Oh! Twins! Mine are 16 months apart - I know how you feel! NO, YOU DON'T

At the supermarket, the mall, in church, wherever I go, I get to hear - "I had 2 in diapers 16 months apart, I know how you feel!" That is nothing like two in diapers of the same age. I get to hear -"It's hard now, but they will be great company for each other soon." Oh yeah? How soon? How soon can I leave them play on the floor for 20 minutes without having them scream to be picked up?

Two infants in diapers, two infants learning how to crawl, two infants learning how to eat and sit up and sleep on their own and needing their Mommy 24 hours a day. Don't tell me you know what it's like. No, you don't. Or, and this is the worst! I can imagine what you are going through. No, you can't. Until you have faced your own Hell at home in the eyes of your twins, who you love and cherish and resent and want to run away from all at the same time, you can not even start to imagine what it could be like.

One starts the other crying. One wakes the other up. One will stick his fingers in the other's eyes, nose and mouth. The other day, one twin used the other as a jungle gym, and scratched him on the gum, over one of his fresh new tooth buds, THEN he bit him on the nose so hard he had teeth marks for an hour afterwards. I had turned my back on them, (oh, error of my ways!!) and looked around just in time to see this chaos and hear the scream from the victim twin. I picked up my little victim, and blood came pouring out of his mouth. So, I carried him into the kitchen and gave him a big ice-cube to suck on. Of course, the biter twin started crying. He couldn't understand why I had A: taken his "toy" away and B: why I wasn't in the room with him. Sorry, sweetie. You just have to cry for a minute while I staunch the bleeding.

I tell little stories like these to my friends and family and generally I get a laugh. But I don't want a laugh. I didn't think a baby's mouth full of blood was exactly amusing. And when you are exhausted and haven't eaten (except for a cup of cold coffee and handful of Cheerios you picked up from the floor) all day, it is SO not amusing. So, I laugh too, and try not to cry.

My friends and family ask - "How are you?" I generally lie and say- "I'm fine!" But why do I lie like that? Why can't I admit the difficulties I face as a Mother of twins? What do I have to prove? I wonder if people really would be sympathetic or of they would recoil in disgust at a mother stating the fact she finds it difficult to just cope. Would I get the understanding ear and shoulder to cry on if I told the story of how an all day twin crying jag can reduce me to a shaking wreck, unsure of my sanity? One friend of my sister in law asked - "How is it going?" I said - "It's Hell." She laughed. Did she think I was joking? What planet did her baby came from that she can't fathom being at home all day could be hard? She only has one baby, for a start.


I have a letter from La Leche League on my fridge, with a list of suggestions for helping addressed to Friends, Relatives and Spouses of Mothers of Twins. I have had it there for months, and over the weekend made a copy to give to my mother and sister. My sister said - "Oh, I saw that! You have had that on your fridge for a while." And my mother said - "I already read that." Really? The main thrust of the list of suggestions is that the first year for a Mothers of Twins is INCONCEIVABLY difficult and that the mom needs understanding and sympathy and sleep more than anything else. If they both read it, where is the sympathy? Why don't they try to watch the babies while I get a nap when I see them? My mother is a somewhat unsympathetic type, she isn't good at the poor you, let me hug you while you cry mothering style. I really don't respond well to her brand of "tough love." My sister is really busy with her PhD and her own two kids, aged 4 years and 18 months, I think she forgets how mentally unstable I can be when exhausted. Either that, or she is so used to running on empty she has forgotten what it was like during her first year.

This entry has become quite a whine fest, but I have been rather low lately. At least I have a dinner on Wednesday to look forward to. I'm looking forward to being away from the babies constant neediness. I love them, of course I do, that is my constand assurance to myself, BUT...

I'm so wiped out I might skip the dinner and take a nap in the car in the parking lot. But the way my luck has been lately, I would get mugged.