Premature Twins

[TriciaP]

My twins (boy & girl) were born at 26 weeks. My daughter did brilliantly well, but my son struggled for the first four months of his life. He was ventilated at least once a month, due to various infections and when eventually he came out of hospital he was only home for four days when he had an incarcerated hernia and had to be rushed back in to hospital.
There he was given an accidental morphine overdose and he turned blue in my arms, as I screamed for help. He was back in ICU needing oxygen support - it was horrifying to say the least.

Still he fought. He recovered well from the overdose and the hernia operation and came home last January. Since then both babies have grown stonger and are doing well considering the terrible start they had. Every day I am overwhelmed by how brave and beautiful they are and also appreciate how lucky I am to have them both.

Until now I have been very isolated from other babies and mums, partly to protect the twins as they are in a high risk category for infections, but also because I have felt as though I had nothing in common with other 'normal' mums. Having read Tinkerbell's story and all your replies I realise that other people have had similar experiences. I feel better for having read your stories and for having told mine - so thanks. T

Hi TriciaP

What an awful experience you have had. It always makes me feel guilty because my twins were born at nearly 40 weeks, 7lb 13 and 6lb 3 and were healthy and had no problems at all.
So glad that yours are doing well, and hope to talk to you again.

By the way how old are they now?

my twins were born at 35 weeks and had no real problems - I am eternally grateful.

I hope things are going well for you all now. If you don't already know it have a look at twinsclub.co.uk - there are people there who have been and are going through similar experineces.

Thanks for your reply.
The twins are 13 months old now (10 months corrected). DD is sitting up, crawling, standing and answering back! DS is angelic - delayed gross motor skills, so only just sitting up (not crawling as yet), but is delightful - full of smiles and giggles. We are otimistic for the future.
T

Tricia so good to hear they are doing so well. I bet they are a joy to you.

I feel lucky my ds twins were born at 36 weeks (5lb and 5lb 4oz) and only spent one night in SCBU.

Hi Tricia P,
My twin DSs were born at 34 weeks by C-section because the smaller one had not been growing properly. He weighed in at 3lb 2oz and the bigger one was 4lb 12oz. They spent 3 weeks in the special care unit before coming home. I tried going to M&T groups but I could never arrive on time so gave up.

They are now 8 months old and thriving well. The smaller twin has just come out of 0-3 month clothes and the bigger has been wearing 3-6 month clothes for about a month. They show no signs of sitting up yet but I'm not worried. If they reach a year old and are still not sitting, I might start panicking .

To be quite honest, I'm very relaxed about their development and I have no doubt that by the time they start school, they will have caught up.

My identical dd were born 3m prem both weighing in at 3lb each v scary experiance due 2 loss of first born , born at same gestation but both dd are fine spending 4 weeks in scbu this was 3 yrs ago they r the same size & developement as any other 3yr old .

Hi,
Well I had triplets when I was 46! They were born at 32 weeks because one had stopped growing. Rebecca weighed 4lb 3oz, Thomas 4lb 7oz and James 2lb15oz! They will be 7 on the 27th Jan and have never shown any signs of any problems, oh and by the way James is now the tallest! I to am very lucky, so glad your two are thriving!

I gave birth to my sons at 32 weeks my eldest son Callum weighed 2lb 13oz and my second son Joshua weighed 3lb 14oz. They spent six long weeks in three different hospitals .Too look at them now you never would of guessed how tiny they really were.

Hi

I had my twin boys at 29 weeks they are 15 months noe (12 months corrected),

They weighed 2lb 13oz and 2lb 14 1/2oz

My twin girls were born at 29 weeks at 2lb 10 and 3lb 4, both done excently and are now 8 months and have no lasting effects, but after the experience of spending 7 weeks in hospital with them I don;t think i'll ever have more children, I'd be too afraid of 1. having another set of twins and 2. going through that terrible time again.