I think it's just terrific that three of you, each with very different circumstances of delivery, have hit two month and four month milestones already!





| Author | Comment | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
Karah R |
Mamas nursing twins |
Lead | ||
|
Seriously.....I think you ladies need to get a thread going with your experiences and tips for success that could be stickied for future twin mamas. I'm sure there's going to be some mama, sometime soon, who is going to find out she's carrying twins and might want to consider breastfeeding--but most of us are nursing singletons and can't pass on invaluable tips for nursing two babies (or more) that you mamas have firsthand experience with.
I think it's just terrific that three of you, each with very different circumstances of delivery, have hit two month and four month milestones already! ![]() Karah & Frank Proud Mama & Daddy to Alexis Evan 6/6/99 Kaia Francesca 5/14/02 and Carter Joseph 4/8/04 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
||||
|
|
||||
beth7919 |
Mamas nursing twins | #1 | ||
|
Mod
I can help you! Platinum Member ![]() Over 30,000 posts !!! Oldtimer
![]() Posts: 35364 03/03/2006 8:23 PM Drew's Mommy!
|
||||
|
|
||||
Debris3 |
Re: Mamas nursing twins | #2 | ||
|
I was surprised to discover we were pregnant with twins when my oldest dd was 3 and my youngest was still 1. Since I nursed both of my girls to 14 months, I was determined to nusre my twins as well. Unfortunately, I encountered several roadblocks early on.
The twins were born at 37 weeks 1 day and both weighed about 6lbs 4oz. They were very jaundiced. To help this, the nurses gave them formula and did not offer me a pump and didn't encourage me to breastfeed! Kept telling me that women with twins didn't make enough milk. I was so tired and sore from my incision that I wasn't really up for arguing! But I regretted it because after we were discharged, I wanted to nurse, but my milk couldn't keep up with their demands. The dropped to 4lbs. The drs made me feed them 4oz of formula every 2 hours on the nose. With twins, it took me about an hour EACH to drink that much! It was exhausting, but still I was determined. I increased my supply by pumping "in my spare time". I was fortunate that the twins still wanted to nurse, it just wasn't enough to fill them. The next and most serious roadblock was that the twins both had severe acid reflux. They would drink 4 ounces or nurse for 10/20 minutes and then spit it all back up. It was unbelievable! They really struggled to gain weight. It wasn't until I was convinced by my dr to supplement my breastmilk with formula that they started gaining weight well. They looked so malnourished for a while there. It took a long time before they broke that 8lb mark! They are now 6.5 months old. I still nurse and supplement with Nutramegin formula (for the reflux). Things are SO much better! They're still small for their age, but compared to where they started, they're doing phenomenally well at 13lbs. I nurse more than I give bottles and they've also started on solids. I plan on nursing past their first birthdays just as I did with the girls. By the way - despite everyone else (other than me) being sick with all kinds of flus and colds this winter, the twins have remained amazingly healthy with NO ear infections. YAY! Some commonly asked questions that I get are: 1 - Do I nurse them together or separately? I prefer to nurse them separately so I can get some one on one bonding time with them. During the day this isn't always ideal as I have my older 2 girls to take care of as well as my home daycare children - I watch 2 more 2 year olds and another 4 year old. So when time is of the essence, I nurse them together. Initially, when they were tiny, I nursed in the football hold. Now that they're bigger, I hold them in like a V position with their bodies facing each other. They like to hold hands thsi way - it's really cute. 2 - Do I have the twins on the same schedule? Yes, most definitely. They're so in sync that they often even poop at the same time! 3 - What do I recommend? Definitely get the book, "Mothering Multiples". It's indispensible. Also, I got by with a regular Boppy in the beginning. You can get one specifically for twins called EZ Nurse Pillow that I've heard good things about. 4 - How do I keep it together with so many little ones? In a word? ROUTINES!!! I follow our routines religiously and that keeps me sane. Last piece of advice - take help whenever it is offered!!! Debbie, 35
DH, 42 Alexa, DD, 4 Naomi, DD, 2 1/2 David, DS, born 8/18/05 Isabelle, DD, born 08/18/05 ... and I run a a daycare! ![]() ![]() |
||||
|
|
||||
Nancymom |
Re: Mamas nursing twins | #3 | ||
|
Wow, where do I start? First, make sure you go to Karen Gromada's Website and spend time reading articles and looking at the gallery of all the moms nursing twins. I spent hours looking at the pictures and it was sooo helpful. She is the author of Mother Multiples, which I also recommend. I also second getting the EZ-2-Nurse Twins Pillow. One of the best things you can do is to prepare yourself by reading as much as you can and talking to as many twins moms as you can that were successful in nursing twins.
