Merry Christmas

Twins at Home

Sleeping was a luxury after the twins came home. We each had a baby in a basinet beside the bed. They would only sleep a little at a time and I found more and more that I had to just bring my baby into bed with me to get them to stay asleep. Trouble is I can’t sleep great with a baby right against me since I’m so careful about rolling, etc. After ten days Lucy went home and my parents came back up for a week. My dad didn’t know it yet, but he was in the middle of a lot of his health problems at the time. He had a lot of trouble breathing and we all thought it was elevation sickness at first. It was kind of scary when they went home and we were all alone with six kids and I was going back to work. Our friends in the ward at church helped out again quite a bit. Rhys got rides to preschool and we had dinners brought over. Women would come over most mornings and help Ann out for an hour or so.

I watched out for the babies’ weight pretty carefully for the first couple of months. They gained steadily, but Tara always seemed so much further ahead. It was a crazy time. Little sleep and the house was always a mess. The kids would forget to get their homework turned in or were otherwise neglected. The schedule for me was to get up and help the girls get off to school, go to work, come home and help out with the kids, and then go to bed. On Saturdays we would try to catch up on house work and on Sundays we would go to church which was the most exhausting activity of all. Within a month of coming home, Brigid had gained almost two and a half pounds—but Tara was still a couple pounds ahead.

The other kids were very happy to have the babies home. I was the most surprised at Teague, who loved them right away. He was never jealous or mean, but wanted to hold them and hug them as much as anyone else. Here’s a post Ann made about Rhys’s reaction:

Rhys: Mom, we're rich.

Me: We are?

Rhys: Yes, because we have these babies, they are so cute. That makes us rich.

I love this boy.

The girls have been a big help to us although the complaining started after just a couple of days. When they were at first super keen to bottle feed the twins, it soon became old hat. They pleaded to be able to dress the babies and then it became too hard. They wanted to feed them solids and soon after complained about the mess. It’s kind of hilarious. We kept venturing more and more with the twins. Ann finally let the helping visits and the meals lapse. We went to a bounce house place for Teague’s birthday. She took both boys and the twins out shopping. She even took all the kids to the splash pool. Having the twins at home finally became normal.

In mid June, Ann’s Grandfather passed away somewhat unexpectedly. I had known him for over twelve years and we were very friendly so it hit me pretty hard too. We agonized about going down for the funeral, but since we were to see everyone for the babies’ blessings and at a family reunion soon after we sat it out. On the weekend of July 4^th we went down and spent time with family and blessed the twins in Gary and Lucy’s ward. It all went pretty well and I felt while blessing them that the pair was certainly sent and preserved to fulfill an important mission for the Lord. During this visit my entire family including spouses and kids managed to make it over to my parents’ house in Prescott. It was the first time in a while and the last time probably for quite some time. Later that month I had my marathon work day. An important system went down and it baffled everyone for a while. My counterpart was on vacation in Europe, so he couldn’t help. I was working for 38 hours straight. It was a great time. Poor Ann had to ask friends for help to get everyone to bed two nights in a row.

Meagan wanted a makeover party for her birthday so while all the party goers and Ann’s friends made over, Kevin and I took the twins and our boys to the movies. It was an experience. We went to Zookeeper thinking it was a kids’ movie, but it’s not. The boys ran all over the place, the babies wouldn’t sleep. I think I lost ten pounds during it, but at least Meagan had a nice party. The next day she got a horseback riding lesson.

The babies’ room was finally painted/decorated in late May and we started using for them to actually sleep in August. It was scary, but it worked out pretty well and they got in a better sleeping scheduling within a couple of weeks. Teague was no help during this phase; he kept opening things and spreading them all over (like baby power, pink nail polish, and baby oil). In September we took the babies with us for an overnight in Park City for Ann’s birthday. They did pretty well, even at the expensive restaurant we went to with Delani and Steve.

A lot for drama and stress came in September and October over our renters who took over after Rich and his family moved to Alpharetta. They never paid any rent after they moved in and the vibe we got of how the house was being treated was a big worry. In the end we finally got them out, but we felt like we had to get down there to oversee the cleanup. The house was in a pretty awful state and the yard was hideous. We went back to AZ for a visit and I worked like 14 hour days trying to get things back in shape. I had a lot of help from family for which I’m grateful. Even after all that work, there were still more things I had to outsource to my dad and brother Jim to finish it off. Even after that, the agency we hired still had to do a few more things. What kind of a sick person takes the silverware tray out of a dishwasher?

