What does your day (and night) look like with twin babies?

[Goandplay]

Babies are 5+3 weeks old.

I think I have post natal depression. Gp seeing me fortnightly and on tablets.

I feel lost, I have no idea what happens next. with my Ds 1 I seemed to know what I was supposed to be doing.

I feel like I've woke up in someone else's life.

As much detail as you want to give such as chores, walking other dc' s to school, washing bottles etc...

I feel like if I have a 'blueprint' to follow then I can fake till I make it.

Hi Go

Sorry to hear you are feeling rubbish. It is a difficult transition to make and having 2 newborns is a major shock to the system, well at least it was for me. Plus you have DS1. I can't imagine having older children to look after as well, so well done!

My DTD's will be 6 months old next week, I have included our routine below. I followed Gina Ford from the time the girls were 4 weeks old and I am so glad I did. Routine suits me and I am a quite an organised person and hate not knowing what to expect. I tweaked a few things to suit our babies but it is pretty much a GF routine.

I feel like I have woken up in someone else's life sums up how I initially felt perfectly. I hated the first 10 or so weeks. There were many times I felt like "what the fuck have I done" and I longed for my old carefree life back. Things have slowly improved as they have got bigger and now, it is like I have always had them. You will find your feet and things will improve for you.

This is our daily routine:
7:15: DP brings up warmed bottles & we wake the girls. I feed them and he goes to work. Nappy change & come downstairs. They usually roll about on their play mat.
8:30: Morning nap until 10am. While they nap, I wash bottles and have my breakfast, shower and get dressed.
10am: I wake them and we come downstairs. They play, either Jumperoo, play mat, play nest, bouncy chairs. I usually fold washing, put washing on etc.
11am: Bottle and nappy change.
11:30am Afternoon nap until 2pm. While they sleep I wash, sterilise and make the evenings bottles. I cook or prepare dinner & try to do a bit of house work (usually unsuccessfully).
2pm: Bottle & nappy change. We often go for a walk after this and if we do, they nap in their pushchair. If we stay in, they have another sleep from 3:15-4pm.
4pm: Just started weaning them, they have some puree
4:30: Bath or wash and pajamas on. DP gets home.
5pm: Come down stairs, Jumperoo or play with toys. DP usually entertains them.
5:45pm: Bottle and bed at 6:15pm.
I make the next days bottles when they are in bed.
10pm: DP does dream feed. I am usually in bed by then.

I hope you start to feel better soon x

That sounds aspirational Gardenpixie. Just in case it sounds like an impossible act to follow I thought I would post to say that my routine with twins (now 6 months) and an older DD (almost 2) is nowhere near as organised, and definitely wasn't at 5 weeks. Generally speaking they just follow me and DD around, eg at home they are in bouncy chairs or on playgym while DD and I play, or sing to them or we all look at stories together, or sometimes I'm just getting jobs done. I find with two the easiest way to get them into the habit of napping at the same time is to use the pram, bundle DD in too then play in the park once they are asleep. Mine didn't get dressed, ie just wore babygrows, for about 3 months, and I think it was about a month before we gave them a bath. It is hard, but I found it got loads easier after about 3 or 4 months. Take it easy and be easy on yourself. Don't expect to be able to deal with them, eg all the individual attention etc, in the same way as you did first time round, but remember they have each other too. Hope you are ok.

Hey go, really sorry you're feeling down.

My twins are now 6 months and I found the first few weeks extremely difficult! Just wanted to say that while gardens routine sounds great, don't worry if you're nowhere near that!

I spent the first few weeks sat on the sofa breast feeding, stumbling through as best I could! At 6 weeks, I started doing bath bedtime routine so they were going down in their cots on a evening and things started slowly getting a bit easier.

Even now at 6 months, it's much much better, but they don't always nap together because they are very different babies and my little girl needs more sleep.

I have says when it's great and days when I find it tough still.

In terms of night feeds, I didn't wake one when the other woke because they woke so frequently! I know some people do. It prob depends if you're beast feeding too.

Anyway, it's great that you're going to see your gp, that's really pro active of you. I think it's v easy just to shut oneself away and that doesn't solve anything.

Twins are hard, I'm sure you're doing much better than you think you are. As I say, I was a wreck for the first few weeks and my dts seem to have come out if it inscathed!