Also, carrying your babies full term is going to make a world of difference when it comes to nursing twins. Nursing full term healthy twins is like night and day from nursing preemie twins, especially ones that have to go to the NICU. Make it your goal to carry your babies full term. Having Twins by Elizabeth Noble is a great book. Choosing your birthplace wisely helps, too. Whether you are delivering in a hospital, birth center or at home, make sure it is a place that is very supportive of breastfeeding. Hiring a doula with twin experience would be good too, to help get you off to a good start nursing. Alot of the same principles of nursing one baby are the same for 2. Nurse immediately after birth and strive for every 1-2 hours until your milk comes in. Plan on doing nothing but nursing for at least the first few months. When I was pregnant I told dh to not expect anything because I would just be nursing all day. Set up a nursing station with everything you need like water, remote, phone, burp cloths, etc. It is very important to establish a great milk supply from the very beginning. Nursing every 2 hours minimum, drinking and eating plenty will help your supply. Also, if you really want to nurse twins, then you need have a never-give-up attitude. No matter what problems you may face, know that you can do it and don't ever quit. It always gets easier, but you may encounter some problems on the way. It helps to have other moms nursing twins to talk to if you need help or encouragement. No lactation consultant, midwife, dr. etc can understand what it is like more than another nursing mom of twins. I can say I have defenitely been extremely blessed and have not encountered any problems. I had a wonderful homebirth, carried my twins to 40 weeks, 1 day, and my babies latched on and nursed right away. I put my babies to the breast as soon as they came out. I nursed Jazmin while I was waiting for Noah to be born, then nursed Noah while I was waiting for the placentas to be delivered. Immediate nursing is very important. My babies have now been exclusively breastfeed (no bottles of EBM either) for 9 weeks and they are thriving. I am also nursing my toddler along with them and have an excellent milk supply. It is the law of supply and demand, so don't let people tell you that you can't produce enough milk for twins. I am nursing 3 kids and have more than enough milk to go around. Jazmin was 6 lbs 10 oz at birth and is now 11 lbs 8 oz. Noah was 8 lbs 4 oz at birth and is now 13 lbs 4 oz. They look just like full term singleton babies, you would never know by looking at them that they were twins. I guess they are going to sticky this post, so it could be here for awhile. But anyone, anytime can PM with questions and I will do my best to help out, even if it is years from now. I have been so blessed to have had an excellent pregnancy, delivery and breastfeeding success and I really owe so much of it to a twin mom I ment when I was still pregnant. She gave me the confidence to carry my twins full term, have them at home and to exclusively nurse. Having BTDT mom can make a world of difference. Ok, sorry for my book! |
||||
|
|
||||
MayDay02 |
Re: Mamas nursing twins | #4 | ||
|
Me- 22 DH to be- 25 DD Madelyn Rose Born 4/20/04 ![]() ![]() |
||||
|
|
||||
ainflower |
Re: Mamas nursing twins | #5 | ||
|
Since I am a mom nursing twins and work full time, I very rarely have a chance to get onto CS anymore, but I will let you know what the books don't tell you as far as my experience has been.