Tara and Brigid have had a developmental specialist coming a couple times a month to measure and help their progress. They struggled at first, but have now caught up. At ten months old they are ahead of their developmental age. Still small, though. They crawl and cruise and sit and babble a lot. Brigid even growls sometimes. I’d like to go through and list what all we’re interested in and doing with our lives, but we pretty much all have the same interests right now. We like to do house work, stay at home, and take care of babies. This very trying year is coming to a close and we’re all healthy, happy, and together. With everything that has gone on in the last year I’ve got to say I’m pretty grateful.

Twins at NICU

Overnight there was a big outpouring of support and prayers to Ann’s own Facebook post about the babies being born. I was able to go home and see the kids that morning; I could tell Fiona had been pretty worried. Teague was really clingy to me at that phase and he seemed kind of angry that we’d been separated so long. Rhys and Meagan were pretty unphased by the panic of the previous day, but were excited about the babies. I showered and changed and went to IMC to see the twins. They seemed a bit better, but they were still hard to get a very good look at since they were covered in tubes, monitors, and bandages over their breathing tubes and eyes. I stayed for over an hour, initially listening to the nurses explain what was going on and how they were doing. I kept hearing the phase “very sick babies”. Even though we were having a free service take the twins’ picture “just in case” the worst happened, I was no longer worried about their survival and while the nurses remained pretty noncommittal I could tell they weren’t worried about it either. Lucy and Denise came to see they twins and got to spend a little time there too.

I got back to Ann and she seemed to be doing a lot better. She was still pale, but since watching her eat her breakfast with a will before I left, I felt pretty optimistic that she would recover quickly. She was super anxious to get to see the babies. The next day, Friday the 25^th, she was allowed a short field trip to go and see them. We got to see what rounds were like where the entire medical team gets together and they talk about all the numbers and progress for every specialty. Ann was delighted to see the twins, but our contact with them still had to be somewhat limited. I had to keep reminding her not to stand too long (she was getting around in a wheel chair for the first few days). She posted this after the visit: I got to see my babies today and touch their little hands and fuzzy heads. They are so small but are improving every day. I'm might have overdone it a bit but now I get to rest. Sorry I'm not responding to everyone's posts but know that we feel the strength from you and that it makes a difference to us and the girls. Thank you.

She was released the next day and got to go home and rest. We of course went again to see the babies, they had both been extabated and appeared to be gaining some strength. The next day was a very difficult one. One of the nursed noticed some discoloration on Brigid’s tummy. They took an x-ray and determined that she had some type of perforation in her intestine (NEC or SIP). So the hospital decided to send her to Primary Children’s Hospital via ambulance. So we waited at home to hear news about what they were planning to do. We knew that the usual treatment would be bowel surgery. Thinking about how very small Brigid was, this weighed on me quite heavily. I went into my closet to pray for a while. After a time, I felt an assurance that not only would Brigid be alright, but that there was nothing wrong with her. When we heard back from the hospital, they were unable to find the same symptom in the x-ray. They decided to wait and keep checking, three days they thought before she’d be able to return home. She even pulled out her breathing tube somehow and was able to breathe room air.

In the next few days we were able to hold both babies and change their diapers. Denise and Kevin stayed with us until Sunday and Lucy stayed ten days. I was pretty careful with Ann to make sure she got some little exercise and a whole lot of rest. We went to see the babies basically every day. Tara got to start breastmilk feedings through a tube that went down her nose after just a few days and she did pretty well from the beginning. She struggled a bit more with breathing on her own. The blood and goo from aspirating and swallowing blood at birth kept passing into diapers and also had to be sucked out of the lungs. They were on and off the UV lights during the first couple of weeks. Visiting both babies was very time intensive. If we wanted to be with each baby for 45 minutes a day, it took us five hours from leaving our house to returning. More often than not, Ann wanted to stay longer than that so our days were kind of killed. When Lucy left, the ward and other friends and neighbors started bringing in dinners. We definitely got a lot of attention in our time of need.

After ten days, they finally started feeding Brigid. She seemed to do ok at first. Each feeding was really only a teaspoon. With Lucy gone, I started watching the kids about every other day and Ann would go in on her own. This would actually take longer since when I drove her I would drop her off and park the car and then leave before her so I could get the car and wait for her by the exit. I wanted to be with the babies, of course, but more than anything I wanted them to get better and come home. I felt that spending time with their mom was the best way to do that. A bunch of my folks came to stay with us around this time: my parents, Wendy and her daughters. We also had Fiona’s birthday party. Despite the situation with the babies in the hospital, we still let her have friends come over and go to the movie etc.

