Monthly Archives: May 2014

Learning from your mistakes: it takes practice

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Beautiful, but not perfect

Beautiful, but not perfect

I was recently watching a documentary by Stephen Hawking called Into the Universe, and there was a line in it that really struck me. He said “there is no such thing as perfection.” In fact, the creation of the universe was reliant on that fact – if all matter had been perfectly geometrically scattered after the Big Bang, then none of it would have started to clump together to form the beginnings of stars and planets. Everything would have remained in a perfect state of geometry, all pieces of matter equally distant from the next, balancing all gravitational pull. Hawking goes on to say

So next time someone complains that you have made a mistake, tell him that may be a good thing. Because without imperfection, neither you nor I would exist.

It’s not such a radical idea I know. We all say “nobody’s perfect”, but having the very notion of perfection presented as something imaginary, that cannot be found anywhere in the universe, is something that speaks to my annoying perfectionist side.

I’m not a perfectionist about everything – one look at the state my house is in most of the time can tell you that. But I can be hard on myself when I make mistakes. I have even been known to avoid a situation rather than risk making mistakes or making a wrong choice. I am much more comfortable in my familiar academic territory of researching a subject, learning the theory and then trying to apply it, in a perfectly ordered, structured way. And then I had children.

Parents often say “babies don’t come with a manual”, but you know if they did, I would have read it cover to cover, underlining important passages! Nothing slings you in at the deep end like having a baby (or, in my case, two.) For all my baby-book research beforehand, I was utterly clueless when it came to the reality of parenting. Everyday you are faced with the multiple mistakes you make – the only way to learn is trial and error. Not an easy thing for a perfectionist. Any time my babies had too much wind, or didn’t feed well, or vomited, I agonised over what I must have done wrong, and was frustrated that I hadn’t found the right answer. And then finally, just as I would start to feel as though I had got the hang of something, they would insist on growing and developing which meant I had to start from scratch again, learning something new, like weaning or potty-training. At each new stage I was clueless once again, making countless mistakes, feeling like I was making it up as I went along.

My children are six now, and my role as a parent has changed significantly over the years. The balance starts to shift at this age from mainly seeing to their physical needs, towards dealing with emotional and psychological needs. And one of these issues is helping your child learn to learn through their mistakes. You don’t want your children to be perfectionists (perfectionism is, after all, an imperfection!) and you don’t want them to feel bad about making mistakes. I am acutely aware that children learn primarily by example, and if they see me upset by my mistakes, or worse still, impatient with their mistakes, they will feel inhibited to try something new for fear of getting it “wrong.”

Luckily I’ve had six years to get used to making mistakes of my own, and in many ways I have also learnt from my children. I’ve watched them have to learn every single one of their skills through trial and error – after all, no baby comes out of the womb walking, talking and dressing themselves. I have admired how they didn’t give up until they could crawl towards the forbidden electric cables, pick up and swallow that tiny piece of muck, and take my best pair of shoes from my wardrobe and put them on their own little feet. Each one of those was a personal achievement which they never would have managed without practice and patience. Learning through our mistakes is something we are all born innately to do, in order to achieve the many skills we take for granted. I don’t think many of us would blame a toddler for falling over on his 2nd step, or mispronouncing a word; we all know it takes a lot of practise to walk and talk. In fact we often find the mistakes along the way quite entertaining. This is something us perfectionists need to remember when trying to achieve the more complex skills we, and our children, strive for later on.

So what can I do to not inhibit my children’s natural instinct of trial and error, or to mitigate any part of them that may be naturally perfectionist? When I feel I’ve made a mistake, I now try to ask myself afterwards, “What should I do next time that happens?” And then try to stick to it (that’s the hard part!) I don’t hide my mistakes from my children, I tell them when I think I did something wrong, and explain what I think I should do instead next time. I apologise to them if I think I’ve been hard on them for something they didn’t deserve. Initially I thought “Will I damage their image of me if I admit I did something wrong?” but I think what I am doing is giving an honest account of being a grown-up, and being human. We make mistakes, we sometimes make a lot of them, but it’s how we deal with them that counts. And of course, I encourage them to stick at something even if it’s hard and I try not to be impatient with them for not showing speedy improvement.

I still make plenty of mistakes. I wish I were more patient when my children are incredibly slow at getting ready for school. I wish my first thought when something gets spilt or broken wasn’t “why can’t they be more careful!” The main difference now is that I realise there is no such thing as a perfect parent. The best I can hope for is to keep learning to learn from my mistakes, so that I’m not constantly making the same ones, but rather coming up with new mistakes all the time.

