Get the right help at home when you have had twins!

by Gcatuk
(London, UK)

Hi, I'm the mom of 11 month old twin girls. My top tip has for those first few months is to make sure you have help and to make sure it is the right kind of help. I did poorly on this and payed for it dearly (with my sanity).

For the first four or five months, I hardly ever had time to shower, eat or brush my teeth, let alone getting out of the house or doing anything other than feeding and changing twin babies 24/7.

I had planned to have some help when the twin babies arrived, but as a new mom, was not sure of what I would need, so I arranged some help and thought I would always be able to get additional help if needed. The reality was, once the babies were born, there was no time for anything and what I had arranged was hardly enough. We didn't have family nearby, and so I ended up having to deal with it all mostly by myself.

If you can't afford someone full time then what you need to do is ensure these three things are taken care of:

- Shopping and cooking - in my case, this was in the end delegated to my partner. He would shop for anything that was needed and would also be in charge of ensuring the fridge was full of nutritious quick food I could eat while breastfeeding twins(often the only time I could eat). I often did not have time to use the microwave and even if I did, I could not eat hot things while nursing because it could spill on the babies. It took us a while to get this right. Sandwiches and finger foods work best. Also you will be constantly hungry if breastfeeding twins, so make sure you have lots of varied food.

- Cleaning and tidying up - I can't stand dust and dirt. Everyone says you have to relax your standards when you have babies and bla bla. I can't. Sitting in a dirty house surrounded by dust and a pile of dirty laundry only made me feel even more miserable and stressed out. So, I resorted to having someone come in twice a week to clean and do laundry.

- Finally, I only got this one right by the time the babies where 5 months, and I wish I and thought of it sooner. Have someone come in for 2 or 3 hours a day to take the babies out of the house. This person would need to come in and help you get the babies ready (when I was by myself it would take me all day as I would constantly have at least one in my arms, and it was very difficult to do anything like that). Then take the babies out for a little while, and you can use that time for whatever you need. It took me ages to do this because I found it difficult to leave the babies with someone I didn't know at all. It's the kind of thing you need to sort out before they are born, do all the checks, meet someone you are comfortable with etc. I never had the time to do all that, until the babies were about 5 months.

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