Brigid had a real struggle in mid-March. She wasn’t digesting her milk and was becoming somewhat lethargic. She got into a phase where her oxygen level was unsteady and her red blood cell count was very low. We sat through rounds with the medical team as this was discussed and they patiently explained everything to us. What was decided was not to give her another transfusion, but to wait and take no more blood from her and also to go ahead and increase her feedings. This actually turned out to be the best thing. After about a week, she had turned a corner and was finally digesting her breastmilk and her levels had risen with the help of some medicine. At last on March 22^nd, after just over three weeks, Brigid finally returned to IMC much to our relief. The problem was that since she had only done so-so with feedings up to then she had gained very little weight while Tara was packing it on. We knew she might stay in the NiCU for a long time.

We kept going to the hospital, I kept trying to work but had a hard time getting much done during this time. We finally bought our new van in late March because our Town & Country only had seven seats. Ann would get babysitters from the ward to watch the boys and Denise would come down a lot so that I could work and she could see the twins. We had a lot of people help us. The babies kept doing better and better and gaining weight. They got to the point that they really just had to gain a bit more weight and learn to keep themselves warm. The nurses were all amazed at how much milk Ann could pump. We froze it and stocked the babies’ freezer and our own freezers were jam packed with it. Around this time I was able to take the other kids to the hospital and we climbed a snowy set of stairs (almost a fire escape) to the window of the babies’ room. They got to see the twins through the glass, but it was a trying experience for me.

Teague was a tough kid to watch for many of his babysitters. His worst offence was the day before my birthday. He was up playing with Rhys and their cousin Gregary in their room when he slipped away without Denise noticing. He got in the bathroom, clogged the toilet and started flushing away. It was soon just running steadily. It flooded that bathroom and leaked down to our hall bathroom and then leaked into our basement. The carpet was soaked. At first I thought we’d have to replace it, but after a lot of shopvac’ing we rented a bunch of carpet fans and ran them solid for four days. They finally were nice and dry. Not quite the thing we needed with everything else going on.

Tara got to come home in mid-April and in reality, although we were thrilled, it was harder to have one home and one in the hospital than it was at any other phase. Luckily, Karalee came up to help us during this time and took some of the pressure off. Brigid started doing really well once Tara left. She was off of oxygen within a few days and started taking her full feeds. We started hoping she would be able to come home too. She gained weight steadily but was still less than four pounds. Tara was almost six pounds when we brought her home. At long last on April 22^nd after two months in the NiCU, Brigid came home. We took in Banbury donuts to the staff and went through the release process. It took a while, but we were finally able to bring her home. Lucy had actually come back by that time and we went straight to the doctor’s office to get Brigid’s weight checked on their scale. Unfortunatley, they can’t do this for new patients, so I waited in the car with Tara for like an hour while they got Brigid in for a regular appt and then checked her weight. It was a huge relief to park in the garage and carry the babies together into the house.

Twins Delivery

At 2:26pm Ann texted me saying she’d been having contractions every 8 minutes since noon. 30 minutes later, she texted me saying she might call the doctor and asking me to come home. I had already been shutting things down at work and left right away. When I got home, Delani had gone home. Ann still hadn’t gotten a hold of the doctor. The contractions seemed to be slowing down, from the time I got there they were 11, 15, and 12. I was trying to find the doctor’s number in Ann’s cell phone, but a sync or something had erased it. We knew that it was way too early to deliver and so I was trying to get her to relax and try to take her mind off of it. I brought her to the bedroom and had her lay down. I put on a movie and gave her some of the Dove dark chocolate she likes. Teague was running around in the room with us and the other kids were upstairs watching a movie.

I was starting to look on the web to try to find her doctor’s number when I saw Ann’s eyes bulge and she said, “I’m going to throw up!” She got out of bed and started for the bathroom, but she kind of stumbled and went down on her hands and knees. She started breathing really heavy and saying, “I can’t breathe!” I tried to sooth her, telling her that she was indeed breathing, but she went on to the next thing. She was feeling terrible pain in her back. I lifted her and started walking her back to the bed, Teague was still running around and I had to move him out of the way. I called for Fiona to come down right away. I told Ann I thought she was having back labor and that we ought to get a hold of the doctor right away and go to the hospital. When Fiona came down I told her to take Teague upstairs, forcibly if necessary. She started to cry a bit when she saw Ann gasping and grunting in pain. I told Fiona everything would be alright, but I needed her help to watch the other kids. I asked Ann if she’d arranged for someone to take the kids in an emergency (as I had asked her to do weeks before). She said Jamie Smith had agreed so I called her at 4:04pm and told her I’d be bringing the kids over soon. Jamie was available and perfectly willing.