So next time you strive for perfection, don’t; the Universe depends on it.

 

The third option: Combining breast and bottle for twins

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1526989_538866736209850_352082975_nThis is a piece I wrote a few years ago when my twins were three. I thought it might be useful for anyone who is about to, or has just had twins and is contemplating the difficult issue of breast- or bottle-feeding. It doesn’t have to be either/or, and after a lot of muddling through, I managed to combine the two with my twins for seven months. It is quite a long piece, but I feel it covers a lot of issues you don’t find in twins books. A shortened form of it appeared in the Tamba magazine in 2011.

My twins are now three years old – life is so much easier now than it was a year ago! The first few months after their birth were the hardest of my life, despite being over the moon to have my “instant family”. Part of what made the time immediately after the birth so difficult (apart from the sleep deprivation and getting over a twin delivery!) was the anxiety and guilt over the decision not to exclusively breast feed my babies. I can look back now and feel happy that I managed to mix breast and bottle-feeding for seven months, but it wasn’t plain sailing partly due the fact that there is almost no information on how to successfully combine breast- and bottle-feeding twins. I muddled through and found a way that worked for me and my babies, but I felt that I wanted to share my experience with twins-mums-to-be in case it can be of any help.

Great expectations

I was always certain that I would exclusively breastfeed any baby I had, and when I discovered I was expecting twins, it never occurred to me that I would treat them any differently than if I had had them as singletons. After reading a couple of books about twins, plus the tiny sections on twins in other baby books, I felt confident that that was not only possible, but straightforward. I’ve since realised it was just the first of many situations where I had to let go of the idea that I could approach raising twins in the same way as raising a singleton.

There is a lot of information available on the benefits of breastfeeding, but next to nothing about bottle-feeding. This is to encourage mothers to breastfeed, and rightly so, however what happens if you find you are unable to? Where is the information on how to choose formula, how to ensure you don’t over-feed your baby, what to look for in a baby bottle? And what about if you don’t want it to be either/or – where is the information on combining the two? This is particularly important when it comes to twins.

No matter how many books you read or advice you listen to, nothing prepares you for the reality of caring for and feeding two newborns. My daughter fed within a few hours of delivery, but my son wasn’t interested. I felt so exhausted from the birth that I probably didn’t persist with feeding them as frequently as I should have within the first 24 hours of birth. This may be a contributing factor to the fact that I simply did not have enough milk to feed my two exclusively, and I never experienced the milk let-down. They lost a lot of weight in their first week, which is common, however they lost up to the maximum that is considered “normal” and were dehydrated.

I tried pretty much everything to build up my milk supply – I ate and drank as much as I could (my hips regretted it later!) I fed the babies frequently – sometimes every hour or hour and a half – which meant I sometimes had no gaps between feeds, because as soon as I finished feeding one baby, the first one was hungry again. I felt that my breasts never had the time to “reload. I then started to feed them simultaneously to save time, but I found breastfeeding very painful at the beginning, partially due to both twins being tongue-tied. Having pain in both breasts at the same time was hard to bear. Also, as a novice at breastfeeding, it was hard to latch one on and then latch on the other – the first one always seemed to slip off, which increased the pain.

Bottle guilt

After a week of this, and my babies still being dehydrated, unhappy and losing weight, the community midwife told me to top them up with a bottle. I was initially reluctant, but I really had no choice as they were not thriving, and they were not receiving enough nourishment from breast milk alone. In a way, it was a relief that I no longer had a choice, but I felt like I had failed at my first task as a mother. I felt guilty that I dreaded each breastfeed because of the pain, and that maybe this had contributed to their failure to get enough nourishment; I felt guilty with every top-up bottle I gave because I felt they weren’t receiving all the benefits of breast milk; I felt like a failure as a mother and as a woman because I alone couldn’t provide the most basic of needs to my newborns. I thought to myself “How would I have cared for them in the wild?” All I can say is sleep deprivation, first-time-mother panic and the guilt of not keeping to the letter of what is recommended is a potent combination for feeling depressed and anxious.

I certainly don’t mean this as doom and gloom, and “look how hard I had it” – all parents of multiples have it hard to start with, and I was very lucky in other ways – mine weren’t premature and I had a lot of support from my husband and my family. I did manage to muddle through and continued to combine breast and bottle until mine were seven months old. Here’s what ended up working for me:

Practical guide to combination feeding

I started out breastfeeding each baby in turn, then passing each to my husband to top them up with a bottle. This didn’t work for me. The whole process used to take about two hours from start to finish, even with two people. I also never knew how much to top up with, and in fact we ended up overfeeding the twins (yes, it is possible with bottles) and they vomited frequently, had bad wind and tummy aches, which didn’t help the colic. I realised at the end of my husband’s four-week paternity leave that this wasn’t sustainable, even with support. I woke up one morning (or night – it’s hard to tell in the early stages!) and realised I had to change the routine if I was going to be able to continue to breastfeed at all.