Good luck with everything xx

Hi there, sorry to hear u feel like that. My twins are 4 months now. When I got them home I was absolutely shellshocked from lack of sleep. I told hv and she told me to see gp about anti-depressants. I saw him just to make sure I was doing the right thing. We agreed I was really really tired from birth, twins and everything - the hv referred me to homestart, the organization that provides free help once a week to mums of multiples. They've been a life-saver. You should ask. If homestart is not covering your area, barnardos do the same.
Anyway, here's my routine ( I started off using Gina Ford's contented house of twins but have adapted it because my twins are different to one another especially when it comes to napping and General wakefulness / tiredness):

7 ish - dt2 will wake up. I let her coo or grizzle for 10-15 mins til dt1 wakes up
Feed them, dress them, play with them til 9 or til they get grumpy and tired ( in the early days I didn't know if they were tired or not as they were usually asleep or crying for 100% of the time)

9am ish - put them in their cots for nap - this still something I struggle with as I have to leave one to cry while I soothe them to sleep. They only nap for 30 mins during the day as they wake after 1 sleep cycle. So if I want them to have an hour they go in the pram in the kitchen by the washer dryer and the white noise keeps them sleeping for longer

10 ish - wake them or go to them if they are awake, do more playing ( I have usually had a shower during nap or during morning playtime, or not bothered to have a shower at all). Instead of playing in my bedroom, we do it in living room or kitchen, so we have a change of scene

11am - do feed with them in carseat to prop them up while I bottle feed
Play til 12/1 - depending on how tires

Tired they are. Sometimes they struggle to stay awake til 12 pm. Again, the biggest sign is they are grumpy and upset, and will fall asleep on me if I cuddle them. because I want them to have at least 2 hours nap now I take them out for a long walk, or shopping or just to a cafe so I can chill on my own or meet others. We always go out for this part of the day. I would like to chill at home some days but because they would not nap v long it is too stressful, and I figure this way we all get fresh air, and feel better.

2.30 ish come home or go to children's centre to feed.

3pm do bottle feed using car seats again or if at children's centre use their beanbags to prop babies up, followed by more playing.

4.30/ 5 ish - put babies in cot for 30 min nap, or walk home and allow 30 mins in pram for nap.

Wait for dh to come home, while juggling both babies. Make up bottles for next day and clockwatch.

6 pm he comes home and he spends time with them, we give them half their bedtime feed to calm them,

6.45 - we prepare for bath and do this together. They have the 2 nd half of their feed and are in bed by quarter to 8.

Hope it helps. In the daytime this can go awry but the one thing that never changes is their bedtime. They have gradually been able to sleep til 7 ish. We have never done a dreamfeed as found it disturbed their sleep cycle in the night, most twinmums swear by it though
Xxxxxx
Any q's just ask xxx

Thank you for all your replies. I'll have a read and be back. I really appreciate you all replying.

Hi Goandplay,

I hope you start to feel a little better soon. My twins are 12 weeks now. At 5 weeks we had no fixed routine at all, we just survived the days and nights and at many times I felt like I was barely surviving.

At twelve weeks, things really are a bit easier. We have been doing 4 hourly feeds since about seven weeks. I tried the Gina Ford routines (which worked with my older DCs) but I found it too hard with the babies. To start with, I just did 4 hourly feeds from whenever they woke for their first proper feed - so it was different every day for us. Now that they are only feeding once in the night (at around 3am) we start the day at 7am and I am feeling a little more in control.

Getting them on the 4 hourly feeds wasn't easy and it took a bit if trial and error, but I think it helped me a lot. I think that for now, you just have to make life as easy as possible and do whatever it takes to get you through the day and night. I am another one who didn't bath them properly for weeks and now they still only have a bath once a week . I do the absolute minimum of cleaning and if I ever get the chance, I sleep in the afternoon or have a bath/read a magazine while eating chocolate . Take it really easy on yourself & never think you should be doing more, you are doing a great job already.

The early weeks with twins is really hardcore so don't beat yourself up! It really felt like a roller coaster to me. Ups, downs, highs, lows and not being quite sure if you're even the right way up .

Your babies are still very little. We didn't even get near to a routine unil they were 4 months apart from working around school run times for dd1. What worked one week didn't the next and it was all change! That can be quite scary if you're a person who he needs structure but we got to a point where we consciously told ourselves that it was ok to go with the flow and take each day as it came. I remember always counting out the hours they'd need feeding through the day as I did the first feed of the day as they always woke at different times.

They're 6 months next week and we have a pretty good routine now. It's still not exactly the same every day but we get by.

Sorry you're having a hard time of it, Goandplay.

Our sets of twins are, I think, just a day apart. Mine are seven weeks old tomorrow. We spent 11 days in hospital where we got into a good three-hourly feeding routine. Now this is more like 3.5 hourly, with us doing about seven formula feeds per day.

Husband has been back at work for 2 weeks and the routine we are trying, and which seems to be working, is that he is on duty and I sleep solidly (in spare room) from 9pm-2am. I take over from 2am and he gets 5hrs sleep before going to work. I get an hour or two around the next feed but I don't nap in the day. Life seemed much more manageable once we started getting these big chunks of sleep.