I had stripped Ann from the waist down to check and see if there was any dilation or anything, initially afraid the babies were coming right away. There was no labor-like progress, so I was relieved at first. But within just a couple of minutes, she screamed that her water had broken. I checked and saw that just a small pool of blood had formed—maybe 2oz. I told her it was blood and my worry resumed. I put the bathroom hand towel under her and called for Fiona again telling her to get ready, that I had to take them to the Smith’s house. She was crying even more, I tried to reassure her telling her to be strong, and that I was counting on her. Ann too was freaking out and I said that she was in charge and could control her breathing. Within a couple minutes more, Ann said she was sure that her water had broken and that she could feel it flowing. I checked again (I had been covering her with the bedspread). There was a lot more blood—at least three times what had been there at first. I told Ann what I saw and she told me to call an ambulance. I don’t recall even really taking time to decide. I knew that my only option was to take her to the hospital myself and right away. I told her I wanted to go to the ER at Riverton (it’s just a few miles away) instead of Murray where she was supposed to deliver.

I helped her get up, but when she stood a big stream up blood fell to the carpet and trickled down her legs which scared her terribly. Realizing how quickly she needed to be at a hospital, I put the towel between her legs and put her sweat pants back on. I started to carry her to the car, but she said it was hurting her to bend her stomach, so I let her walk with my support to the garage, down the steps and not wanting to walk her any more I put her in the Accord because it was closer. I went back inside and the kids were sort of halfway down the stairs. I grabbed the boys and urged the girls to hurry. I carried the boys to the Accord and shoved them in the back seat. Fiona and Meagan were quick to get in and Fiona still had a terrible look of worry on her face and tears streaming down her cheeks. Ann continued to moan and scream as the pain in her back continued. I asked Ann if she’d gotten a bag ready for the hospital (again a request I’d made along with the arranging for someone to take the kids). She told me where it was, I rushed in and grabbed it along with my laptop bag, since it was on the way back to the garage door. I threw these in the trunk and ran out to the car.

I figured it would take less time for me to take the kids to the Smith’s than to try to find a neighbor or someone to come over to wait with them. So, I drove the 200 yards to their house, and opened the door. I hadn’t taken the time to buckle them in or anything, so when I opened the rear door of the Accord, Rhys fell out having been leaning against the door. Luckily he didn’t hit is head or anything. I scooped him up and grabbed Teague and ran to the door calling for the girls to follow. Jamie opened the door and I told her what was going on and handed Teague over to her. He started crying and reaching immediately as always, but I said goodbye as I ran back to the car. I couldn’t drive very fast because I was in the neighborhood. I took Oakmond south to get to 118^th and despite Ann’s panicked state, she still had it in her to tell me I wasn’t going the right way. I told her I was taking a more direct route and once on 118^th pushed my speed up to around 50mph.

We stopped at the light at 126^th where I wanted to head east. I took the time to reach out and give her a blessing telling her that she would be able to control her body and have strength and courage, although I had had my doubts I also blessed her and the babies that they would survive and eventually resume good health. In just another minute or two, we were pulling into the hospital. Ann was still coherent enough to tell me where the ER entrance is. I parked in the driveway and ran in to get a wheel chair. The waiting room was totally empty and there was just one receptionist sitting at the desk. I told her that my wife was in labor and bleeding and grabbed a wheelchair. I brought it outside, set Ann into it, and rushed her inside. The receptionist said she had run back to get someone and that I could go park the car and run back in, that she would help me find Ann once I got back. I ran and parked quite quickly since the lot was practically empty.

Ann was gone when I got back inside, but the door opened for a middle-aged couple who were exiting. I recognized the husband as a guy I knew from work, but his name escaped me and I just said hello and walked through the doors. I turned a corner and saw Ann down a ways next to a nurses’ station. I receptionist saw me and said, “There he is,” to the nurses as I approached. A tall orderly had Ann’s wheelchair and he’d been given a room assignment already. We walked to the elevators; Ann was still groaning and crying. The orderly punched the wrong floor at first and we had to wait for the doors to open and close before we continued up to the right floor.

