Pam I Am

Thanks for the support for my last post everyone, I really felt like I was moving forward a little after I had posted it, and I appreciate so much the good response it had since it was so hard to do. Having some online support really helps right now since I’m pretty much a pro hermit these days. Since we kept the fact that we were having twins a surprise, and even lied about due dates to help our cause, I thought I’d try and share a little bit more about that.

Basically, we kept it a surprise because we thought it would be fun. We wanted the moment when we told our parents to be as fun and as exciting as it possibly could. Sheesh, I don’t think that plan could have possibly backfired any worse than it did. We had an early ultrasound on November 6 for a very minor reason, and I noticed it was taking much longer than previous ultrasounds, but I thought nothing of it and took advantage of being able to lie down in a dim room with my eyes closed for longer! Finally our completely boring ultrasound tech asked if I wanted my husband and kids to come in, and I said no, he’ll probably just come in during my regular 20-week one when the baby’s bigger and he could see more. So then she said plainly, “well, you’re having twins.” WHAT??!! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?? GO GET MY HUSBAND PLEASE! (You strange lady who should have insisted I get my husband anyways). Below is a photo taken right before the ultrasound at 3 months when we hadn’t told anyone about being pregnant yet.

Below, 3 1/2 months, the days we told all of our families. We had wanted to wait for the results of the ultrasound before we told everyone to make sure everything was okay, and then for some reason it was seemingly impossible to try and find a time to catch everyone and tell them in person, so we ended up telling them a bit later, when I was all ready clearly showing.

Our immediate reaction was just laughing and crying from the overwhelming news. To say it was one of the happiest moments of our lives would be an understatement. Having twins hadn’t crossed my mind in a long, long time. It’s funny, when we did have them and announced it on fb, my best friend wrote me in disbelief that I actually had twins, because growing up I pretty much flat-out told everyone that I WAS definitely going to have twins. :) With my dad being a twin, me and my sisters would always say, “no, I’M going to have twins.” That sort of fun family rivalry. As a little girl I desperately wanted to have twins, I think that’s normal though? It’s probably not normal for said little girl to boldly inform the world that she IS going to have twins, but moving on…. I truly hadn’t really thought about the chances of it since we actually started our family, not totally sure why, but we were completely shocked. We had giant perma-grins slapped onto our faces for at least 48 hours straight. We went to Canadian Tire right after, people probably thought we were delirious. (We were.) We kept texting each other for weeks…they went a lot like this. “BAHAHAHAHAHA TWINS!!!!” I actually felt like in those first few months like I was walking around on clouds. I was blissfully happy that we were about to have five children. I’ve always wanted six kids, but since I’ve had to have all c-sections, was never sure if six c-sections could even be possible for me. (The doctors tell me to take each one at a time before they’ll approve the next one). I couldn’t believe my luck, that I was getting two babies for the price of one c-section!

Below left in the sexiest Christmas pajamas alive, 4 1/2 months, below right, 4 months. I can’t believe how fast my belly was growing.

Sitting in the parking lot of the radiology place after we found out is when I first brought up not telling anyone until we actually had the babies. Derick immediately agreed it would be awesome and hilarious and the funnest thing ever. We of course weren’t sure if we were even going to be able to keep the secret the entire pregnancy due to the sheer size of what my belly was going to grow to, but we thought if we could, we would just let everyone think it’s just one (and that I’m just huge), and we weren’t going to tell anyone otherwise until they came to the hospital to see the baby for the first time. There in the hospital is when they’d walk in to see two babies! Leah was going to be there to video/take pictures of their reactions. It would have been priceless. Once both sets of parents had found out (they always visit on the first day), is when we were going to try and Skype or iChat with the rest of our family members and show them our twins. We told everyone our due date was April 15th. The real due date was May 7th, but since our doctor wasn’t going to let me go past April 15th, we thought that would help us keep our secret in relation to my belly’s growth. I also had a feeling I would go earlier than that (not January, but March maybe), so I would often say I’ll be getting delivered end of March, early April. We couldn’t believe though how many people asked, “are you sure you’re not carrying twins?” Which I actually think is a pretty rude thing to say. Ha. If I wasn’t actually carrying twins, I probably would have been super annoyed of everyone! I think we may have made it to March though (convincing people I mean). I’m a pretty good liar when I need to be. ;) And why can’t a girl on her fourth pregnancy just be super fat!?

