I'm coming out of the bad mom closet.

There as some views on motherhood and mommy practices I have that other women just cringe at. I find this fascinating. I think the way I do "mommying" works for my family and for me, and that's all that matters. But every once in a while I get a comment that just shocks me. I'm not way out there in left field or anything, so I get surprised.

I figured I'd put it all down on paper, so to speak, to see what other women think of these things. If you'd like to comment, I welcome your comments. Good or bad! I like to know what other people think. I'll never change what I do, but it's interesting to hear other viewpoints.

I find breastfeeding gross. I've only had one other friend who shares my viewpoint on this. It makes me cringe to see another woman pull out a boob in public. I feel like if you choose to do it, it should be private. When I did it, I kept it very private, and I'm one of the least modest people I know.
I breast fed Mitch for six weeks, and it was just dreadful. It felt gross. I actually wanted to do it and looked forward to the experience before he was born. I was insistent on breast feeding. Then, as soon as I started doing it, I felt disgusting.
It made me sweat. I couldn't stand the way it felt when the milk left my body. My breasts just ached constantly. He had to eat every 15 minutes because he was such a large and hungry baby, and I became engorged. Pumping hurt. Everything in the general area was constantly in pain. I just didn't enjoy it at all. But seriously, the worst part was that it made me sweat. I know I already mentioned it, but it just got worse and worse as time went by. It felt like flu sweat. Like I was sweating out all the toxins in my body, but there were just too many toxins.

I spank. When some people hear this, they picture me beating my children with an aluminum bat. Other people realize what I actually do, which is spank only when the punishment fits the crime. For instance, the last time my 8-year-old was spanked was longer ago than I can remember. This is because spanking worked with him. I'm not saying it works with every child, because it doesn't. Every child is different and responds to different forms of punishment.
The babies are too young to spank. They do, however, get a pop on the hand when they touch stuff and grab stuff they're not supposed to. They get it done immediately with a firm "no" to go along with it. This is reinforcing what the word no means while at the same time giving them a consequence when they do something they're not supposed to do. They then equate touching the cable box, for instance, with getting their hands popped.
My son is a very well-behaved and well-mannered child. I credit my discipline strategy for that. I fully expect never to have to spank him again because the older he gets the less he needs it. For minor infractions, we do "consequences".  We take away his video games and tv time. That works much better than spanking at this point!

I really don't care about germs. My kids can put their mouths on almost anything they want, short of a stranger's skin. Chewing on the shopping cart bar? No biggie.
I don't wash the babies' hands before they eat. They're 1. They have their hands in their mouths every second of every day. What about eating makes it any different? My grandmother freaks out when I do this. It almost makes me laugh, poor woman. She thinks this is such a serious thing.

I think cloth diapering is ridiculous. And I say so readily. Why would you spend the time cloth diapering when there are disposable diapers you can throw away? Poop is so nasty. To me, there are lots of ways you can do your part to help the environment, but my goodness. That's just not one I'll spend time on. We've come a long way over the years. Let's use the efficient things that have been developed. In my mind it's like saying instead of using a sanitary pad you should wad a towel up in your pants.

I find the childbirth experience unnatural and disgusting. I've done it both ways: vaginal birth and c-section. People think I'm crazy when I say the C-section was easier than the vaginal birth, but I wholeheartedly believe that for me, it was. Maybe not for everyone, but for me, yes.
I don't understand women who do this at home. There are women in my life I love and respect who have done this, and I think they're crazy. Why on earth would you NOT want a doctor around when your child is born? What if something is wrong with it? When I say this, women come back with the response that for centuries women did it without doctors. My response is that for centuries, babies died. Now, it's not necessary for babies to die. I know that if you're careful and have someone there who knows what he/she is doing, it cuts down on the risk, but I'm just not a risk taker. And seriously, I have never gotten a sense of euphoria from giving birth. A sense of pain and wanting tons of medication and three fingers of bourbon afterward, yeah, but euphoria? Nope.

These are my confessions. Ha! Take them as you will. I yam who I yam.

More than just a cloth diaper.

When you find yourself with one baby, convenient baby products are a must. But when you have multiples - or multiples and older children along with them - convenient baby products are sometimes a lifesaver and a key to retaining your sanity.

I figured it might be helpful if I shared some hints and the baby products that go along with them.

All of the products I'm listing below have one thing in common: they're great for transition. Babies go through so many transitions so quickly, so when you're dealing with more than one, anything that can make those transitions easier is worth every penny.

Surprisingly, though, most of this stuff does NOT cost a fortune.