She was brought to a room and put on a bed. Nurses came in with us and started taking vitals, asking me for background, and trying to start an IV. I told them that England was her former doctor and local and they decided to call him since he serviced that hospital and should be close. Although they put Ann in a hospital gown, removing all her clothing from the waist up, they kept her pants on. She was there only about 5 minutes before she vomited up the chocolate I had given her earlier. After about another 5 minutes she told us all she was going to pass out and did for about a minute and a half. Ann told them she was sure she was still bleeding and seemed frustrated that no one was checking. I called Ann’s sister Denise at 4:33 and asked her to come down to take care of the kids. She didn’t grasp the severity of the situation at first (I’m at little too even in a crises apparently) and was worried about missing the recording that night with Choir. I explained a little more and she told me she’d get some things together and call me when she left. The nurses continued to talk about getting a doctor in as soon as possible. Dr England was at home and the doctor onsite was busy and less qualified for the anticipated procedure (I conjecture).

About 20 minutes after arriving at the hospital, Dr. England entered the room. He got the lowdown from the nurses then turned to me to ask what had gone on. After some quick explanation, he decided to check Ann. When her pants were pulled off everyone’s face changed in horrified surprise. Ann had bled profusely and had big, black blood clots sitting between her legs. Dr England turned to me and said they needed to do an immediate c-section. As they prepped to take her out, he went out to don scrubs and wash his hands. When he was back and they were starting to wheel her out, he told me that they had to move so quickly they’d need to put her under general anesthesia which meant I would have to wait where I was. But, he patted my shoulder and told me not to worry, she’d be ok. I was worried as they took Ann away because she’s always a lot more panicked when I’m not with her and they had been so much alarm already.

The next 30 minutes were pretty awful. I tried to reach Gary and Lucy (Ann’s parents) just after they took her away around 4:45. I then called my mom and told her what was going on. Five minutes later Lucy called me back and I explained the situation to her. I then called Jamie Smith to let her know what was going on and tell her that Denise was coming down for the kids. I paced back and forth and contemplated the sprays and smears of blood on the floor as I waited for news. A nurse came in a few minutes later and told me everyone was stable. She explained that the placenta had abrupted causing the loss of blood and clotting. They had done the c-section quickly, both babies were born within the same minute (4:42pm). We later found out that Brigid had swallowed so much blood she was flatlined when she came out. They revived her with chest compressions. Ann also says that when they first took her into the OR she had fought with them about the oxygen mask. Her memory didn’t pick up again until they brought her back into the hospital room. I called Lucy at 5:05pm and my mom at 5:10pm to let them know that Ann and the twins were alive and stable.

It was still another 20 minutes or so before they brought Ann back in. Dr England came out to explain more to me. An abruption occurs when the placenta pulls away from the uterus and the result is bleeding and blood clots. Ann had last about three liters of blood out of an estimated five liters total. They gave her a transfusion of one unit (one liter) and talked about giving her another that night or in the morning. He said I had done the right thing by going to Riverton rather than calling an ambulance or driving all the way to Murray. She was losing so much blood, the worst might have happened. Ann began to wake up while we talked. I could see her moving a bit and was concerned about her waking up wonder where I was and what had taken place, but still listen to Dr England I didn’t get to her side until she began calling my name. She was groggy, but pretty alert right off. I told her that the babies had survived and were being worked on. It’s a little foggy for me what happened during the next half hour or so. I remember Dr. Zarbock, our pediatrician, came in and told me that although the twins were stable, they had swallowed a lot of blood and needed help to breathe. As we expected, they were to be taken to IMC. Somewhere in there, a little before 6pm, Denise called me to let me know she was leaving her house and that she’d call me when she got to ours. The rest of the time I spent trying to make sure Ann was comfortable and stable emotionally.

We were told a number of times that the twins would be Life-Flight’ed at any time. We could hear the helicopter arrive, but although the nurses said they would try to make sure they babies were brought to us so that we could see them (for the first time), we continued to wait. I waited by the door so that I could see/hear the nurses’ station, not wanting them to pass by without getting a glance at Brigid and Tara. A new nurse came in around 6:20 to again tell us about Life-Flight and what was going to happen. I told her that no one had been sure whether or not they would bring the babies into the room for us to see prior to take-off. She said she was sure they would, but that if I hadn’t seen them yet, she would take me to them that moment.

