Thursday, September 22, 2011

The Girls Come Home!

Okay, so, 8 days after the girls were born and Dave and I had spent every minute we could at the hospital with them, Kayla was discharged and came home!  We were excited, but nervous as could be!  Granted, we had a lot of experience with babies being that my sister-in-law is my best friend and has 2 kids who I live for!  I knew how to change a diaper and feed a baby a bottle.  And, like I mentioned last time, the NICU was such a blessing in disguise and taught us everything!  But, it’s a whole new ball game when it’s actually your baby you’re bring home!  In order to help us, we hired a baby nurse who would live with us 24 hours for about 2 weeks and help us take care of the girls and take care of us!  But, being that I had the girls early and then they were in the NICU, our baby nurse was not available that first night.  So, we tearfully said good-bye to Zoey that day and brought Kayla home.
We had Kayla sleep in a bassinet in our room and she was up every 3 hours.  Wow, I never realized how much I liked sleep until I wasn’t able to do it!  She was just so little and helpless, it was scary!  But, we made it through the first night and then our baby nurse came to literally save the day!  We moved Kayla into her crib in her room and the baby nurse slept in the room with her, taking care of her during the night.  And, 3 days later Zoey came home too!  That was a very exciting day, but it made everything very real for me.  All of a sudden, we really had 2 babies!!  I still didn’t feel like they were totally mine, but I knew I was responsible for them to say the least!
After 2.5 weeks with a baby nurse, Dave took off a week and a half and we really started getting into a groove with the girls.  They were on the same NICU schedule of eating every 3 hours and basically sleeping in between.  Then, he had to go back to work.  I thought I was such a big shot and said, “No problem, I can totally do this!” 
After crying every day for a week, I finally admitted I needed help.  Not only was I so overwhelmed by having 2 babies at the same time that could not do anything for themselves, nor tell me what they wanted or needed, but I was also really missing being me!  I wanted to go to the gym when I woke up, shower, eat breakfast, go get a manicure, etc.  I wanted to do all of the things I used to be able to do without even thinking about it.  Now, I was a slave to 2 little aliens who I still didn’t totally believe were mine, and I had a very hard time adjusting!  If you ever felt any of these feelings, you’re not alone!  In fact, just last night when I was out celebrating a friend’s birthday, I was talking to some of my new mommy friends (who have been one of the best things to happen to me thanks to the girls!) and she was saying she had the exact same feelings.  It’s hard adjusting to being a mommy and I don’t think anyone should feel guilty about that!   
Anyway, after Dave went back to work and I was on my own for a week, we found a night nurse to come 2-3 nights a week.  She was my savior!  I got to sleep and try to rejuvenate and eventually, I convinced her to come earlier in the afternoon to give me some time to myself too!  I honestly don’t know what I would have done without her!  I highly recommend a night nurse if you can afford it (it can cost a small fortune but worth it!)
So, now, I’m getting into my groove with help, the girls are on a schedule, but I’m still crying almost every day.  What now?

No comments:

Post a Comment