So here are my top five fave transitional tips/products from the last 14 and a half months of twin mommyood.

5. Little gPants

Little gPants: The wonder pant! Find them at www.gpant.com or Babies R Us.

• These cloth diaper-like products are not helpful when used as intended. I'm not a cloth diaperer. I understand that it's probably good for the environment and cheaper when done traditionally, but let's be real here, people. I work and have three kids and a house to maintain. There's not time for this stuff. 
• So here's how I use them: They are excellent leak guards and a great way to move to the next size diaper before your babies are big enough for that size. 
• Leak guards: Some babies pee so much in the night that they leak every night. This is just a fact. I was AGONIZING over how to keep them from leaking outside their diapers because they would do it so quickly, and the liquid would cool on their clothes and the cold would wake them in the middle of the night. So I thought about the vinyl covers, but my husband didn't like that idea because he said he thought the wet vinyl would cause rashes. So off to Babies R Us I went looking for a cloth alternative. These were expensive. Like, almost 30 bucks for a two pack. The good part about it, though, is you only need one for each baby if you're using them to protect against leaks instead of as cloth diapers. They have vinyl inserts that you can pop out and rinse, but the majority of the pant is cloth that can quickly be popped into the washer and then dryer and ready again for nighttime. 
• Transitional sizing: Many parents of multiples receive a ton of diapers before the babies are born. They were almost ready for size two - but not quite - when we ran out of the generously given size ones. We were broke, as many parents of multiples are, and needed to use what we had, but the diapers were still so large on them that they wouldn't stay on all the time. Enter Little gPants. They have Velcro adjusters just like diapers, and we already had them to guard against leaks. So we popped on a size two diaper and popped on their Little gPants on top of the diaper and just used it day and night until they got big enough to wear the size twos without the gPants holding them on. 
• I think everyone should own one pair of Little gPants for every baby on hand. They're great! 

5. Nûby Standard Non-Drip Bottle 

I cannot say enough about this product. It is a basic that every mommy should have, but especially mommies of multiples.

• Because of the handles on this product, my babies were able to hold their bottles so much sooner. I know handles have been around forever, but these are the perfect size and are removable, so if your baby doesn't dig handles or you're ready to teach him to hold on without them, they just pop right off.
• These come in two sizes, so stock up. You will need the bigger size later on if you use them with my special instructions, so keep that in mind.
• The Meredith way: These are great for really hungry babies. Again, as with cloth diapering, I know all about how breastfeeding is best, but with multiples, it's just not so easy. So for those of us who prefer a little bit more organized, streamlined and, let's just face it, easier, life, we bottle feed with formula. Now, all three of my babies had to switch to some kind of solid at six weeks old. My 8-year-old was breast fed for six weeks and almost starved to death. At six weeks, we put him on formula, rice cereal and stage 1 baby food. Struggling to feed him all of this when he was that young was difficult. Eight years later, skipping the breastfeeding stage altogether, I was faced with the same problem with two of them at once! So I put a lot of thought into this, and I decided to improvise.
• I used the Nûby bottles because they could hold more. The thing about the nipples with these is that they're not standard, so with a thick mixture like I wanted to create, I couldn't use the nipples that came with them. So I substituted regular nipples as the first step. In the bottle, I put six ounces of formula (the twins were already downing 10+ ounces every three to four hours), I jar of Gerber stage 1 fruit or vegetable and enough rice cereal to create the consistency that seemed right for their appetite at the time. 
• This worked great as long as I cut a small X in the nipple hole. It was a fantastic transition for the boys between bottle feeding and spoon feeding while making sure they got enough food. It also stretched their feedings out at night so that we were able to get more sleep. 
• So, as a product alone, it's fantastic, but after I modified it and used it my own way, it was a terrific transitional feeding tool.

3. OP Baby Boy Two-Piece Flotation Swimsuit

• I love, love, love, love this. Taking a baby swimming is hard, but, damn, the cold water feels good because you are alway so sweaty from lugging around a baby. Or two, in my case. So, we tried out those floaty things with the canopies. Those are great when you have one baby. But try keeping two babies in those things while you're floating around in a public pool. Or three. Or four. Catch my drift (ha!)?
• These are like a take on the arm floatie and life jacket all in one. The bottoms are like regular swim trunks. The top is like a life jacket with sleeves and a zipper up the front, but it has a padded strap that hooks under the crotch area. So the baby doesn't fall down into the life jacket. If you've ever worn a life jacket, you know exactly what I'm talking about.
• Now, you can't let the baby go and float in this, of course, but you can hold the baby next to you with virtually no muscle power needed, which is nice when you're toting those suckers around all the time OUT of the water. This way, you can give your weary muscles a break. And since it's more of a life jacket, you can get the babies closer to you and hold two at once mostly effortlessly. 
• In keeping with the transition theme, of course, the pads can come out of the shirt and the straps can come off if you'd like a regular two piece for your child. And, lastly, taking away the top, the shorts can be worn just as swimming trunks, making this suit last as long as it will fit.