I went with her into a room filled with doctors, nurses, and Life-Flight personnel. They were working pretty busily around Tara, but Brigid was fairly solitary. Dr Zarbock was in there and when he saw me he brought me to Brigid and gave me some updates. I don’t remember much of that, they girls were intubated and responding well to the oxygen. I was pretty worried by Brigid’s appearance. Dr Zarbock estimated their weights at between 2.5 and 3.5 pounds. Brigid definitely looked like she was too small to be out of the womb. Her narrow head and slanted eyes coupled with the big probe on her forehead and blood encrusted skin were alarming to me at first. It entered into my mind at this point that these babies were so premature they may well face lifelong disabilities. When Dr Zarbock took me over to Tara, the medical staff working over her welcomed me and made space for me to see her. Tara was definitely bigger than Brigid and didn’t seem as foreign to the outside world. I was dazed and light headed in this room and seeing the blood on the tape that held her breathing tube in place brought tears to my eyes. I took pictures of them both with my iPhone and didn’t linger much, worried about distracting the staff and wanting to get back to Ann and show her the pictures. Ann was in good spirits, though pale and weak. She was relieved that they had all made it through the ordeal. Her focus was nearly single to getting a chance to see the twins—slightly distracted by desiring any kind of sustenance they would allow her (mostly nugget ice at first).

Around 6:40 I called the Smith’s and talked to Fiona and Meagan to tell them what was going on and to ask how they were doing. Jamie had helped Fiona feel better about what was going on. She had stopped worrying so much by the time I talked to her and Meagan seemed pretty unperturbed by the whole thing and more anxious to know when she could see the babies. About 6:50, Denise arrived and called Jamie about how to get the kids back home. In the end, Tiffini Denham, desperate to do something to help, went and picked up the kids from the Smith’s house and dropped them off at our house. One of the nurses was very concerned with me for some reason. She wanted to make sure I had eaten and whether I felt faint. I told her I had been through four births before these without a problem, but she insisted that this one was different. I remembered and pointed to a tray of food they had brought for me like a half hour prior. I didn’t like to eat in front of Ann, since she couldn’t; but I was fatigued from all the stress and standing and pacing. So, I went ahead and ate the food very quickly without tasting it and prayed that for once a cafeteria could provide food without giving me food poisoning. Another nurse noticed the blood on the floor and had a janitor come in and mop it all up. He seemed very eager to get it all.

The Life Flight folks finally brought Brigid to us at about 7:30. I snapped a couple of pictures and Ann was granted permission to reach in and touch her tiny (and I mean tiny) fingers. They stayed for about five minutes and then left. We could hear the helicopter take off from the hospital room. A nurse came in and told us a little later that there was only one helicopter available and so the same crew would be coming back for Tara. Ann was allowed some jello and juice by then and surprised everyone with how well she was doing. She was very pale, but never needed more than the one unit of blood—even though they told us many times she might get another that night or the next morning. At 8:20 the crew brought Tara into the room. They were in a far greater hurry this time and I felt a greater sense of urgency for Tara’s wellbeing. They did allow me to take a couple of pictures again. One of them then told me that I could walk down to see them load Tara into the helicopter and watch it take off. I readily agreed. I conversed a little with the Life Flight crew and the security guards, but it was hard for me to make light small talk under the circumstances. I was allowed to come pretty close and watch/video them loading her, one of the security guards had me come back a ways to watch the helicopter take off. He waiting for me the whole while (the rev time for a helicopter is a lot longer than I had been expecting). I went back into the hospital with him and helped get the bed we used to carry the mobile isolette put away.

I went back up to Ann’s room and showed her the videos. Soon after we moved to a recovery room. There was a couch at the window that folded down into a bed. They brought me sheets and a very thin pillow. We tried to rest and I think Ann might have dosed a bit. We tried to watch TV as well—mostly Raymond reruns if I recall. We finally got news from the hospital around 10:30. The twins were both ok, but needed transfusions, oxygen, and drugs to get their lungs working. We said a prayer together in thanks for the relative health of all three and for a continued blessing over them. We slept fairly well that night. There was the usual checking by nurses and the administration of pain meds, etc. I woke up about once an hour, but was able to doze off without much trouble.

Twins Background

Ann has had endometriosis since before she was pregnant with Fiona. After Teague was born, she started having pelvic pain early. Her doctor dismissed it thinking it was too early for her to have any issues. She went on the mini-pill, but continued to have a lot of discomfort. We did some research and decided to look at an IUD instead of moving to the pill Ann had been using before we started trying for number four. The IUD literature suggested that the more constant release of hormones in addition to the impossibility of ‘forgetting’ proved a better fit for most sufferers of endometriosis. Ann checked with insurance and they said they would cover it as a treatment for endometriosis, so we proceeded with it at the end of October 2009. It was problematic for a while and hard to see in ultrasounds when they checked for it.

