Louis. The trainer told us to keep him in the "wait" position just past what we knew he could do. If he could sit and wait for 5 whole seconds, keep him in wait for 6 seconds and keep building on it. Our four-year old is capable of sitting on the park bench and waiting until he can go play, but our two-year olds will struggle with it (though our four-year old will struggle with sitting on the park bench if he sees both his brothers are allowed to stand in front of it). I feel like now I try to put them in situations that I know they can do, build on the skills they have.

Their personalities are all so different. Our oldest is a stubborn child, much like his father and mother. One of our toddlers reminds me a lot of him, though D is much more interested in having our approval and attention. C is much more about doing what makes him happy, regardless of how we feel about it. On one hand, that is a good thing (we dont end up in near so many Battle of the Wills) and on the other it is not (if he wants to do something, he wont be happy until hes done it). O is much more happy-go-lucky and mellow. I call him my bohemian baby because he just wants to kick his shoes off and play with his toys. While C is following D around and trying to play with him, O is crawling into my lap with a book. The "Terrible Twos," as they are called, have played out differently with all of them. While D was a breathholder from 6 weeks to 3-years old, weve only had two breathholding episodes from C and none from O.

I think they get called the Terrible Twos for a number of reasons. They come out of nowhere. One week you are loving how excited your toddler is about life and learning new things and the next week you are staring at a writhing, red-faced toddler on the floor of Target wondering where this new behavior has come from. The Terrible Twos also come with a surge of independence. Things that never were a problem before suddenly become knock down drag-out, all-in battles. Transitioning from activity to activity becomes challenging. He wants to be out of his room, but he doesnt want you to lift him over the gate or open the gate or help him in any way. He doesnt want you to brush his teeth or take off his shirt. You want to allow some independence, yet it is hard when they wont allow you to help at all, whatsoever, dont even look at them with a helpful look on your face.

I gave the toddlers ice cream cones the other day. It started melting down their hands, which was very upsetting. Neither toddler could eat another bite until their hands were properly cleaned. They wouldnt let me wipe their hands. They wouldnt hand me their cones so they could wipe their own hands. They wouldnt use their free hand to wipe the dirty hand. We were stuck. It ended up being that I wiped their hands quickly while they flailed in anger, making more of an ice cream mess, upsetting them more, because now instead of some ice cream melting onto their hands, they had ice cream drips on their pants and shirts. By the end of it, I wanted to just throw the ice cream cones away and forget about the whole thing. It was exhausting.

Today we went to the movies. One of the toddlers did pretty well, as I thought he would. The other did horrible. He wanted to grab the seat in front of him. He wanted to drag his blanket in the bucket of popcorn and rip the lids off cups. He didnt want to sit in his seat, or my lap, or stand quietly in the row. He stood and whined and moaned. I tried ignoring him, hoping he would stop, but no. He moaned, like Harry did in When Harry Met Sally. I didnt want to leave my husband with one toddler and our preschooler, in case the toddler cried that I left the theater or acted out later, causing our preschooler to miss the movie. So I took both toddlers out of the theater. The toddler who was behaving well in the theater thought it was fun walking down the stairs with Mommy and fun walking into the lobby with Mommy. The other toddler didnt really know what was going on until we started walking outside toward the car and he lost it. He threw himself on the ground screaming, "Movie! Movie!" He wouldnt use his legs. He kicked and screamed. I tried picking him up and he flailed so hard I thought I would drop him. Im standing on the curb of the movie theater with one toddler holding on to the Hold-On Handle and the other toddler face down on the concrete, my purse stuffed full of diapers and wipes and a tote bag full of their lovies, wondering how on earth I was going to make it to the car.

Its a phase. I know it is a phase. In a recent blog post about toddler twins ("Keep calm and carry on"), I mentioned a woman who was a bit of a Debbie Downer to me about whether it gets easier or harder. I made the point that I dont think it gets easier; it just gets better. My oldest had temper tantrums like this until he was three-years old and then they morphed into a whole new beast: The Three-Year Old. I dont know, maybe three-years old will be easier with these guys. They have different personalities; they have someone to play with whereas my oldest had to entertain himself a lot more. We are hitting another phase with our four-year old as we are dealing with the Terrible Twos. School has let out for the summer and I think it has sunk in that he wont be seeing his preschool teachers again or going back to school with his classmates. It breaks my heart thinking of how much he loved that school and misses being there.