I decided literally to half breastfeed, half bottle-feed. I would breastfeed one baby and bottle-feed the other for one feed, and then swap over at the next feed. Alternating feeds worked really well for me. It meant if I was on my own, the process of feeding two babies didn’t take so long because bottles went down a lot faster than a breastfeed. I could monitor, at least half of the time, exactly how much the babies were taking, and I knew I would have enough breast milk for a feed now that I wasn’t trying to split each feed between two babies. Also, it meant that if I did have someone else around, they could give the bottle at the same time as I breastfed, which saved a lot of time, especially if we were out and about (the few times we were at the beginning!) It also meant that over-feeding was not such an issue, since I could more or less follow the guidance on the formula packet, without trying to guess how much breast milk they had taken.

I always used to start the feeding cycle with the bottle feed for a few reasons: Firstly, because formula takes longer to digest than breast milk. By starting with a bottle, it meant that it was always the baby who had last had breast milk who would go first, and the one who had taken a bottle would have a longer gap before their feed.  That way, I tried to reduce the number of times I had to sit through one baby crying with hunger while I was feeding the other. It’s not fool-proof! It also meant that the baby that was going second didn’t have to sit through a whole breast-feed (which takes a long time at the beginning) until they got fed. Bouncy chairs were a God-send at that time, and can pacify a peckish baby until his/her sibling has finished (also not fool-proof!)

If either looked like they needed a top-up between feeds, I used to offer the breast, so that I kept my milk supply up and they didn’t start getting more bottle than breast, and then start to reject the breast. It also meant that they weren’t too over-full for the next feed and get out of step with their sibling. My milk supply easily coped with what was the equivalent of feeding one baby. In fact, once my two started to go a little longer between feeds at night, I started to have enough milk in the mornings to breastfeed both (one after the other. I confess I never mastered the art of breastfeeding in tandem). Then at the 11pm (ish) feed, my husband gave two bottles so that I could have some extra sleep.

If it happened that I was giving an odd number of feeds in a day, for example seven, I would alternate daily which baby got four breast feeds in a day so that I didn’t end up with one having more breast than the other. After a while, I actually did end up giving more bottles to my son than to my daughter because he was the hungrier baby, and she was a very windy baby and was more comfortable after a breast feed.

Nights didn’t follow too much of a pattern. I just tried anything to get them to sleep – sometimes just offering the breast so there wasn’t the hassle of preparing bottles, sometimes just giving bottles in the hope that formula would keep them fuller for longer.

Finding a routine

I did have to stick to a feeding routine in order for this to work. I only started doing that when they were a few weeks old – I don’t think newborns are really capable of any routine to start with, and I think muddling through as best you can is probably the only way, until you find something that suits you and your babies. I eventually worked out (with the help of my health visitor) how many feeds the babies needed in a 24-hour period, and tried sticking to a 3- to 4-hourly cycle once they were a few weeks old. Again, this was an adjustment as I never thought I would impose a rigid routine to newborns, however I needed to get the twins in synch somehow, otherwise I really would have lost my mind! I was as flexible as I could be, and did offer top-ups of breast-milk if they were hungry.

It was always a bit of a juggle when the babies grew out of one routine and needed a new one, for example, when they were ready to drop a feed. It’s difficult to tell if they are ready to drop a feed if you have them in a routine and not feeding on demand. You end up being afraid of changing the routine in case it messes everything up and your babies end up cranky, and you more tired. Again, I had a good health visitor who helped me with that.

Concerns over nipple rejection

I am very lucky that my babies took so easily to combining breast and bottle, because I know that some won’t take to bottles at all, and some won’t go back to the breast once they have had the quick and easy flow of a bottle teat. I don’t know if I had particularly easy babies in that respect, or if I by chance introduced the bottle at the right time for them to accept both. I can only tell you what worked for my babies.

I introduced the bottle after they had been exclusively breastfed for one week. I thought that would be too soon, but it worked fine. If you introduce the bottle very late (say, a month or two down the line) they apparently may not take to it at all, however I obviously personally don’t have any experience to say that authoritatively. The type of bottle I used may be significant – there are a few on the market that say they are suitable for combination feeding. I personally used the Tommee Tippee “Closer to Nature” bottles, which to me looked the most like a breast(!) These served me very well.