Sometime before mid July 2010, it must have dropped out without Ann noticing it (the IUD changes frequency and intensity of cycles, I don’t want to get into it in detail). Near mid-August Ann started feeling unwell, she had a low-grade fever for weeks. She went through an antibiotic cycle and her temperature wouldn’t return to normal. She finally decided to ignore it, since it was so low-grade. During this time, we thought Teague was old enough to get rid of a lot of baby things. We made piles of stuff, took it to Deseret Industries, and gave it to people in batches. In early September, Ann started to get nauseated pretty regularly. Again, we puzzled over what was wrong with her. The nausea kept returning and it finally dawned on me that she might be pregnant. We both figured this was unlikely because of the IUD. For some reason we never have any spare pregnancy tests sitting around, so to find out for sure we needed to buy some. On 9/18, Ann took a vanload of baby things, including the expensive baby gates, to Deseret Industries right after we had a conversation about waiting due to the possibility of she might be pregnant. Later that day she bought some tests at Wal-Mart and decided to use one the following morning when it would be the most accurate.

On 9/19, a Sunday morning, she got up and took the test first thing. I was still waking up, but aware she had gotten out of bed. I woke up fully when I heard her crying in the bathroom, she showed me the test—it was positive. Ann worried about waiting until the next day to see a doctor, the Mirena website indicated that emergency care was necessary if you get pregnant while using their device. We had done the math and I figured a day more or less wouldn’t matter much when she was already 9 weeks along. The following day, she told the doctor’s office what had happened and they saw her that day. I had decided to stay home with Teague since Ann hadn’t been able to find a babysitter. She called me a little after 10:30 to tell me that they’d done an ultrasound and found that two babies had been clearly visible. Ann sounded a little weepy during this conversation and asked if I could come there to be with her. I protested that Teague would be too much trouble at a doctor’s office, but she insisted and the two of us went off to meet her there. This was the first time I had been to the new office and I had to get instruction on how to get to the right one. When I was shown to Ann’s exam room, she had apparently calmed down a lot. The nurse asked if she was doing better and her face showed signs of recent crying. Ann related to me that when she first saw the two little circles on the screen and the doctor had confirmed they were looking at twins, she had gone into a panic for a little while. The doctor and nurse decided to leave her alone to calm down for a little while, around which time she had called me to come over. There was no sign of the IUD in the uterus.

We went to a lab where a tech did more extensive scanning, still no sign. He thought the IUD must have dropped out, but the doctor was sure Ann would have noticed this and assumed instead that it had pierced the uterus and was somewhere in the body cavity. They wouldn’t be able to say for sure until after the births since x-ray scans are dangerous for the unborn babies. We were left in the following weeks to try to get used to the idea of not only another pregnancy but two more children. The idea was not very comfortable at first because Teague had been and still is very difficult in many ways. He is very stubborn and given to tantrums. He is extremely resistant to correction and the cost of property damage at his hand has been very expensive. He requires a lot of love from us and we were concerned that dividing our hearts again to allow for two more children might be difficult. We also frequently regretted having sold and donated so many things that we would need for our new babies.

Since Ann was so far along in the pregnancy, we didn’t wait at all to tell everyone. I let Ann call most of our family about it. There was a lot of surprise and excitement. Jen Richardson’s response was unintelligible since it was screamed or squealed—she was unable to speak normally for some moments. It was left to me to inform the men in my family. I received mostly derisive laughter from my brothers and friends. I feel that this propensity was partially my fault for the way I described the discovery of the pregnancy and its nature. Many of the friends and ward-members Ann told reacted in fear and agitation, because so many of them too were using IUDs and their reliability was now in question.

On December 9th, we had an ultrasound at the office of a group of specialists for high risk pregnancies. By this time we were a lot more joyful at the prospect of having more children. We were really happy to see the high quality imaging there. However, the tech went out to get the doctor after scanning and measuring for around 45 minutes. When the doctor came in he started explaining to us what TTTS was and then told us that our twins had it. Sometime during the time he was explaining possible treatments, Ann started crying. He apologized and said that he was blunt by nature, but figured most people would rather get it straight. What followed were ultrasounds twice a week until they could decide whether or not to seek treatment. We started out will an imbalance of amniotic fluid of about 8 and 3 cm (with Brigid being the donor and saran-wrapped in the dividing membrane). We kept going in twice a week with few changes until December 20^th, when the doctor advised us to seek the laser ablation treatment right away. The fluid was measuring at about 10 and 2 cm. We made arrangements and left later that night. Denise and Kevin took the kids for us for the nights of the 20^th and 21^st; the Dave and Jamie Smith took them the nights of the 22^nd and 23^rd. It was pretty surreal to go straight away like that all of the sudden. We got into the airport pretty late and I think it was after midnight by the time we were checking into the motel. The hospital is in Hollywood and the motel was right across the street, not the nicest place. At least it was clean.