Ive decided Motherhood moves in waves. Some waves you can ride to shore, some throw you under, and some you have to dive through. Were trying to dive through this wave right now. We know it is a big wave, a hard wave that will beat us into the seabed if we let it carry us. We know this isnt the only wave and that there will be more waves someday in the future, bigger waves that are even harder to handle than this one. Just like when you are at the beach, we are taking one wave at a time-- focusing on making it through this one. Some people just want to survive each wave. We want to survive the wave with style. My oldest loves watching surfing. I was thinking last night about this and how when these waves start hitting us, I need to channel my inner surfer, like a surf competition. I Googled "vintage surfing images" and came across this one at Surf for Sanitys blog:

Image courtesy of Surf for Sanity at "Vintage Surfing Book Review-- Jim Heimann"

That picture is so corny; I love it. I want to take all this busyness and turn it into something positive. I want to ride the waves with style. What to Expect: The Toddler Years by Heidi Murkoff, Arlene Eisenberg, Sandee Hathaway, B.S.N., and Sharon Mazel says on page 45 in the revised and updated 2nd edition regarding "Toddler Negativism:"

Your toddlers negative behavior is not a reflection on you (as a parent) or your child (as a person). All children, usually beginning early in the second year (and occasionally even earlier), go through a negative phase. In some children, its short-lived and half-hearted; in others, petulance is more persistent. Either way, a toddler cant control his compulsion to resist authority any more than he can control teething or growing. His testing of your authority is healthy and normal, a vital form of self-expression, an essential part of ego building, an important step on the road of personhood.

The next paragraph on the subject in What to Expect: The Toddler Years begins with this cheery sentiment, "Knowing that a toddlers negative behavior is healthy and normal, however, doesnt necessarily make it easier to live with." No kidding! Here is a picture of Goofy eating it on a wave; I dont want this to be me (though this is what Ive felt like all week!):

Image courtesy of Pin Pics, pin 9019

Ive also found a lot of comfort talking to other moms who have "been there" or are going through it as well. It is nice to hear about things that help ease the toddlers frustration (consistency and routine) and ways to ease your frustration (baby-sitter and Sam Adams Summer Ale). Ive really started participating a lot more in my local twin mom group just to hear what other moms are doing with their toddlers to get through this phase.

Double Trouble? I posted a blog post recently called "Comments" about things people say to me when I go out with twins. I really do believe in the "give peace a chance" and "live and let live" vibe I put out in that blog post. I posted a blog awhile ago called "We are moms" with the intention of bringing twin moms and singleton moms a little closer together. We all say the wrong thing sometimes. We are all going through this. I love talking about my kids and we are trying to raise polite, well-mannered boys.

Ready for the however? Since weve been going out with our "Terrible Twos Double Trouble," as Ive heard so often lately, Ive been getting a lot of the wrong kind of attention. This afternoon when we were leaving the movie theater, I was struggling to get my two toddlers to the car as one of them was throwing an epic meltdown. While the other was staying close, I still had to keep an eye on him to make sure he held on to the Hold-On Handle as we slowly made our way through the bustling parking lot. Four adults stood within arms length of me and started asking me questions about my twins as we did this. "Oh, twins? How old are they? My sisters son has twins..." I was literally dragging one of my two-year olds along by the back of his sweatshirt. I really, really,really wanted to tell them that if they had any twin questions for me, I would be happy to answer them as they helped carry my bags to the mini van three spots up.

And that outing I mentioned in "Keep calm and carry on?" There was a restaurant full of people at Chick-Fil-A watching this happen and no one held the door for us as we left. No one offered to carry anything to car for me. And several people said, "Oh, twins? I dont know how you do it! My goodness!"

I found the patience when it was two babies that I could control, even if crying in a stroller, but when Im struggling to control my twin toddlers who are having meltdowns, that is not the time to tell me about how you once thought you were going to have twins because your cousins brothers wife did.