I also tried to replicate the latching-on to a breast when I bottle-fed. I would rub the teat by their lips, and wait for the babies to open their mouths for the bottle, rather than shoving it in so that they didn’t get out of the habit of opening their mouths to latch on to the breast. I didn’t do that all the time, because sometimes you just want to take advantage of the faster bottle and get it done quickly. This is probably the only problem I did have with combination feeding – my babies sometimes didn’t try to latch on properly to the breast. This problem did resolve itself, and eventually they did swap between the two as if it were second nature to them.

Happily ever after

I managed to keep going like this for six months, and then I gradually weaned them off the breast when I felt ready, and when I felt my babies were ready. After a while, I looked forward to breastfeeding my babies, because it no longer became a source of guilt, stress or pain. It did become a lovely feeling of closeness between the babies and me that no one else can feel.

I hope that this opens up a third option to twin-mums that isn’t discussed in many books. I’m sure there are a lot of different ways of combining breast and bottle, and if that is what you want to do you will find your own way that works. I only wanted to show that it doesn’t have to be an either/or situation, and share the practicalities of how I went about it. I also hope to prevent other twins-mums who may not be able to breastfeed exclusively, from feeling the guilt that I went through. If your babies have received any breast milk at all, you are doing really well, because it is far from simple with more than one baby, and, I believe, practically impossible if you are not receiving support from others. In any event, your babies are not going to remember whether you breast-fed or bottle-fed them, but whether you provide comfort and love. There is so much more to being a mother. I hope my experiences are helpful to you, but do whatever is right for you and your babies.

 

In a nutshell

  • Breastfeed one baby and bottle feed the other at each feed.
  • Alternate which baby gets the bottle or breast at each feed.
  • Start with the bottle feed since formula takes longer to digest than breast milk.
  • Try to get your baby to latch on to the bottle as if it were a breast.
  • Don’t feel guilty about not following the guidelines to the letter.

 

Flying with Kids – Top Ten Tips

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ImageIt’s soon going to be holiday season, and I thought I would write a few tips about flying with young children. I have been doing long haul flights with my twins since they were three years old to visit family abroad, so my husband and I have negotiating airports and planes with young children down to a fine art.

Here are my Top 10 Tips:

  1. Be prepared for airport hell, but know it is short-lived. Bear in mind when you arrive at the airport you will have your luggage, your hand luggage, your children’s hand luggage, car seats, possibly a stroller, and children to contend with. It’s not a pretty sight. There is no such thing as travelling light with kids, and people are not always eager to help or be patient with slow-moving meandering children. It’s ok. You will get through it, and once you are through security it’s a breeze.
  1. Trunkis are fantastic!! The airport itself is the worst bit of the journey. There’s usually a lot of walking, queuing, waiting and mad dashing. Having a trunki your child can sit on when waiting for security, or be pulled along on when their legs are tired is a godsend. They are a mixed blessing, as you will find if you pull your child too fast on it you may lose them as you round a corner. And there is a very strong possibility you will find yourself carrying the trunki, your hand luggage and your child, but on the whole they are a help. Plus children LOVE to pack them like a grown-up.
  1. Plan your hand luggage. Having a good hand luggage system is something I have refined over the years. I recommend that everyone take one small item of hand luggage that can fit under the seat in front of them, in addition to any normal hand-luggage case they take. That includes the kids. You want these small bags to have anything you are regularly going to need for the journey – toys, tissues, books, wipes, medicines… Anything you are not likely to need during the journey, put in the overhead locker. You don’t want to be messing around getting bits you need from those bags either as you get on the plane or during the flight. This is the best way to make your flight time easy and stress-free. I have a small vanity I take for that purpose, and each child has a trunki in the overhead locker and a small backpack under the seat with toys for the journey. I don’t know why it took me several flights to work that one out!
  1. Pack a change of clothes for the kids in the hand luggage. Just in case.
  1. Let normal rules go out the window. So they want to eat their dessert first – so be it! All children presented with a tray with all the courses in one go would choose dessert first and spoil their appetite. I like to spoil myself on a flight, and your kids will be that much happier if you let them spoil themselves too!
  1. Bring a few snacks. Airlines don’t give as much food on planes as they used to, and the gaps between meals can be a bit long for the children (and adults!) Think biscuits and cereal bars rather than chocolate or yoghurts. You’re going to be in the same clothes for a while, and it’s easier to clean off crumbs. Plus, if your plane is delayed you don’t want starving children to contend with. Consider buying some bottled water once through security, as you can’t pack any in your hand luggage.
  1. Locate the sick bags as soon as you get to your seat. You’ll be thankful of those extra seconds if the time comes.
  1. Plan simple things to keep your children busy. A plain notebook and some crayons (no felt tips!!) can be the source of endless entertainment, and is open-ended so they can use it in a variety of ways. Avoid things with small pieces like lego or Barbie’s shoes, as you will be spending your whole time picking them up from under your, or some increasingly annoyed passenger’s, seat. Of course ipads can be great, but the battery doesn’t last long! Stories, colouring-in books and sticker books are also great, and can be brought out in the airport easily too. (Did I mention the airport is the worst part?)
  1. Bring a variety of toys/entertainment, but don’t show it all at once. Keep the mystique so you can get their attention if needs be. If your kids are happy watching lots of TV, lucky you, you’ll have a peaceful flight. I recommend getting a few new items as gifts, removing any packaging first. It doesn’t have to be expensive – a new notebook, a fun pencil, an activity book. I wouldn’t bother wrapping them as then you are left stuffing wrapping paper in all available spaces.
  1. Choose things that don’t need too much adult intervention – you want to be able to watch the movies! This may sound selfish, but being on a plane is the closest thing I get to luxury – someone is not only cooking my food, but giving it to me and tidying it away at the end! And I’m allowed, even encouraged, to eat in silence in front of the TV! Where else do you get that opportunity? So no, this is one occasion where I am not reading lots of stories to my children. They are busy drawing, colouring in or watching TV.