2. Nûby No-Spill Sippy Cup 

• Nûby is a great product. Hands-down it's probably my No. 1 baby feeding product. I'd take a Nûby product over any other one without even looking. 
• The reason I love these particular cups is because they're shaped like the traditional sippy cup but they have a silicone top. So if your baby is teething, this gives them something to chew on. 
• The other great thing about the silicone top is that the baby can suck on it like he/she can suck on a nipple from a bottle. It has the same feeling, so it allows them to transition to a sippy cup more easily, so there doesn't have to be as much attention focused on it from the parent. I remember with my older son, I spent a lot of time coaxing him into drinking out of a hard-topped sippy cup. With these, all I had to do is hand them to the babies, and they took to them immediately. I could turn right back around and keep cleaning/cooking/doing laundry instead of having to teach the babies how to drink out of these. They're worth their weight in gold.

1. 

• This tops any list. For any reason. Ever. If things are going bad, this will go a long way toward fixing it. Every mother should remember this. If out of this particular product, the product below will also work.

Sharing

There were many concerns on my mind when I found out I'd be having twins.

One of the biggest ones was wondering how I was going to give enough love to two babies. Every mother wonders how she will give love to a second baby when she already has one. I already had one, and I was wondering how I was going to give enough love to a second one when I got sucker punched with the revelation that I would be having two more.

So now there had to be enough love for three children when I'd only ever loved one. How on earth could I share?

I very quickly learned, before these boys were even born, that they would be forced to share everything in life. They received every gift addressed not to "Hank" or "Harry" but to "Hank and Harry" or "The Twins".

They got nothing of their own. This quickly inspired a project. They had to share a room, but I would, by God, at least let their beds be their own.

Because there were two more mouths to feed, I couldn't go all out buying stuff for them, which was a disappointment, considering they were likely my last babies. So I went to Hobby Lobby and bought cheap cardboard letters to spell out their names above their beds.

We bought their cribs secondhand, but each one of them had a crib. Each one had his own space in their room. They have been in the same beds since they were born, and I've never been prouder of a cheap, easy project.

I was watching them in the floor this past Saturday eating their snacks. They're now a year and change old and as they sat watching the Backyardigans, handing snacks back and forth to each other, simultaneously pushing their trucks around the floor and rolling a ball back and forth, I had never been prouder.

Hank and Harry, twins extraordinaire

At first I thought I was proud of them. They were sharing so nicely. Then I realized I had to be proud of myself. Those two have never had the chance to be selfish, yet they've also never wanted for anything. I've done a great job providing for them and at the same time limiting myself to the sometimes painful constraints of reality.

Sometimes I am surprised. I have a brother who is almost two years to the day younger than I am. Many people thought we were twins when we were younger. We look amazingly like my twin boys in our childhood photos. We are still amazingly close, so it shocks me how I never could have realized how much more my boys will get out of this relationship than I ever thought they could.

My brother Derick and me. We were two years apart, but lots of people thought we were twins. We have a really strong relationship.

After putting their relationship into context, and remembering my own with my brother, I realized I knew a lot more than I thought I did about how great it is that they can share so much. They will always share. They will share clothes, their room, their food, probably girls (ha!), a car, maybe even their first apartment. They will share joys, losses and they will probably be best friends for their whole lives. While they have to give up some sense of individuality, and I have to give up spoiling them as individuals, they are lucky. I am lucky. Our family is lucky. Above everything else, they share a bond and a love that can probably never be destroyed. Not only am I proud of myself, but when I put it in perspective, I find myself a bit jealous of those two as they carry on in their secret language...

How long could this possibly take?

So the twins aren't walking yet. I honestly don't remember when Mitchell walked, but if you've read any of my postings, you know my life was a little different when he was this age. I wasn't as involved.

My back has only gotten worse, and the results that are coming in are suggesting this could be a much worse problem than we thought. The twins passed 25 pounds a while back, and yesterday I accidentally dropped one of them.

They're walking by holding on to one hand, ever so tentatively, but they seem so stubborn about actually taking those first steps. I think they just realize it's easier to crawl.

