31w4d: I'm Scared!

It was 10 weeks ago today that I was put on bedrest.  Back then, I was scared that I would lose my babies, or that they would be born so early that they would have long-term difficulties.  Now that I'm quickly approaching 32 weeks, I realize that we are definitely going to end up with two healthy babies at the end of this... and the end of this is rapidly approaching.  I still think I'll be lucky to make it to 36 weeks, but even if I went into labor soon, we would likely be coming home from the hospital in 4-6 weeks with our sons. 

So I have started to look at books about nursing, and babies, and raising twins. Thank goodness I waited until now, because those books are scary!  Those babies are going to make it very hard for us to sleep apparently.  Both Eric and I are 8 hours a night kind of people... How will we make it on so little sleep?  Will we kill the kids? Each other? Both?  My mom reassured me that there are many sets of twins living as adults, and their parents didn't kill them.  Oh, and then one of the books I read made mention of something about divorce rates being highest in parents of twins.  Great, one of my worst fears!  I know Eric and I are going into this with a much stronger relationship than most people have, and we have had many conversations about the ways we plan to maintain our relationship after the babies come.  But I'm starting to panic about how little time we have left just the two of us, I wish every minute we could be spent doing something special or romantic, but we can't.  And we're not allowed to have sex, and I figure between bedrest, post-partum recovery, and babies, I don't know when we will.  That makes me really sad, too. 

And I have always, always, always wanted to breast feed.  I have a lot of romantic notions about breastfeeding, but I am also too cheap to pay for the amount of formula these two babies would need if they were exclusively formula-fed.  But all I hear are nightmare stories about babies that can't latch, cracked and bleeding nipples, mastitis, nursing non-stop (and that's with one baby, not two), lack of supply... and I am sure there are other awful things that just aren't coming to mind right now.  I hear so much about people giving up early on, and I hope that I will have the dedication to keep going and get through the hardest parts with the boys.

I find myself wanting to make all kinds of social commitments for the spring and summer.  I want the boys to be portable in the beginning.  A friend is doing a 5K walk for breast cancer on Mother's Day.  I want to walk it with her, and just push the boys in the stroller, but who knows what they'll be like at that point?  And we plan to go to Maine in July, the boys should be about 3 months old.  I want all our family and friends up there to be able to meet the babies, especially Eric's grandparents!  Our boys will come into this world with 6 great-grandparents.  They are so lucky.  I don't know how well they will get to know all their great-grandparents (very sad to say) so I want them to have as much time together as they can.

The funniest to me, though, was my sister.  She asked if I thought the babies would be here by the first week in April, and I said I thought they would.  So she told me, "Great! I am off work the 2nd week in April, you should come down to DC and we'll go out for oysters!"  I pointed out that I would likely be exhausted, in yoga pants, and figuring out how to breastfeed.  She said, "No problem, you'll just carry the babies on your lap."  Ok... I'm not that delusional.

Those are some of the thoughts I've had over the past few days.  There are more, but I know when to stop.