Below left, 4 months, in the hotel right before my work Christmas party. There was a cute, very tall and skinny co-worker at our party pregnant with her first baby that was due in March that didn’t even look the slightest bit pregnant, so everyone thought I was some kind of freak show with my huge belly due in “April”. Ha. Below right, about a week over five months. Taken after church, the day before the twins were born, so 24 weeks and 4 days pregnant. So thankful we decided to take pictures that day.

We did, however, decide I should tell my two sisters. They had known for a month all ready that I was pregnant since we were having a hard time scheduling our girls’ road trip to Seattle, and Jolene kept trying to convince us to wait until Spring to go, and finally since she wasn’t buying any of my made-up excuses why that wouldn’t work, I finally blurted out, “well we can’t because I’m all ready pregnant!” Ha ha. And that decided that. :) I was bursting to tell someone about our twins’ news, and completely overwhelmed with excitement and nervousness (naturally). And I needed to be able to logistically talk to someone about it too and figure out what I needed to do to prepare! And with the amount of how much time I spend talking to my sisters, I just plain wanted to make my life easier by not having to have my guard up 24/7. I’m thankful I at least got to have some fun and funny conversations with my sisters about how great twins was going to be before life got completely derailed. In hindsight, we of course wished we’d all ready told everyone so that we could have at least seen the looks on their faces, and enjoyed the reality with everyone that we were going to be blessed with twins, no matter how short celebrating that reality would have been. That said, it’s hard to regret being the type of parents and people who try to pull off a surprise like this just for the sheer fun of it.

And of course, the second you’re keeping any kind of a secret, you start getting huge paranoia that everyone suspects that you are. There were a few close calls, but only one that came too close for comfort. A few days after we found out, I went to Montana for three days for an earlier-planned girls shopping trip with two of my very close friends and college roommates. We were shopping at a packed vintage market and we had gotten separated early (it was so packed). I was literally bursting to tell someone! It had only been four days since we found out. This is where I found our vintage elf that I thought would make a perfect elf on a shelf for us, and I was buying it from the nicest, cutest elderly couple who looked like they’d just packed up every knicknack from their house for their booth. :) I told them what it was for, to keep my three boys in check and report to Santa on a nightly basis, (they hadn’t heard of this new phenomenon).

Then getting carried away in the very noisy shopping crowd, I added, “and I’m pregnant with twins!” Of course they thought that was wonderful, and then I headed on my way to the next vendor, taking a look around and seeing neither of my friends. But sure enough, when I did meet up with them a few minutes later they both had giant grins on their faces, asking if I had something to tell them! Apparently one of them had been directly behind me when I was talking to the elderly couple! You’d THINK I would have shoulder checked. Nope. She turned straight around I guess and headed straight for our third pal to spill her accidentally-eavesdropped news. Lol. It was pretty funny, but I totally played it off like I had no idea what they were talking about. I *think* I did a good job of lying to them, they seemed to believe me anyways! I was actually quite proud of my ability to play it off and keep myself from grinning and giving it away. (Especially because it had only been days since we found out and I was going crazy inside!) And yes, they were both (jokingly) upset with me when they found out I actually had been pregnant with twins. Ha.

Thanks for listening, I’m going to post some house pictures next because I just need to mentally shift gears for awhile, and it’s actually been pretty exciting all the changes that have been going on around here. Just wish I could feel excited about them.

 

 

 

I’m not sure the best way to share this, and every few words I type I burst into tears all over again, but here’s the beginning of the story of our sweet matching baby boys Shepard and Deacon.

On January 14th, 2013 at 24 weeks and 5 days pregnant, my fourth pregnancy met some very serious complications, and I delivered two identical twin boys via emergency c-section in the Calgary Foothills Hospital. We knew we were having twins, but had left the sex and the question of whether they were identical or not a complete surprise. Our doctor thought we were awesome, (and we couldn’t help but agree.) What can I say, we lived for the surprise, and I was ready for a girl or boy either way, and didn’t feel the need to make any big preparations for whether we were receiving two boys or two girls. I bought extra unisex swaddling blankets and a bunch of new white onesies, but other than that, I felt ready. I was never going to be one to dress my twins in exact matching clothing sets constantly anyways, it just isn’t for me. And I figured I had the rest of their lives to buy clothing for them, no need to get a few months’ jump on it and get in the way of such a fun, joyous moment of surprise.