Developmentally, I know there's nothing wrong with them, but having this back problem sure does make it hard to get them around when they're not getting around on their own little feet. I love them dearly, but I sure do want them to start walking!

The biggest twin problem yet.

As you all remember, about four months ago I had a giant meltdown when I didn't get any sleep for a couple of days. Anyone would. Not sleeping for that long is not healthy.

Husband and I were not on the same page about how to sleep train the twins. He was in favor of a more gentle mode of training, rocking them to sleep at night and then trying to put them down without waking them. I was in favor of balls to the wall, aggressive, letting them scream it out until they got used to it and fell asleep kind of training.

In an earlier post, you've figured out that I believe marriage is all about compromise. So, through my tears, I managed to explain to him that I was willing to do a modified kind of sleep training as long as he could give some from his end too. So I found a book, by a pediatrician, explaining that it was ok to let babies cry it out.

Long story short, we compromised and it worked. Nothing since has been as difficult. I've been blessed with easy babies.

Also as you all know, the babies turned 1 about a month ago. They are starting to walk. They crawl really fast. They're talking right on schedule; they both have lots of words. They're sleeping 12-13 hours a night. They love to snuggle with us. They understand the word no and are incredibly well-behaved 1-year-olds.

The only problem, the only hang-up, is that we are struggling through the eating part of things.

When they got out of the hospital, they ate like champs. Actually, as soon as they got out of my belly they ate like champs. They gave them two ounces of formula right there in the OR to make sure they ate well. And boy did they ever. They both sucked it down in seconds.

At their one-week checkup, the doctor said they were't gaining weight fast enough, so she had us put them on Gerber Good Start. They ate it like it was the best thing they'd ever tasted and both shot up in weight really quickly. The only problem is by about three weeks, they were seeming hungrier and hungrier.

Most docs won't advise solid foods until six months, based on the American Pediatric Ass.'s guidelines, but all three of my babies had to start rice cereal before they were a month old. We put it directly in the bottle.

With the twins, by three months, they had to have baby food. We tried with a spoon at first, and they just weren't coordinated enough to eat it, so we put it in their bottles with their formula. At first, we only did it with the morning bottle and the night bottle, but as they got older, they needed it constantly. By four and a half months, they were eating it in every bottle. We went on like that, adding as much as we could fit in a bottle, until they were around six or seven months old. Then we just started feeding them baby food outside of the bottles and increased their bottles to eight ounces with rice cereal.

In short, they've always eaten a lot, so when we tried to put them on table food and they started to stall out, it frustrated me. For the last couple of months, we've been fighting to get them to eat. Harry is starting to come around and eat pretty much everything we give him. Hank is more picky. He cries and turns his head and screams.

When he does this, it affects Harry. Harry gets upset, and it keeps Harry from eating. WIth one baby, you can negotiate and find things for one baby to eat. With two, by yourself, you have to make sure they're both in a good mood and eating, or one affects the other.

So I haven't figured this whole thing out yet. I've looked for books about this, like I found a book on getting twins to sleep. If such a book is out there, I surely can't locate it. If any of you knows of such a book, I'd owe you eternally for finding it for me!

If I figure this whole thing out, I will, of course, write about it. If any of you other moms of multiples out there knows what to do, please clue me in! This is a serious cry for help. I'm tired of seeing my babies so frustrated with their eating. And I'm tired of being frustrated about their eating. With one baby, I know it's just a phase, but with two, they just feed off each other, with their attitudes, their likes, their dislikes.

So any tips would be appreciated. And if you're not a mom of multiples, don't tell me it's just a phase and they'll get over it! Please! I'll get mad at you. And I don't like being mad at people.

Are Republicans and Democrats like Husband and Wife?

Early in my current marriage, I remember late nights - we're talking 2 or 3 a.m. - fighting with my husband. We had serious things to fight about, as most married couples do in the beginning.

I won't go into the problems, but they had to be resolved in order to make our relationship work. Our relationship was something we were working on together, to make stable, to make emotionally profitable and to sustain the people within it.

So, obviously, this is an analogy. My marriage is only five years old. The United States government is 235 years old, and the people we have put in charge of making it work are not making it work.

They've had 235 years to bicker, to argue and to get over it, but instead of doing what my husband and I did and working through our problems, they continue to fight.

They continue to fight to the detriment of the people who depend on them. And they don't care. This blows my mind. I figure, as long as they're still getting paid, they don't care. They have no stake in this. Money and pride seem to be the main motivators.

I remember those late nights fighting with my husband. I was RIGHT. And I was going to stay right no matter what the cost. I would be tired to parent effectively in the morning. My head would hurt from the lack of sleep. My throat would hurt from the screaming. My eyes would hurt from the crying. But none of that mattered as long as I was right.