I think moms of singletons also hear a lot of comments when going out with their little ones. I heard a lot of random, bizarre, and poorly timed comments going out when I just had D. As I said, he was a breathholder. When he would throw a tantrum in public, people would either avoid me, look at me in a way that read "That will never be my child," or give me unsolicited and sometimes rude advice, "Back in my day..."

Here is a made up conversation that Ive never had while out with one two-year old throwing a temper tantrum:

Stranger: "Single trouble?"

Me: "Yeah... Bud, you have to walk. Right now. One... two..."

Stranger: "My nieces husbands sister has a little boy."

Me: "Oh, really? Thats wonderful. Bud, I mean it, you have to walk."

Stranger: "Yeah. How old is he?"

Me: "Um, hes two. Bud. Use. Your. Legs."

Stranger: "Wow. Two-years old. You have your hands full."

Me: "Yes. Bud, if you dont listen, we will have to leave."

Stranger: "I cant imagine having one. I mean, seriously. How do you keep up with him?"

Me: "Allright, we have to go bye-bye. We do not throw ourselves on the ground and scream."

Stranger: "Wow! How do you keep up with him?"

Me: "Its busy. But I have to go. I think its time for nap. Come on, bud."

Stranger: "[Hollering to spouse] Honey, you have to come look at this! She has a two-year old boy with her."

Me: "Bud, I gave you a warning. Stop throwing. One... two..."

Strangers spouse: "Omigoodness!  A two-year old! Did my wife tell you that my nieces husbands cousin has a little boy?"

Stranger: "I thought it was your nieces husbands sister?"

Strangers spouse: "No, Im certain its his cousin."

Me: "Im sorry, but I have to go. You have a nice day! Bud, we dont throw."

Stranger: "Can we take a picture of your two-year old?"

Me: [Looking at my red-faced, screaming two-year old kicking his legs while throwing french fries out of the stroller seat I just stuffed him into] "Umm, I would prefer not. Come on, bud. We are going."

Stranger: "Okay, just one. Real quick. Honey, where is the camera?"

Me: "Im sorry. Im leaving. Have a good day." [walk away]

Stranger: [to spouse] "Can you imagine having a two-year old boy?"

[Both strangers watch as I struggle to open door while pushing a stroller and shake their heads in disbelief that I have a two-year old.]


Heres to channeling your inner surfer! :)

Image courtesy of Celadon in "Happy Birthday USA"

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weight loss methods during pregnancy | Keep calm and carry on

weight loss methods during pregnancy

Awhile ago I was at the park and a woman approached me, "Twins?" When I said yes, she continued, "I have twins too. They are in school now. People always used to tell me, It gets easier, when they were small and I wish someone had just told me the truth. It doesnt get easier. It gets harder. So. Much. Harder. I didnt even know, but now I do." Even more disconcerting, she had a haggard, worn expression on her face as she said this. Her khaki cargo capris were wrinkled and her heather pink scooped neck t-shirt looked stretched from too many wears. I listened to her explain all the challenges of having older children-- specifically twins-- and then she quoted a well-known Mommy expression, "Little people, little problems. Big people, big problems."

Ive said these very things. I say, "Little people, little problems. Big people, big problems." I went through the first two years with my oldest who was a colicky breath holder thinking, "Okay, it will get easier." I went through the first year with our twins thinking, "Okay, one day I will feel like I have this under control." And then-- BAM-- three-years old hit with my oldest and I felt like I had no clue what I was doing. And then-- BAM-- two-years old hit with our twins and I feel like I have no clue what Im doing.

That lady at the park was a little bit of a Debbie Downer. Man, she really let me know how she felt about things. I can tell you, standing there listening to her with a four-year old singing "I Believe I Can Fly" at the top of his lungs while climbing up a slide and two two-year olds throwing sand in the sandbox, I felt like, "Well, crap."

I think often times, we as mommies hang on and hope for the next stage. I think this hope that the next stage will be easier keeps us going on hard days. I think we like to classify bad or hard to manage behaviors as "phases." For instance, I told one of my girlfriends the other day that my oldest is going through a "Silly Phase" because I caught him lapping water out of the dog bowl. In reality, not sure if that is a phase or just a four-year old being a four-year old. I dont think that is a bad way of looking at things because these are different phases for them. Our two-year olds will eventually learn to sleep in a bed, just as our oldest did. One day-- in the far off future-- our toddlers will potty train, just as our oldest did. Some of these phases are harder to deal with than others and some are easy breezy. I just think that sometimes this "phase mentality" has a way of being a huge letdown when the next phase is worse than the previous or when you realize that each one of these phases has brought with it a new set of challenges, some more difficult than the last. When does it get easier?