We were ecstatic to say the least about two more boys. Five handsome boys in five years, does it get any better than that? And as if our first three boys didn’t look enough alike, we were blessed with two more that looked exactly alike? How could two people on earth ever be more lucky? We quickly named the firstborn Shepard Fred. We’d had the name Shepard picked out for at least two years, and to be honest, I desperately wanted at least one of the twins to be a boy just so we could have a darling little Shep in our family. His middle name is after my dad, Fred, who was a (non-identical) twin himself, so it was perfect. Our twins were not hereditary or assisted through fertility in any way, just completely random, two spontaneous blessings. We had two girl names picked out, a girl/boy name, but not a boy/boy set, so it took us until the end of the first day to name Deacon. I’d loved the name Deacon ever since I was pregnant with Boston, but it needed to grow on Derick, and finally for his fifth boy, he was ready to embrace the adorableness of the name Deacon. He was given the name Bennett as a middle name after my mom’s maiden name. I grew up very close to my Grandpa and Grandma Bennett and loved them to pieces, and I also think their last name is very cute which, if I’m being honest, matters a lot (okay, the most) to me when picking names, middle or first.

To say we knew next to nothing about babies born premature would be an understatement. The doctor who delivered me assured me this was their best chance and that babies delivered at 24 weeks is not that terribly uncommon. All the twins’ doctor said to us in the first two days following was that they were doing great, and not to expect them to to be released from the hospital until their true due date, May 7th, which was obviously just fine with us (and naively put as at ease).  We visited the boys in the nicu, they were kicking like crazy and clutching onto our finger just like any newborn does. They didn’t give us any reason to feel concerned. Something I found out later they apparently do because that’s what they felt parents would prefer, to not be given reason to worry until the moment there’s reason to worry. Even when the chances of having a reason to worry is extremely high, which is absurd to us. So needless to say we were shocked and unprepared when things started to take turns for the worse after day two.

After the longest most anguishing 24 hours of my life, Deacon passed away on January 17th, 2013 at 3 days old. We were absolutely torn to shreds, literally beside ourselves with grief. I wish I could say there were at least some moments of peace to be found, but there were none. Shepard, who had been doing surprisingly well, heartbreakingly started to follow in his brothers’ footsteps on day 4. After 48 more hours of what I can only describe as numbness and pain, Shepard passed away on January 20th at 6 days old.  When it was time to let our little ones go, respectively, their doctor and their sweet nicu nurse brought us each boy into a quiet, private room with their breathing equipment still attached, and then gently took them off of it while we held our little boys for the first time. These two experiences were each wonderful blessings even though they were also accompanied with agonizing heartbreak. To experience them back to back like that has been beyond comprehension for us. We then had some time to ourselves while Shepard and Deacon each peacefully went to heaven. We were blessed to have my very brave little sister Leah there to take some pictures for us. Something we will never be able to adequately thank her enough for. Here’s a few of them below.

Shepard. I still cannot believe how much hair they had at only 24 weeks. You can see a slight bald spot on Shepard’s head due to one of the pic lines he had in at one point.

Below, Deacon. They had Van man’s exact little nose. Pretty amazing. They both weighed just over a pound, Shepard weighing a few grams more. They were literally little one-pound copies of our first three babies. Their eyes were still fused shut unfortunately and a touch swollen, (but not unlike a full-term newborn really). The nurses said they would have opened in a week or so. And true to form like the rest of our babies, they had some major eyelashes in the working.

Left, Shepard. Right, Deacon. My older sister Jolene and her husband brought us this adorable blanket and a simple diaper shirt just before we held Deacon. I’m so thankful to have held them each in the same darling blanket that will forever be somewhere special in our home to remind us of them.

My head and heart hurts all over again. Actually typing these words and having them belong to my life now is still so unreal to me. I know talking about something this personal in any sort of detail isn’t for everyone, but (I think) it’s for me. I hope it will help me in a lot of ways. I’ve always thought blogging was strangely therapeutic. It’s been over two months, and it feels like two seconds. It’s been more than six years since my brother Boyd passed away and it feels like six days. The phrase “time heals all wounds” completely boggles me, at least in relation to time on earth anyways. The wound will never fully heal until I’m reunited with my babies again. I’m thankful I have that moment to look forward to, at least I know that moment exists in my future, and holding them in that soft gray blanket under the most heartbreaking conditions imaginable wasn’t a true goodbye. Shepard and Deacon, when we’re through with the privilege of raising your adorable, perfect older brothers, mom and dad will pick up with you right where we left off, cradling you in our arms. Only this time we’ll be crying tears of joy, and we simply can’t wait.