The next morning we had breakfast at a 50s diner that was pretty cool. Then we went into the appointment to have measurements taken and then consult with Dr. Chmait. We were very nervous; the ultrasound tech was doing measurements for about 45 minutes when the computer on the machine froze up. She ended up losing all the imaging she had taken. Dr. Chmait had to come in and take over since she had committed to help out another doctor (everyone was short staffed due to holiday week) and he could ‘diagnose’ on the fly which she couldn’t do. The measurements they took were useful for research, but the imbalance was the only relevant one for us. They confirmed what we had found at IMC. Dr. Chmait recommended that we move ahead with the surgery. We talked about it a lot and prayed together in his office. We both felt that it was the right thing to do. I recall feeling that the babies would be ok if we proceeded. The assistant took us on a sort of tour to let us know where we’d need to be and when and what people we’d be seeing. We had ‘lunch’ again at the Café 50’s where we’d eaten breakfast. In reality we shared a milkshake and a banana split. We then went on a quest to find comfortable footwear for Ann to wear around the hospital. We finally found something at a nearby Payless. We had dinner late, since Ann wasn’t supposed to eat after midnight. We bought a bunch from Pollo Loco and brought it to our room to eat.

The next morning, we checked out of the motel and went to the hospital. We were told we had problems with insurance since our carrier had misunderstood in which hospital Ann would be receiving the treatment. At first the hospital wanted us to put down $4000, but then it turned out they just wanted us to pay a down payment on it, which ended up being $1000. Soon after, Ann was taken to surgery and I was left on the way at a waiting area. I was promised news within an hour or so. The waiting was pretty awful. I prayed a lot and kept trying to distract myself by playing on my iPhone, but the time passed very slowly. At last Dr Chmait himself came out to let me know things had gone well. He showed me pictures of the babies that he’d taken during the procedure and they were pretty amazing, but I again had that surreal, distant feeling. Apparently Ann had made some comment about the babies having my feet.

During surgery, Ann had felt a little panicked so they gave her something to help her relax. Although it had made her feel a little loopy, she had been able to watch on the TV screen during the procedure and remember what had gone on fairly well. It took a while longer to finish things up after the visit from Dr Chmait, but Ann and I were together again before long. One of the nurses on his staff brought me to her. We were both happy that things had gone well. There was one vessel in particular that had been difficult to track since it went under the tissue of the placenta and then came back out again. He was glad to have performed the surgery since experience allowed him to separate this flow as well which might have been missed by someone less experienced. It was so unusual, in fact, that he intended to write a paper on it. We were somewhat nervous during the next day because the first 24 hours are so crucial. It had been raining all day and the talk started that night about the heavy rain storm causing mud slides and traffic problems that night. I went down to the cafeteria which was by far the worst I had ever seen. Everything seemed dubious to me and I thought it safe to get a pre-wrapped sandwich. I was quite wrong and spent the night with an upset stomach followed by vomiting the next morning. By morning the rain had gotten to be the prevailing news story and we heard from various staff about their difficulties making it into work. It started to worry us about our travel plans and the possibility of missing Christmas with our kids.

During the course of the morning we went to three or four different places in the hospital for follow-up tests. I remember the cardiologist spent quite a while looking at the babies’ hearts. Everything looked ok and Dr. Chmait felt confident enough to release Ann and let us head home. We left the hospital around noon, but our flight wasn’t until evening so we drove around Hollywood and then up to Malibu where we finally ate lunch at Morgan’s Café, an interesting place. The weather had cleared a lot and the danger of us missing our flight had diminished, but we were still a bit antsy and got back to the airport with a lot of time to spare. The return flight was uneventful, but we got back so late that we decided to let the kids stay another night at the Smiths since they were asleep already. We picked them up midmorning the next day (Christmas Eve) and started the festivities.

About a week later, we went in for the follow up appointment post surgery. The fluid levels had started to equalize and we were passed the initial phase of highest danger. The doctor thought Ann could pretty much return to normal activity, but not to lift anything over 20 lbs (Teague). Even so, we tried to keep up with the advice Dr Chmait gave us about taking two two-hour breaks each day where she was off her feet. That lasted about three weeks. After that she was mostly back to normal. Looking back, I wish she had continued to take it easy since she went into labor two months (almost to the day) of her surgery.