Life With Twins Is Twice the Work, But Double the Joy
Preparing for life with twins required my husband and I to level up — for ourselves, for each other, for our son, and for our new babies.
A little over two years ago, newly pregnant and at a routine eight-week ultrasound, I received some unexpected news.
My husband, toddler son, and I watched a grainy image flicker on screen.
“Well, it looks like there are two babies here,” the ultrasound tech announced after a moment.
Two babies?
Twins.
Twins. To say I was surprised would be an understatement.
I left the appointment with my head spinning.
How on earth would I survive a twin pregnancy?
Would the babies be premature?
Would there be complications?
I couldn’t imagine what our future held. As my husband drove home, I ordered some books from Amazon from the passenger seat. I took a few breaths and prepared myself for whatever twin life had in store.
The rest of my pregnancy was steeped in anticipation as I wondered what twin life would bring.
The pregnancy was lightyears harder than my singleton pregnancy had been three years earlier. Hyperemesis gravidarum made me so sick that I couldn’t eat a single thing without vomiting. There were many days I couldn’t even get out of bed. Mercifully, it lifted before the end of the first trimester. But after that, the aches of pregnancy hit early and hit hard. Midway through my second trimester I started physical therapy for the debilitating pain.
In addition to the physical discomfort, fear clawed at me. I wondered and worried if I would be enough for my new babies.
Would they feel equally loved?
How would I respond to two crying babies at once?
Would we bond as easily?
And what about my oldest? How was he going to respond to having to share his beloved parents with not just one, but two new babies?
I worried and worried and worried, and then one March day, all my questions were answered. My twins — a boy and a girl — arrived safely, healthy, and strong, via scheduled C-section at 38 weeks on the dot.
The nurses wheeled me back into recovery, and moments later, our twins joined us. I held one and my husband cradled the other. In that moment, my fears dissolved. A warm glow washed over me. I knew this feeling . It was the same feeling I had with our older son. The love was familiar and unmistakable.
From there, our love only grew.
Life with twin newborns was exhausting. However, instead of feeling overwhelmed as we juggled the needs of three children, we felt calm, prepared, and equipped to handle it. Our twins were two of the sweetest babies we had ever known.
As our twins grew, so too did our joy. It’s often said that twins are “double the work, but double the joy,” and while it’s certainly a cliché, it is also 100% true. When our twins were born, it was like we received a double dose of love and happiness that inoculated us against the challenges twin life would bring. No matter how exhausted we became, our joy outweighed our stress. Even when I was diagnosed with a life-threatening blood clot two months after giving birth, we approached the challenge with considerable ease.
Preparing for life with twins required my husband and I to level up — for ourselves, for each other, for our son, and for our new babies.
To this day, the joy continues to multiply. Our oldest son loves being a big brother to twins, and we enjoy watching our twins share milestones as they get older. It’s amazing to watch them grow in tandem — and just as incredible to observe their differences as their individual personalities emerge.
There’s something so special about watching two tiny people share such a unique bond.
Having spent nearly every moment of their lives together since before birth, the twins constantly look out for one another. Their eyes light up when they see each other upon waking. They greet each other with hugs and kisses. They ask about the other when one isn’t there and instinctively comfort their twin when they’re upset. They don’t yet know that not everyone is born with an instant best friend.
They are all love.
The challenges of bringing the twins into the world and caring for them in their earliest, neediest days have been more than worth it.
Though at times it’s tested us, life with twins has been so much more joyful than we could have imagined on the day that we tried to make sense of that fuzzy ultrasound screen. In that moment of shock and overwhelm, I could never have predicted how well these two tiny people would complete our family. And now, I can’t picture our lives any other way.
