Going it alone

Our maid Daisy took her well deserved day off yesterday. That meant it was all hands on deck for Packrat and I. We entered the day with great trepidation because even with the 3 of us, the two bubs can be quite a handful. Anyway, we prayed, took a deep breath and dived headlong into the day, telling ourselves that no matter how endless the day might seem, it would eventually end.

Knowing fully that Daisy was going out at 9, I woke up early just to get ahead of things, take a shower, express and get dressed. Then I dragged Packrat out of bed to do the same. He wasn't too pleased seeing that we got home late the night before but I wasn't going to be the only one staring bleakly into the day ahead.

We had the day all planned out. We'd go to church. Then, after church, we'd go to my in laws for lunch, then a quick stop home to pick up milk for the bubs and a quick feed before heading off East to my aunt, who was back from Bangkok and then to my brother's (also in the East) for dinner. It was planned such that, apart from church, there would be other people to take the babies off our hands. We had even fantasised about going to get the car washed and ice cream from Ice-Cream Chefs, our new favourite ice cream haunt after The Daily Scoop. Of course, like all well laid plans, they never work.

We didn't anticipate that the bubs would be so restless and needy yesterday. They constantly demanded to be carried and putting them in their car seats elicited great screams of disapproval and dismay. They ended up screaming from Holland all the way over the Sheares bridge to Siglap because they had disrupted sleep the entire day. Every time they fell asleep somewhere, they got moved. Very unsettling. It wasn't their fault that they were testy, we take full responsibility for that but boy, can they scream their little lungs out! By the time we got to the aunt's house, they were exhausted from the crying and Jordan eventually passed out in Packrat's arms. Evan who was just a little bit less cranky spent a better part of the hour looking around, an hour where he should have been sleeping, but you try telling that to a barely 3 month old bub.

By the time we got to my brother's, the both of us were too tired to go out again and we were so thankful that Daisy was already there and ready to take the bubs off our hands. I think both of us could have fallen to the ground and kissed her feet in relief to see her. Even though the both of us did not lose our cool with one another or the bubs the whole day, we were feeling the strain, especially me since I was sitting in the middle of the screaming and surround sound screaming, despite how much you try and tune it out, is designed to get onto your nerves. I think only at that point, when their means of resting no longer started and stopped in accordance to traffic rules did the 2 finally settle down for bed. And even then, there was general all around testiness. Packrat and I let some of the stress bleed out from us, him by passing out on the couch, much to the amusement of the men in my family and me by going down to the Cold Storage and buying 20 bucks of breakfast food just to wind down.

Thankfully, the day did end even if I had to come home and express before going to bed and knowing that my internal boob clock would wake me up in a couple of hours even if my exhausted daughter slept through the night as she was wont to do after a day of sleeplessness. Packrat and I did spend a few minutes in bed looking back at the day, in a manner shell shocked soldiers from the front, thankful to be alive at the end of the battle try to make come to terms with what they had just experienced. And we arrived at these conclusions:

1. Even though it was extremely exhausting and back breaking (literally, my back hurts from all the rocking I did through the day and Packrat's arm hurts from carrying either one or the other of them through the day), we're more in love with our children than before and I think we understand that little bit better- there's no better way to learn than being thrown in the deep end.

2. Our maid must never go off again! Haha, no. The next time our maid goes off, we'll need to plan help a little bit better. Even though it's possible for the both of us to look after the 2 bubs, it's physically and emotionally draining and tough to face a work day the next day. As if Mondays weren't hard enough.

3. Days like that when I have no time to express causes my milk supply to take quite a hit. The bubs are supposed to be more effective in draining the milk than the breast pump but my bubs are lazy and generally take enough to not be hungry anymore rather than taking enough to be full for the next 3 hours.

4. This one came from me and I don't think Packrat agrees with it all that much- We NEED to move back EAST cos that's where my family is. When we got married and we moved to where we are, close to his parents, I made it tearfully, sorrowfully and mournfully clear that I was only doing this once and the next home we bought had to be in the East because I missed my family far too much. This fact, for many reasons, not just yesterday has been recently hammered home very loudly.

Anyway, the day did come to an end, we did make it through, the bubs are none the worse for wear and we live another day.

Here are the two bubs, showing total displeasure for being trapped in the car seats so much of the time yesterday. I don't have any screaming ones because when they were screaming, I felt like I was at a tennis match...

Placate child on the right, placate child on the left, placate child on the right, placate child on the left...

Rinse and Repeat from house to church, church to in-laws, in laws to home, home to Aunt's house, Aunt's house to brother's house. Thankfully the last trip, brother's house back home, Daisy was in the car and the bubs were too pooped to utter a squeak. That was when I took a 10 minute nap.






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