Our country will suffer. People will lose jobs. But gosh darn it as long as the Republicans win, or the Democrats win, it'll all be alright.

In Texas, our educational system is on the verge of collapse. Teachers, who used to have the most job security of all, are wondering how they'll feed their families when they lose their jobs and take pay cuts. Parents of special needs children - I am one, so I know - are having a hard time figuring out how the schools will continue to take care of their children. Parents should be worried enough, seeing the product that is coming out of Texas schools right now, but now they have to worry even more when almost everything is taken from their children.

When this is on the verge of happening in Texas, though, you look at the political agenda right now and have to wonder what the heck people are thinking. They're actually fighting about abortion. They're doing this at the national level, too.

Why?

In my mind, this is like my husband's and my fights early in our marriage. We had big issues on the table, and we had small issues on the table, but all of them were important when we just had to be right.

Is abortion as important as saving our government right now? No, not to me it's not. And I'm guessing to the many federal employees who will lose out on a paycheck starting tomorrow it's not as important either.

We're so far in debt it's ridiculous. My husband and I faced a similar problem recently. My company has been on a salary freeze for four years, and we're now looking at at least two more. The hubs is facing budget cuts next year. And because we didn't expect this, we lived beyond our means for a while, and it caught up with us.

The federal government is in the same predicament. What did we do? Because we're five years in with more experience than when we first got married, we took the small stuff off the list and tackled the big problem. We figured out a way to fix things. We compromised. We each gave a little, as we weren't in agreement on how to fix it. We came to a COMPROMISE.

Has the government done this? No. And because of that, we're looking at a possible shutdown tomorrow.

Maybe that's a good thing. If they're shut down, they can't spend any money, right... ?

My first ever real vacation.

I've had a full-time job with benefits for four years now. This is something in my previous life (the one where I never thought I'd make it through college!) I never thought I'd have.

Year one - in 2008 - I didn't get vacation time. I had to make it through one year of employment before I could get paid vacation time.

Year two - in 2009 - I got part of the regular 10 days because I wasn't employed through the whole year of 2008. That year, however, I spent those vacation days on a cot in the PICU with Mitchell as he worked his way through the initial stages of his diagnosis of Type I diabetes. It was rough. It was not a vacation. I was newly pregnant and suffering from morning sickness, all the while camping out in a very uncomfortable room while my baby was hooked up to machines and unconscious most of the time. I also had to puke in a tiny, tiny bathroom that I wasn't even supposed to be using. They made an exception and turned their heads since I was in my first trimester. Coincidentally, I didn't yet know I was having twins. This was about two weeks before I discovered that little fact.

Year three - in 2010 - I had to use my full 10 days of vacation before I could start my disability pay for maternity leave. So I spent it hugely pregnant in bed, alone, in pain and suffering. Bed rest sounds great, but when you've got two huge babies incubating in your guts, it's not too pleasant.

Enter year four. I am pleased to announce that my kids are healthy, and I'm healthy. I knew this year I would get to spend my vacation however I wanted.

I figured I'd take one week in the spring and one in the fall and take off time from both jobs and just enjoy being home with no responsibilities. There was one thing I had to take care of this week, which is why I decided to take off, but it's been taken care of. So the rest of the time was devoted to me. I thought.

Monday, we had a slight panic over money. Everything turned out okay. It ended up being something that happened on the bank's end, but I had to spend the whole day trying to figure out how to handle it. It stunk.

Tuesday was a little better, but I was still trying to shuffle funds and figure out how to get back on track with the bank's mistake. Then I spent all day designing a budget to help us stay on track. The spreadsheet was awesome, if I might say so myself. Formulas and all. A thing of beauty. Yesterday I slept on and off until noon because I woke up with 102 fever. I was sweating through everything. I made it to the drug store to get NyQuil and load up on Red Box movies, but that was about it. Today, I'm feeling a little better and am hoping to salvage the last two days of vacation.

Though it sounds bogus, this is the best vacation I've ever had. I'm catching up on watching movies, I'm napping, I'm reading, I'm relaxing and I've even gotten all of our laundry done. The best part is not having to worry about work at all. And knowing I have another week to try to do this better in the fall. Vacationing is an art form, and I'm learning how to do it well.

Some day my vacations will be spent at the beach, or on a cruise ship. But for now, I'm enjoying getting this whole relaxing thing right. I was able to enjoy some great snuggles before starting my next to last vacation day this morning.

Me and my mini me