I wrote a blog post about this awhile ago called, "It gets easier." I have had more and more challenges the older the boys get. D is our first and so each new age is breaking new ground with us. Every age he turns is new territory. We never had a newborn before him. We never had a toddler before him. We never had a preschooler before him. With the twins, we feel like we know what to expect in each age since their older brother has been that age. We know how hard it is through the first and second year as they teeter on the brink of developmental milestones-- almost crawling, almost walking, almost talking. We know how frustrating it is for the little guys and how that frustration affects their moods. We feel like we know what is coming. But once it comes we have to balance it with taking care of their older sibling-- who is at a different developmental stage than them-- and some of these stages have been uniquely challenging with two children reaching them at the same time.

The first three months for us were a bit crazy with twins. It was a big adjustment figuring out how to balance two babies at the same time, from the feeding schedule and the sleep schedule to the constant diaper changes and getting out of the house for the many pediatric appointments. Once I got that down then I had the challenge of balancing the two different age groups. It was a lot of busy work moving around two babies, but they were both interested in bouncy seats and swings and both comforted easily with a diaper change, feed, or nap. It was harder with their older brother who wanted to "help," often times waking sleeping twins or accidentally being too rough (yes, I have caught him trying to put his newborn brothers in the swings!). And, as Im sure most older siblings are at some point or another, he would be jealous that we were spending so much time with the babies. I remember the walking phase as being the hardest for him. We would help the babies learn to walk, applauding their efforts, and D would put on this jiggly leg walk and coo as he toddled towards us, often times knocking his brothers over and getting in trouble for it. There were times we felt like a three-ring circus, juggling all the needs of all three of children while trying to keep a household running and my husbands grades up in college.

I still think having twins is an advantage in so many respects. Dealing with different age groups is really hard. I cant take all three boys to the places in the childrens museum that my four-year old is interested in; those places arent age appropriate for two-year olds. I can take the toddlers without our oldest to the childrens museum just fine; they play together in the two-year olds area happily. As the toddlers have gotten older, they have steered more and more away from just epic toy battles to having a buddy to play with. They may be tearing apart my house, but they are happy to do it together. There are many afternoons when the toddlers are napping that D sighs and asks when his brothers are going to wake up; it makes the thought pop in my head that he wouldnt be so bored during his brothers afternoon nap if he had a twin.

I guess all of this is a build up to the fact that our twins are two-years old and it is a crazy phase that I have not been enjoying for the past week. Not enjoying at all. I feel grouchy. I feel like I wish my mom lived closer. I feel like I want to drive over to my girlfriends house and spend the afternoon sitting on her kitchen barstool while she whips up something nummy to eat. I feel like I want to spend the entire day reading and drinking coffee.

Here is how our day has gone so far:

The toddlers screamed at the kitchen counter for bananas while I told them they needed a diaper change first. One of the toddlers reached up and pulled the fruit basket down on top of his head, making him scream with pain and anger. The other toddler quickly grabbed a banana and tried to hide from me.

Both toddlers screamed through breakfast: yogurt spilled in his lap, yogurt spilled on the table, a drop of yogurt fell from his spoon onto the carpet and he wont eat until I clean it up, neither wanted their face or hands cleaned before getting down from the table.

I wrestled through getting them out of pajamas and into clothes. They tried to eat Play Doh. They threw a fit when I wouldnt let them eat Play Doh. They threw Play Doh containers at me. They got in trouble. They screamed. I wondered how they even got the Play Doh containers and were running around the house with them {insert guilty older brother}.

I got ready in 10 minutes and forgot to brush my hair. The toddlers emptied all the toy bins in that 10 minutes. And somehow got the Play Doh again, but this time it wasnt older brothers fault.

