When I found out I was expecting twins I got all the books I could find on multiple births out of the library. All three of them. There are more but they tend to be American and therefore…well, you get the idea. Actually one of the three is American but beggars can’t be choosers as…someone…once said.
Now I’m a seasoned veteran of the whole twin thing (cough, splutter, guffaw with laughter), I have decided to revisit the books to see how they compare to our real-life experience.
So, first up for “assessment” is Double trouble: twins and how to survive them by Emma Mahony. This is the book that mums of multiples recommend to others. It is written by a mother of twins who is a twin herself, in an informal style with lots of serious information balanced by lots of anecdotal, jokey stuff.
This is the book that advocated the wonderfulness of breastfeeding in such a warm, easy way that I ordered dh to Ikea to buy me a SPECIAL CHAIR to put in the girls’ room so that I could tandem feed the girls comfortably whilst gazing out of the window contentedly in earth mother mode as the sun came up. He didn’t argue. I was 32 weeks pregnant at the time. I wouldn’t have argued with me either.
I only tandem breastfed once. In hospital. In recovery. Full of lots of lovely morphine and other drugs. I was TERRIBLE at night feeds. In fact, I was an absolute monster who cursed loudly and repeatedly during the whole sorry process. I swear the girls only started sleeping through because I was so awful at night. The chair has been moved to the living room, where it doesn’t match the other furniture. I know many women manage to tandem breastfeed twins successfully, but they aren’t stuck with a mismatched (albeit lovely and very comfortable) Ikea chair afterwards.
As for her chapter on ‘help’, oh don’t even get me started. I think my au pair got lost in the post from the Ukraine. Shall I tell you what ‘help’ we have? Precisely sod all. The girls go into nursery three days a week because I work but also it’s for our sanity. We wouldn’t get a break otherwise and I’m firmly convinced that if they didn’t go to nursery I would have done a Reggie Perrin approximately three months ago.
Also, I didn’t float around in a Ghost dress during the latter stages of my pregnancy! Nor did I raid the local deli every day – I barely managed to keep water down at one stage let alone a quiche!
So, this book is an entertaining read and is far more accessible than the drier, ‘everything can and will go wrong’ more serious books on multiple pregnancy and birth. However, aside from a fairly short chapter on the ‘fourth trimester’, the first year with twins isn’t covered in any great detail and this was the stage I really wanted to know more about.
However, if you live in Highgate, your hubby manages a hedge fund in the City and you have room for a nanny in your three storey house, this is the book for you! Ah, I’m just being a little bit grumpy. This book is very positive about multiple pregnancy and birth and you take from it what will be relevant to your circumstances. There’s far worse out there but I’ll come to that later...