The '2 under 2' rollercoaster

I've been a Mum of 2 under 2 for 8 months now.  It's been an interesting roller coaster!

Piper has 'come alive' significantly in the last month or so, and I'm a bit of the way through a post about all of the things that she is up to these days and I hope to finish that off sometime soon and get it posted.  She is a little ball of mischief and seems to be having a lot of fun exploring and learning.  This post is about my adjustment and how I have learnt to cope with the reality of having 2 kids under the age of 2.

Having Mackenna first taught me about the need to have to give up my time for someone else.  I haven't been single for long since I left high school, so I've always had to give up time for a partner, but they understood if I didn't want to join them or be involved in what they were doing and they could look after themselves.  This little baby needed me to do everything for her and I had no choice but to call to attention when she asked for help.  My entire life became about taking care of this precious little life and I was happy to do anything she wanted me to do.  I adapted my life to suit her needs and she always rewarded me with her love and smiles and laughter.  She is an absolute dream child and she really doesn't ask for much, so she made my job quite easy.  It was busy, because when you have to do everything for someone as well as yourself, it is busy, but I did also get time for myself and life was pretty good.

Then Piper came along.  This little girl threw our entire world into chaos.  Mackenna was only 14 months old at the time and still demanded much of our time and attention and we wanted to ensure that she still received it.  Todd arranged a month of work, which gave me some peace knowing that he'd be around with an extra set of hands to help me.  I had only just confidently gotten my head around Mackenna and caring for a baby and then we had to start it all over again with a new little life that needed more of our time and attention then Mackenna did.  We tried to get into the same system that we had with Mackenna, but because I was determined to breastfeed Piper and not be so quick to introduce bottles, where we had with Mackenna, it meant that I had to be up at night feeding Piper.  This worked for us anyway, because I wanted to make sure that Todd was rested enough to look after Mackenna if Piper ever woke her up.  The best thing I did was to teach Piper the difference between night and day from the first night after she was born.  All of our night feeds have always been done in the dark and quiet and it seems to have worked, because she only doesn't go back to sleep when it's still dark if she needs to poo.  The sleep deprivation killed me though and to this day, it still does.  The only way of getting Piper back to sleep now if she wakes up at night is to breastfeed her.  We haven't tried a bottle, because in the time it would take to make it her crying would wake Mackenna up.   (Since I first started writing this post, I have moved her room to a quieter one and let her 'cry it out' a bit more at night to see if she really does need the feed.....  she doesn't... goes back to sleep after 3 - 4 mins of crying and has been sleeping heaps better in her new room! Her crying also doesn't wake Mackenna, which is great!)

The time came for Todd to go back to work and I was genuinely scared. (He ended up having 4 months off and started a new job at the time.)  I didn't tell anyone, but I was.  I didn't know how I was going to cope, but I knew that I had too.  I warned Todd that there might be days that he could come home and we'd all be happy and had had a great day, but there would be others where he might find 2 babies in their cots screaming and me in the foetal position on the bed.  This hasn't happened yet....  but at least 2 days a week, he leaves for work with me in tears because Piper hasn't slept well and I'm still tired and my muscles all ache because they haven't had enough time to rest.  He knows I'll be fine in an hour or so once Mackenna is up and I've had a cup of tea, but it's hard for him to leave me like that.  It's unfair of me to do that to him too, but it's all I can do at the time, because it's exactly how I feel and to get over it, I kinda need to get it out.

The first few days/weeks went really well and I was confident that I was able to do it.  There were absolute shocker days too and I couldn't wait for Todd to get home just to take the burden off me a little bit and make someone else responsible for their well being for an hour or so.  We still have good and bad days and the good definitely outweigh the bad, but the bad do take their toll.  There are days when Mackenna is bored shitless by the end of it and becomes like a Category 6 cyclone because I honestly couldn't be bothered going out, or investing time in playing with her and I let her wander around all day finding her own fun and things to do, or set her up in front of her favourite TV shows.  I do hate it when she misses out on Playgroup, or her 'outings' because Piper hasn't slept well and I don't have the energy to put in to taking her out (it does take a lot of energy to always be aware of what both girls are doing while trying to hold a conversation with a third party!)  I also hate that both me and the girls have many friends we'd like to visit and catch up with more, but just can't get out the door in the morning!