Preemies - to get them to go home asap, the hospitals mostly send them home with bottles, very little time BF, and sometimes even on gavage feedings. The only reason that my boys are exclusively BF is because I was EXTREMELY stubborn about wanting to exclusevely BF, and just kept at it. At a certain point I had to not worry about how many CCs they were getting and just trust that they would eat enough and they did. (after 4 months - they were 2 months adjusted age then). No one told me how to transition them, and I was terrified they would not get enough, but after going exclusevely to BF, they actually started gaining weight faster. You probably will need to accept getting only 5 hours of interrupted sleep at night for 5 months at least. Not easy. This will be your schedule: Wake babies every 3 hours. Change them, nurse them for as long as they will feed, burp them, bottle feed them expressed breast milk (EBM), burp them, pump, try to get them to sleep, get to sleep yourself after setting alarm clock, which will, if you are lucky, be 1.5 hours later. If you work full time like me, in the day time you will basically work in 1.5 hour increments, 6 hours a day 7 days a week. After a couple months, the babies can go longer between feedings, maybe 4 hours, and at 11 lbs or so, they can sleep 6-8 hours at night, but you make up for it by feeding them more in the daytime--nursing every 2 hours instead of every 3. If you work full time like me, you end up having to work during the time they are sleeping nice and long hours at night. Your babies will probably be smaller (thinner, not necessarily shorter) than formula fed babies, but that is normal. They will likely spit up more than formula fed babies, and this is normal also. 10 ccs of breast milk spit up looks like a cup, so it can be scary to see them loose their lunch all the time, but trust that it looks like more than it really is. You will probably have some blocked milk ducts... extremely painful--take lecithin 1200 mg 3 X per day. Use hot packs, how showers, massage, and nurse, nurse, nurse, (cry). Blocked ducts are more common in moms of BF twins/triplets. Take fenugreek to enhance supply. While babies are in NICU, pump religiuosly every 2.5-4 hours (7-8 times a day) and store the milk. Don't get lazy about it at night or your breasts will overfill, and your supply will go down. Double BF pillows for the most part, really don't work when you are alone. You can't keep one latched and burp the other one. It may come in handy when the boys get big enough to position themselves and can sit up and such. I am waiting to see about that. Drink lots and lots of fluids. You will probably be pretty hungry, and will likely not loose a lot of weight right away because your body wants to keep up with the supply. You won't have your period, even if you did when you nursed a singleton. One of my boys eats 7-8 times in a 24 hour period and the other eats 12-14 times. I spend about 5 hours nursing in a 24 hour period. My boys are 6 months now, 4 months adjusted age. One had heart surgery and is quite a lot smaller than the other, so he eats more often. I can't keep them on the same schedule, although they do synch up often enough that its pretty manageable. I was led to believe that pumping alone can keep up with their need, but this is not true. At some point, they need to suck to make your body keep up with their demand. All pumping does is empty the breast, which signals for them to fill up again, but the sucking stimulates let down and if they suck longer, the body will get the message to make more milk. At 4 months, I finally quit pumping (unless I have to go into the office for a while) and only BF. At that point, pumping alone wasn't keeping up with their supply and I was using frozen EBM. Now under normal circumstances, I make as much as they need. The main thing that will make my supply go down is stress. Stress from the pain of a blocked milk duct, not getting enough sleep, not drinking enough fluids, not eating enough, drinking too much caffeine, deadlines at work, and maybe just obsessing and worrying too much. Ocassionally I have to thaw 1 or 2 feedings a day for them if my supply is obviously not keeping up. I guess these are the basic things no one told me or that were kind of suprising for me. The main reason I have chosen to BF is for the health of my babies - they have not yet been sick. Also, it is very expensive to buy formula. Finally, I think it is better for my own health to nurse. The main reasons I have thought of to quit are, having more "other" time with the boys. DH is stay at home dad right now, and when he goes back to work, I wonder if I can keep this up. I have made it 1/2 way to 1 year, so I think I can handle 6 more months, especially because they will go onto some solids soon. Maybe you will disagree with what I said, but it is my own experience. I don't mean to make it seem overly difficult to BF twins, but it is realistically, very difficult to manage the time. It could be different if I was the non-working, SAHM, but I am not. In some ways it helps that DH is SAHD, and I can mostly work from home, but sometimes it is hard to get enough time for work, and I have to use vacation days, so I will have very little time off. No matter to me, it is all worth it... |
||||
|
|
||||
beth7919 |
Mamas nursing twins | #6 | ||
|
Mod
I can help you! Platinum Member ![]() Over 30,000 posts !!! Oldtimer
![]() Posts: 35364 03/05/2006 12:31 PM Drew's Mommy!
