The last year as a first time mum to twins has been challenging, miraculous and truly life changing. Naturally as my girls turned one, I’ve been thinking about the last year and everything I’ve gone through.
What have I learnt? What did I wish I’d known a year ago? What am I glad I didn’t know?
The blog is part reflection for me and partly a chance to share some wisdom for the first time mums coming behind me.
Here is a mix of admissions, reflections and realisations from my year as a first time mum to twins.
I didn’t always feel love.
My love for my twins was always there. I never doubted that I loved them deeply.
But I couldn’t access my love for the first six or so months. I didn’t feel it, most of the time.
My love was buried under exhaustion, disconnection from myself, resentment.
My twins needed me completely. I was simultaneously the most important person in their world and felt like I didn’t matter at all.
There were moments that I felt like my babies had taken everything from me. My body. My purpose. My freedom. There were days that all I saw was what I had lost.
Now (mostly) all I see is what I’ve gained.
The difference is time.
My fiancé’s mantra in those early months was ‘it will get easier’ and honestly that got us through.
Now I feel love for my babies deeply.
I wanted to share this because I think it’s ok for our feelings about our babies to be complicated.
As first time Mums we’re grappling with a huge identity shift alongside the biggest physical transformation a human can go through. We’re learning a whole new role of mum. And we have very little capacity to process all of that because twins takes nearly everything we have all day, every day.
Something I saw early on is that parenting feels hard because it is hard. And that is definitely true (at times, more on that in a sec).
Being a parent gets more joyful.
A big reason that I began is feel love for my twins more clearly is as my twins got older, more interactive and their personalities emerged, our relationship began to feel reciprocal.
The first time H smiled at me, I thought this is all so worth it.
Now I watch B’s determination to learn to stand and my heart fills with pride. I see both their faces beaming when they get home from preschool and I could burst.
We play. We sing silly songs. We dance.
There is so much joy in watching babies explore the world. I am endlessly amused by the faces they pull when trying new foods.
That’s the more obvious joy.
There’s also a deeper fulfilment that comes from getting some independence back.
As my girls play independently and I can write this blog. Or now they are easier to look after by one parent, my fiancé and I can give each other time for ourselves. I’ve started going to the gym and feel SO GOOD FOR IT.
I’ve really noticed that as I get that time for me, that chance to feel fulfilled outside of motherhood, I am a much better Mum.
Fixating on hard keeps you stuck.
I mentioned before about how parenting feels hard because it is hard.
And that is absolutely true.
Something I’ve come to realise is that this thinking can become a cop out.
Because the expectation is that parenting will feel hard, it’s easy to just suck it up. To feel like there is no alternative.
When the exhaustion is threatening to break you, to keep pushing through it because that’s just the way it is.
A belief that has really supported me over the last year as a first time mum to twins is ‘creative solutions are always available’.
When my twins started waking every two hours after being great sleepers, I booked a sleep consultant.
When I felt seriously depleted from breastfeeding twins and broken sleep, I booked a nutritionist who specialising in supporting post partum.
I very intentionally didn’t stay stuck in the hard.
My advice to first time mums of twins
No doubt the last year has been tough. And joyous. And a massive learning curve.
Looking back what it’s really asked of me is to think about the Mum I want to be. To ask myself what kind of family do I want? What kind of home environment?
Thinking about those things has really served me.
If I was going to give any advice to other first time mums of twins, it would be this:
Having twins really requires defining success for yourself. Letting go of what society shows good parenting to be so you remove the pressure to go to every swimming lesson and sensory play class.
The additional intensity, the extra exhaustion. You can’t compare to the experience that first time mums of singles are having.
Figuring out what works and setting my own expectations has been the best thing I’ve done for me and my family.
For support with the unique challenges of twin mum life, check out The Mum Lifeline.