They didnt want to put on shoes to leave the house. One found size 4 sandals when they wear a size 8 and was furious I didnt let him wear them. One would only put on his shoes if sitting in a certain chair yet when I put him in that chair to put on shoes he wouldnt give me his feet. They didnt want to walk down the front steps. They didnt want me to help them down the front steps. They didnt want to walk down the front walk. They didnt want to climb in the van. They didnt want me to help them in the van. They didnt want to sit in their carseats or have their carseats buckled. They didnt want their window down in the van. They didnt want the toys their older brother was offering them to get them to stop crying. They cried when he put the toys down, but when he picked them back up again they threw the toys.

They didnt want to sit in their stroller. They didnt want to hold the toys I gave them to sit in the stroller (toys from the van). They were mad when I put the toys back in the van. They screamed when I pushed the stroller. They screamed through the store. They screamed at the check out. They screamed when I put them back in the van.

They screamed when we walked into Chick-Fil-A. Then they saw the playground and squealed with delight. They sat obediently and took off their shoes. They played happily on the playground. They sat down in high chairs and ate like gentleman. One of the toddlers ate his nuggets and his fries; the other toddler at all his nuggets and all Ds nuggets. Then they went and played. I thought, "Sweet. Finally, a break in the clouds." No. They started running in and out of the play area and getting dangerously close to smashing their fingers in the door. This became the game-- running in and out of the play area-- so we left. They screamed when we put on shoes. They threw themselves on the ground and screamed. I struggled to get them out of Chick-Fil-A. I got them to the van and they ran into the bushes outside Chick-Fil-A. I pulled them out of the bushes as they screamed. They screamed as I buckled them into carseats. They screamed all the way home before falling asleep as we turned into our neighborhood.

And now they are not napping in their room because we just had to switch to toddler beds because they kept climbing out of their cribs, despite our best efforts to keep them in their cribs. I am exhausted. And it is barely 2 pm.

Little people, little problems.

A couple months ago while I had my miscarriage and molar pregnancy, my middle sister was moving across country with a one-year old, both of us calling my mom saying, "I need you." Before that, my mom had four teenagers, homeschooling me for my senior year of high school and my middle sister for about three years of high school. Now, my siblings and I live all over the United States and she works a full-time job, finally finishing her degree when my youngest sister was in high school-- making three college students living under one roof, myself, my middle sister, and my mother. When things go wrong for me, I call my mom. How will I feel when I get the phone call, "Mom, we lost the baby," or, "Mom, my husband is underway and the baby has a 105.3 fever"? I cant imagine how my mom felt when she watched her grown daughter rushed off in an ambulance from an asthma attack. I cant imagine how my mom felt when I went into pre-term labor at 5 months with my oldest, which they thankfully stopped. And those are just my problems; I have three other siblings who have their own lives.

Big people, big problems.

I dont want to be that haggard mom at the park. I dont want to be beaten down by motherhood or feel like Ive lost myself. The phases come and go. No, it doesnt get easier. But it gets better. I love my relationship with my mother now. She is still my mother, but she is also my friend. I can talk to her about things as adult. (Even better, shes been through what Im going through and has wonderful advice!) I need her in my life. I love seeing that shes calling me to chat and I love when Im visiting and we go out to lunch together. I just love being around her.

And now Im building a relationship with my own children. It isnt always easy or fun. But, oh, how rewarding it is. How my heart fills up when one of our toddlers says a new word. How we laugh when they do something silly. How I burst with pride when our preschooler tells me about something hes learned or tells me a story. How loved I feel when each of our boys comes to give me a kiss before bed. How content I feel when I peek in their rooms before I go to bed and see them peacefully sleeping.

Today I felt in over my head. People were looking at me with horror (maybe I misinterpreted their expressions-- haha!). How do you discipline two two-year olds appropriately in a crowded fast food joint? Forget that, how do I get them all to the van as quickly as possible? How am I going to get them to nap at home in toddler beds? How am I going to let our four-year old know that I understand it is hard on him right now, but hes doing a great job?

Who knows if I did right today. Who knows if my four-year old really understands how proud of him I am for how he behaved today or if my two-year olds really understand how much I love them. Im trying and my heart overflows for these boys. In the end, I think they are worth it. Whether or not it will ever get easier, it will only get better and better.

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