Learning to relax a little.....

While the last 10 1/2 months have been the most difficult of my life they have also been the most exciting and moving times of my life.  When the girls first came home I thought that I would never be able to sleep again.  I hate to admit this, but there were a few nights when I would actually poke the girls just to make sure they were still breathing.  The machines at the hospital had become a crutch.  Instead of focusing on holding my beautiful babies, I was consistently checking the monitors making sure that their oxygen levels were ok and that their heart rates were where they needed to be.  I became serious uptight and obsessive about knowing everything that was going on.  A few evenings ago, I watched back the video of the girl's baptism in the NICU.  Instead of focusing my attention on what was going on, you can see in the video that I was preoccupied by the monitors.  When we finally got the girls home the monitors and alarms were not there to reassure me that everything was ok.  Hence the reason for my constant poking of the girls while they slept.  After a few months, I learned to sleep again.  It took me quite awhile to actually get that "good sleep" back.  I always felt like I was sleeping with one eye open or that I could never fall very deep asleep because I wanted to be alert in the event something happened.  I can honestly say that I now feel at peace when I lay down at night.  It only took me about 10 months but I'm finally there.

Change?!?  UGH!  I've never been one that is great with accepting new things.  I usually stress about it until it completely over takes my life.  When Addison wouldn't take her bottle when she first got home, I became obsessed with finding out what was going on.  I literally would not sleep until I figured out what was going on.  Come to find out that it was something as small as changing from a rubber nipple to a silicone nipple.  Addison doesn't like the silicone nipple and prefers rubber.  Where Alexis will only drink from a silicone nipple and dislikes rubber. 

When Alexis kept waking up every night soaking wet I became obsessed with finding the perfect diaper that didn't require her to lay in sopping wet pj's every morning.  I think I tried almost 9 different types and brands of diapers until I found a solution.

Over the weekend we made the switch from the specialty preemie formula to regular Similac Advanced formula.  Our pediatrician told us we could do this several weeks back.  She told us to use up what we had left and then transition them into the new formula.  I seriously have been having some major anxiety issues about switching the girls from their high calorie preemie formula to a regular infant formula.  Would they like the new formula?  What if they won't drink it?  How do we switch them?  Do we mix in some of the new with the old and slowly keep adding more of the new stuff?  Nope, as advised by the girl's pediatrician, we just switched them cold turkey.  Once again, All of my anxiety and stressing was for nothing.  They didn't even bat an eye at the change. 

These are only a few of the things that I've fixated on over the past few months.  So the moral of this story?  Is all of my anxiety, constant worrying, tension and stressing because I'm crazy or because I only want what's best for my little girls??  Probably a combination of both.  But after this weekend, where the girls once again surprised me with their amazing resilience, I'm vowing to chill out a little.  I've learned to sleep again, why can't I learn to mellow out a little?  It's the tiny little things like this that have caused me to prematurely grey.  Yes, at 32 years old I'm finding more and more grey hairs everyday.  My new goal is to just roll with the punches.  Shit happens and there is absolutely nothing that I can do to change it.  I feel like my constant obsessing is making me miss out on the amazing little moments that my girls experience everyday.  From here on out I will relax and take the time to breathe in my surroundings and not sweat the small stuff.

I saw this quote on a fellow MoM's (mother of multiples) blog last week and I thought it was perfect.

"In spite of the six thousand manuals on child raising in the bookstores, child raising is still a dark continent and no one really knows anything.  You just need a lot of love and luck - and, of course, courage."

--Bill Cosby