what is your twin advice? just found out its twins!!

[rubyred84]

Hi everyone, I had my 12 week scan today and found out I'm having twins!! Still can't quite believe it but over the moon!!

To the mums of twins, what would you tell the '12 week pregnant you' if you could? And what advice do you have/would you do differently if you did it all over again? Excited doesn't quite cut it at the moment, and am blissfully ignoring the thought of double night feeds!! Haha!!!

Congratulations! Twins are very special, I still get the wow factor when I look at mine 2 and a half years later!

Advice for my 12 week pregnant self...
Buy the best buggy you can afford, it will make life so much easier

Dh and you will feel the strain tremendously for the first 12 months and your relationship will suffer but it will eventually get back to normal

Your pregnancy will be healthy and you will grow two big strong babies (I was very worried throughout my pregnancy)

Special Care is tough, it steals away your first experiences and expectations of motherhood. You will be tearful and it will take a long time to get over it but you will :)

You become a celebrity when you are out and about with your twins, people love to stop you for a look and a chat. Even now at 2 the girls get oohs and ahhs!

Don't plan your delivery, ultimately the babies will decide what happens

Cook and freeze meals in advance or you will live off toast

Having twins can be very lonely as it isn't as easy to get out and about. Join a Twins Group as soon as you can. I love ours and I have made some lovely friends.

You will look like shit for a long time. It doesn't last forever.

Watching them together is very special and despite the hard work, tears I have cried and arguments dh and I have had knowing they will always have each other makes it worthwhile.

I could go on forever but I won't!

That's a super post, never

I've nothing to add other than my constant refrain it gets easier.

It does.

Great advice from never.
When you come home with your twins sleep and have naps when they do, no matter what time of day or night.
Fuck the housework! Honestly, do not worry about it just concentrate on you and your babies.
Leave it to OH or anyone who offers. Get as much help as possible.
If you want any advice post on here!
Congrats and best of luck!

thanks everyone, great advice! It still all feels very surreal at the moment, I have now told everyone so hoping it feels a bit more real soon! my bump is coming along so that should help!

Are any of you members of TAMBA? Is it too early for me to join now? And do you go to multiples clubs with your babies as well?

It sound silly but all I can think of at the moment working out how to do "normal" things? Like for instance, food shopping with twins? do you just grab a few essentials, or is there a way to do a full shop with newborns? Or do you just order to home? I know that should be the least of my worries but it is now like a bit of a riddle I cant get to the bottom of......

I joined Tamba while I was pregnant. Twins playgroup is for the children but mums (and dads) get a lot out of it too. We went to ours this morning, they are a life saver. My twins played, I chatted with other twin mums and got my first and much needed cup of tea of the day. We had a women pregnant with twins visit us today at play group, she wanted to meet some of us, get advice and find out where to come once her babies are born.

Food shopping, always online when they are tiny. I would take mine for bits and pieces when they were tiny and put them in the double twin seats (with a blanket over the seats). Now that mine are older, food shopping is a great for them, they love to help. I plonk them in the twin trollies. All supermarkets have them.

Baby twin trollies & toddler twin trollies.

Definitely join Tamba now. They have excellent info on multiple pregnancies and parenting (and the mothercare discount is worth the membership fee IMO). Have a look if any of their courses are running in your area too - I went on an excellent breast feeding course and they have a parenting course where they basically teach you about being the best parent you can be rather than the 'perfect' parent. I found this really useful advice because it is so hard in the early days not to compare yourself to singleton parents and worry that you are half the parent they are. You're not. Every family does things differently but your twins will cherish you just as much as a singleton baby cherishes their parens, even if they do have to wait a few extra mins for a nappy change.

There are a few practical things that I have found useful with twin babies - a twin breastfeeding cushion if you're planning to bf, a sling to put one in whilst you are dealing with the other and baby bean bags so they can sleep in the room with you during the day and you're not running upstairs to cots all the time and leaving one alone.

We did Internet shopping for the first few weeks but most supermarkets have twin baby/toddler trollies (all of our local Aldi trollies are twin ones) and my one year olds find food shopping bizarrely fun! It's like a (free) sensory play session with the lights, smells, people, colours!

If you've got any more questions just ask or feel free to PM me. Congratulations and good luck, it's amazing tiring having twins.

No advice here but congrats times 2

Congratulations, interesting times ahead!

I'd tell my pregnant self not to worry so much - there are risks with twins but I carried ID twins to 38 weeks and they're now healthy 2 year olds. I carried on doing some exercise as long as possible which I think helped keep me healthy but you need to rest up towards the end of pregnancy e.g. I'd walk back from town but have to sit down several times.

Some great advice above - definitely agree with supermarket delivery (wish we'd sorted this out sooner) and I seemed to live under my tandem feeding cushion for a while! Mainly just do whatever you need to do to keep you and the babies fed, clean, rested and relatively happy for the first few months. For some people that's routines, for me/mine that didn't work so it was more feed on demand and try to rest/ sleep when they sleep - ended up bedsharing for quite a long time as the best way to get enough sleep. TAMBA do a preparing for parenthood course which I found helpful. If you have stairs then duplicates of things upstairs and downstairs is good e.g. 2 lots of changing mat, nappies and wipes. I went to the local twins club a couple of times when I was pregnant and found it helpful to chat to other mums and ask about buggies and practical stuff.

Twins are hard work but also lovely and it's so nice to see their relationship with each other developing.

Lovely message from neversleepsagain.

I feel very blessed to have my wonderful girls. I think at 12 weeks I was more scared than excited so - echoing some other comments - I would try to enjoy it more

Thanks so much ladies. I'm now 14 weeks and have definitely calmed down and am enjoying it. I realise that really at the moment there isn't much I can control, so am just enjoying watching my bump grow!! Great advice from all, thanks again xx

Brilliant advice from neversleepagain, whose name is scarily appropriate. I definitely agree with getting the best buggy, and try for a (relatively) smaller one, I got a mountain buggy duo and though it is great, is a just bloody huge.

It's not popular on here, but mine were in a routine from day one and I think it made things easier, or at least less chaotic. Helped that they were already on a routine from NICU.

Try to get another pair of hands for the first sixth months. I couldn't and I wish I had.

Don't beat yourself up about anything ever. Try to relax your expectations about yourself and everything else.

Mine are three now and it's bloody hard, but they have started to hold hands and cuddle together and just generally like each other more, and it is loveliest thing I have ever seen and then they try to murder each other two minutes later

You will feel torn. There will be times when you have to choose who to comfort or pay attention to more. The plus side of this is they will learn patience and taking turns from very early on, and they always alternate who is more needy quite quickly. In fact mine take it in turns alternating who is in a bad mood each day.

You will also get stopped a lot when out and about, especially if they are identical IMO. It can be bloody annoying when you're feeling grumpy, but most people are just excited and trying to be nice. Equally it's quite special when you see other twin parents in the street and you share an eyeroll and a knowing look