We use dummies to soothe, and I spend half my time putting them back in. We don't have playtime yet - I'm too busy trying to deal with bottles, washing/drying tidying, eating etc! - but we have lots of good cuddles around feedtimes. We bath the babies about once a week - they love it but at the moment there just doesn't seem to be the time. We are so grateful to get them off to sleep (one is really struggling with wind, or possibly silent reflux lately - need to see health visitor or gp to get advice on this).

We have a cleaner for two hours per week and I'm relieved we can afford that as it is one thing we don't have to think about. No family close by, although enthusiastic grandparents come to visit for a couple of days every couple of weeks. We have found a nanny and she will start doing a couple of hours a week this month and if it works out she will look after the babies for two afternoons a week in the first instance.

I find everything just about possible in the day - most days the feeds go reasonably well, I get some washing done, I eat etc, and some days I actually have a shower and get some emailing or even a bit of work done - but several times I've been in tears when DH left for work, or when he has phoned me at lunchtime, or walked through the door in the evening (he is out of the house for 11 hours). I don't want to feel worn down by the relentlessness of it, and I do actively want to start doing a few more hours of work per week to feel more like myself (and it's easy as I work from home), so the nanny for us is a good solution.

The most difficult thing I suppose has been my recovery from the c-section. I had a D&C for 'retained products' three weeks ago and am still bleeding :-( Also, I was very active (cycling, jogging) before pregnancy and now it's difficult to walk more than two miles. My muscles split quite badly down the centre of my stomach and my lower back and hips feel really unsupported and achey. And I was housebound with the heaviness of the bump and mild-ish SPD since November, so have zero stamina! I know I will feel much better when I get back to my pre-pregnancy self physically.

Good luck - I hope you feel brighter soon.

Oh it is so much harder with twins. You are more exhausted, you have two to sort and an older as well. My days had no pattern until 10/12 weeks-ish at which point I started putting in a napping routine. I don't honestly think you can get them into a fixed pattern until then.
Don't feel you have to try and fake anything. Get your health visitor to do her job and come round to your house and give you extra support. (Mine was useless) You absolutely deserve help. Having newborn twins is ridiculously hard. If you were all neat and sorted it would be weird.
For what it is worth my routine ultimately looked like: both babies awake around 7, both get feed. Bet both down for nap around 9.30. Feed on waking. Get both babies down for nap around lunchtime. Wake on feeding. Small top up feed around 5pm and bath bedtime feed routine before bedtime starting around 6/6.30pm.
But don't worry about this too much yet.

I read all your replies and I find them really helpful and comforting even though I never had a chance to reply.

Twins are 16 weeks on Friday and I have managed to drop the dummies (they seemed to cause more problems than solved), we have a bedtime which makes all the difference and they can self settle so I feel quite positive. My DS can sleep through and my DD was waking once for a feed between 3/4 and I was in the process of reducing the size to wean her of this feed because she wasn't hungry in the morning. She has started to wake every 2.5 / 3 hours which has left me frustrated but I'm sure it's not forever and once I know how to deal with it I feel confident that I can deal with it.

I wanted to leave a post to say thank you and also to show that it did get better.... Think this it is how it will always be, one thing after another always different but each thing always passing iykwim.

Sorry for errors using Kindle predictive text and one hand.

Really hope the GP can help but it's a good thing that you're dealing with it some don't and hide so to admit that you have PND shows you're strength :)

Dts ar 8mo nearly 9mo and our "routine" is:

05.00-06.00 - Wake up sometimes they wake later, they talk idly in their cot until I get up or they cry.
06.15 - Nurse & skin to skin before putting them in the playpen in the bathroom so I can shower & dress.
07.00 - Breakfast & play time.
07.30 - Nurse then get them dressed.
08.15 - Preschool run & Walk the dog & park, usually fall asleep in stroller.
09.30 - Home, wake up, Nurse & snack time. Then play.
11.30 - Nurse and nap.
13.00- Wake up & Nurse, lunch time, then play.
15.00 - Preschool run.
15.30 - Home, nurse, then play.
16.30 - Tea time.
17.00 - DH comes home, bath time with daddy & daddy Skin to skin.
18.00 - Nurse, bed time.
20.00 - Dream feed.
23.00 - Wake up & DH see's to them puts them back down.
00.00 - Nurse, back to cot.
02.00 - Wake up & DH deals with them (only brings to me if won't settle).
03.30 - Dream feed. Then they usually sleep until it's 5-6am.

This is basic routine; discounting every nappy change as I change about 5-7 a day and other dc's routines. This is what a calm day is but most days are different and dts cluster feed and don't have a set night routine.