|
||||
|
|
||||
Karah R |
Re: Mamas nursing twins | #7 | ||
![]() Karah & Frank Proud Mama & Daddy to Alexis Evan 6/6/99 Kaia Francesca 5/14/02 and Carter Joseph 4/8/04 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
||||
|
|
||||
Laineys Momma |
Mamas nursing twins | #8 | ||
|
Everyone else pretty much said the advice that I had to give so now I will just give me story
When I found out that I was pregnant with my daughter Delainey (now two) I was one of those moms that had the thought that breastfeeding probably wasnt going to be for me. The more I learned I switched to the train of thought that if nursing works then great and if not, that is what formula is for. The nursing experience with Delainey went great until she self weaned at 9 months (she would still nurse at night, but was to busy to nurse during the day). So when I found out we were pregnant again I instantly knew I was going to nurse that baby as well. When we found out that we were having twins I went back to that sadness that I wouldnt be able to nurse. But so far it has been a wonderful experience. As most of you know Avery and Shelby were born 5 weeks early and needed to spend 2 weeks in the NICU. Thankfully the nursing staff at my hospital was SUPER supportive They gave me the parts to the breast pump so that I could pump to get my milk in, even though I had to pump and dump as I was on magnesium for high blood pressure issues. I pumped for the first week and during that we started practice nursing in which they would have my hold the baby as I would if I were breast feeding and then they would be fed through their g-tube (they had no suck reflex what so ever) and we slowly were able to go from the feeding tube to bottles and then to nursing. Both of the girls left the hospital still getting bottles (of EBM) as at that point I just wanted them home and didnt care whether they nursed or not, but once we got home we pretty much threw out the plan that the NICU had given us and nursed the whole time. There was a small weight loss for Shelby as she wasnt quite as strong of a nurser as Avery but as you can tell from their current weights they are doing great!!!! I also wanted to mention that with out Nancy (nancymom) I probably would have given up during their 3 week growth spurt! She is my savior and some of the best support that anyone could ever receive. I also want to thank EVERYONE from this forum for being here for me and my girls!! You are all the best!!! |
||||
|
|
||||
gkmt50 |
Mamas nursing twins | #9 | ||
|
Titanium Member
Over 40,000 posts !!! Oldtimer
![]() Posts: 50024 03/07/2006 7:04 PM
|
Shoshana - Thanks for stopping by to share your story! I can't believe your twins are 6 months old... Seems like yesterday you got your BFP!
|
|||
|
|
||||
MsMoon880 |
Mamas nursing twins | #10 | ||
|
You girls are such an inspiration! You make nursing a singleton sound like a piece of cake (which to you I'm sure it is!).
~Jan
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() My Blog: The Evan Events Quote: |
||||
|
|
||||
ainflower |
Re: Mamas nursing twins | #11 | ||
|
Do you ever worry about not having enough milk for your twins at a given time? I know overall, I can produce for them, but every so often, it seems one gets shortchanged. I have one fast flow and one slow flow breast. When I pump at work after 4-5 hours, my slow flow gives about 3-4 oz while the fast flow gives 5-7 oz. One of my babies normally gets on the slow flow and the other on the fast flow. Sometimes I put the slow flow baby on the fast flow side to even out how much he is getting. Then I worry there is not enough left in there for the normal fast flow guy. Does that make sense? Anyway, this is when I usually resort to giving one or both some frozen EBM. They normally only take 1 - 2 more oz at most. I just wondered if others had a similar situation.
![]() ![]() Rayhan & Alim |
||||
|
|
||||
flickasam |
Mamas nursing twins | #12 | ||
|
I came here today to specifically ask about nursing twins, and then found this post already here I can't go into much detail but I have a patient who is just setting out feeding her preemie twins. She has b/f a preemie singleton before so has a head start on most people, but I have been looking at all your comments with great interest. I have spent all my shift with her and her babies, and I just hope she gets the same elp while I am off for a few days. I would to hear more about positioning two babies ( I'm afraid I can't seem to visualise the 'v' that Debbie mentions. Also...does anyone co-sleep with their twins? How do they do it comfortably? This lady has a five foot bed, and there is often her, her hubby and her son,(6) in it already. Ideas would be appreciated! |
||||
|
|
||||
kiwiliv |
Mamas nursing twins | #13 | ||
|
|
||||
beth7919 |
Mamas nursing twins | #14 | ||
|
Mod
I can help you! Platinum Member ![]() Over 30,000 posts !!! Oldtimer
![]() Posts: 35364 06/21/2007 11:08 PM Drew's Mommy!
|
anyother twins still nursing?
![]() Angels lost: m/c 8-22-03 m/c 10-3-03 m/c 3-25-04 trisomy 17 d&c-baby girl Drew was born: 2-12-05 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() We nursed for 28 months and 9 days...what a WONDERFUL time! ![]() ~Crochet Baby Blankets by Beth~ |
|||
|
|
||||
nancymama |
#15 | |||
|
Hi, we are still nursing around the clock at 22 months.
|
||||
|
|
||||
nancymama |
#16 | |||
|
Oh, and this is nancymom, but it said that username was already taken but it wouldn't accept my password. Anyway, I am still figuring this new board out.
Help, Kristin!
|
||||
|
|
||||
2cutekitties |
#17 | |||
|
Should we rename this to moms nursing multiples
|
||||
|
|
||||