There's a few things I've learnt along the way....  things that have helped me enjoy the good days and 'suck up and get on with' the bad ones.  Rather than continuing to ramble on, here's a list of some of them:

• I actually only need 5 hours sleep a night to feel human and not 8 like I once thought;  
• My house is always going to look like someone broke in and trashed it.  There is always going to be food and toys and god knows what on the floor, normally in a main traffic area.  Fighting it just makes it worse;
• Living out a washing basket isn't so bad, just so long as the clothes are clean;
• I don't have 6 arms and can only do one thing at a time.  If that means Piper whinges for 5 minutes waiting for a feed while I organise Mackenna a meal or similar, that's just what has to happen;
• My instinct to always ensure Mackenna doesn't put herself in dangerous situations and just let her do some of the things that aren't so dangerous and let her deal with the outcome (if it means her on the ground crying, then obviously I'm going to then make that my priority, but more often than not, she gets herself into and out of the situation with no problem and after a few goes, the novelty wears off and she doesn't do it anymore);
• The idea of having any kind of routine and 'normality' in this house is nothing more than a joke right now.....  we have 'normal' days and our desired 'routine', but not much runs to plan, maybe 1 or 2 days a week, if I'm lucky.  I like regularity and predictability and letting go of that has been a very hard thing to learn to live with.  (I'll get it back one day....  maybe when the kids go to school....)
•  Finding a new hobby in blogging isn't a good idea just before you are about to welcome your second child in under 2 years into your already busy enough life!
• There really is no such thing as 'fairies'....  nobody but me is going to hang out the washing, or fold it or do the dishes or feed the children......  if I don't do those jobs, nobody else is going too and I'm going to regret not doing them in the first place.
• Letting the phone ring out and go to voicemail isn't so bad and is much easier than trying to get a bare assed child off the change table, or interrupting a feed and getting to the phone before it goes to voicemail.  I hate though that I often don't get time to return the call or message until sometime after 10pm, when no one wants to have their phone ringing or beeping!  Email and FB messaging have become a great friend of mine to help me keep in touch with the outside world, but I worry that people think I'm being impersonal.
• News happens....  the share market crashes, countries almost collapse, people die in wars and natural disasters and sport teams win grand finals.... and much of it will pass without me even knowing it happened.  My world keeps turning the same way it did the day before (.... which I can't complain about though, because it means we are all happy and healthy!)
• Cancelling much anticipated plans due to lack of sleep, motivation and energy (and a genuine fear of getting in the car and driving anywhere because of my sleep deprived spaciness) is going to happen and getting upset about it is only going to make it 50 times worse.  Instead, don't get so excited when making plans and don't make guarantees or promises (to myself, the girls or anyone I'm making the plans with) that it will definitely go ahead.  
• Also, if I have to cancel or change plans, it's because I am protecting the best interests of me and my children and if anyone has a problem with that, it is their problem to worry about.
• There's going to be times when my toddler is going to push my buttons until I am ready to snap, and snapping at her isn't such a bad thing.  Mackenna responds best to me showing complete and utter disappointment in her...  smacking doesn't work (she played me a great one when I smacked her one day!), restraining her and trying to talk to her doesn't work, the concept of time out for a 21 month old is laughable (... at least this 21 month old anyways!) but she sure as hell takes notice when I pick her up firmly and speak to her in a stern voice and let her know that I am definitely not playing games with her.  I feel guilty as afterwards and once she's settled, we have a hug and kiss, change the subject and things go back to normal, but I get my point across and I do believe that she has to learn in the way she is most responsive too.
• My husband is generally more than happy to help me with whatever I need, I just have to ask.  Crying at him that I'm over living in a messy house and not getting enough sleep is not a very effective way at communicating that I might need a little bit of help and is not very fair when he is just about to leave for the place he has to go every day that lets me stay at home with the girls and keeps us fed and with a roof over our heads, when he'd much prefer to be here with us.
• I'm going to make the wrong decisions from time to time.  They aren't going to hurt anybody and there is no point worrying over things that I could have maybe done better.  Shit happens, get over it and on with it!
• Mackenna isn't going to die if she has the same thing for lunch as she had for dinner last night, nor is she going to die if she has a tin of spaghetti or McDonald's with their deep fried chips and nuggets more than once a week (... obviously not many more times) especially considering she eats loads of fresh fruit, vegies and meat and drinks heaps of water most other times;
• Watching 5 back to back Yo Gabba Gabba episodes isn't so bad if it keeps your children happy during those days where you are surviving on 3 hours sleep and 6 cups of coffee;
• The more people that come to live in this house, the smaller it gets.  I can throw stuff away, give stuff to charity and rearrange things until we have only what we need to survive (if we can find it after I've moved it 4 times) but it isn't going to give us any more room;
• Just when I think things are going ok and starting to settle down a bit, something will happen and throw life into chaos again!
• ....  and so many more things too!!!

The most important thing I've learnt though is how wonderful being a parent is.  My girls are my entire life and I couldn't begin to imagine a life without them.  Just walking into either of their rooms in the morning when they are happy to see me and smiling and laughing brightens every single morning.  If I had a dollar for every time I laughed or smiled, I'd be a millionaire in no time.  Juggling them gets easier every day and the age gap gets smaller as each month passes.  In no time, they will be eating the same food and playing the same games at the same time and will be easier to bath.  I don't want to be wishing their little lives away, because I know that once my babies are gone, I'll be saying how much I miss them being babies.