 

 

 

 

Twindividuals

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There is a line in The Sunscreen Song by Baz Luhrmann which goes “Don’t congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either.” I often think of that in reference to bringing up children. It’s easy to view any positive behaviour your child displays as being evidence that you did something right, and any negative behaviour to be a testament to your failure. I think having twins is a trial by fire which teaches you very quickly that the influence you have as a parent is limited. That first year may be gruelling for the lack of sleep and colic in stereo, but you learn very quickly that what works for one baby does not necessarily work for another, something that may take longer to learn if you have just the one.

I remember at the few baby groups I managed to get out of the house for, a major topic of conversation among new mothers was how long their baby slept. There was always some mother there who claimed her newborn slept seven-to-seven, which seemed to be the Holy Grail of newborn sleep. There was a certain false modesty to how they would say it that showed they thought they had cracked the secret to baby sleep. It left the other mothers (who were the majority) asking her to reveal her secrets, and feeling that they had missed something. I personally believe those mothers of fantastic baby sleepers probably were doing the sorts of things any of the mothers were doing, but had babies who were naturally good sleepers. I also have a sneaky suspicion they had babies who weren’t very hungry and could bring up burps like little troopers. You feel so lost, sleep-deprived and out of your depth when you first have a baby that you keep looking for the miracle answer to having a contented baby. Of course the truth is, there is no one right answer.

From the moment my twins were born they had different personalities and needs. My son wanted to be held all the time, and would cry if left alone. My daughter was more laid back, as long as she wasn’t suffering from colic. My son would get cold very easily, my daughter too hot. My son was ravenous every 2 hours, my daughter had to be coaxed to feed. And as for sleeping, well they did have that in common: they didn’t like it at all, and certainly not at the same time. Here I was performing my own psychological experiment of nature versus nurture, and nature was by far the big winner.

I’m not saying that as parents we don’t have influence over our children. Of course we do. It’s just that the form that influence takes is dependent on the individual baby. I’m sure you could take a naturally good sleeper and manage to create an environment that would make it very difficult for he or she to sleep. But on the whole, if you’re not doing anything drastically detrimental, whether your baby sleeps when you want them to will be down to their own physiology and personality. Likewise with how well they feed, how well they take to weaning, how easily they are potty trained, how sociable they are… the list goes on.

Each one of the milestones I went through with my twins showed me how a person’s approach to any situation is completely dependent on the individual. I still remember my twins’ first taste of carrot – my son gave me this wide-eyed appalled look that something other than milk had been unceremoniously put in his mouth. He then burst into tears when we laughed at his funny expression. My daughter opened her mouth, swallowed the carrot, looked faintly bored, and opened her mouth for another mouthful. Their two reactions demonstrate very effectively their two very different approaches to new situations, which persists even now. It was programmed into them at birth.

I need to make sure I cater my parenting to my twins’ individual needs, recognising that each one has their own likes, dislikes, abilities and weaknesses that are entirely unique to each of them. My aim is not to mould them into my own idea of what they should be. My job is to encourage their best traits to blossom, and help them mitigate traits that are obstacles to their wellbeing, whatever those traits may be. So next time someone congratulates me on how well my children have behaved in public, I mean it genuinely when I say it is all them, not me.