Becoming a parent is a blessing. And when you are a parent of twins then the blessing gets doubled (and also the trouble). While twins bring double the joy, parenting them brings double the work and stress especially during the first year of their age. Taking care of twins every day and managing their eating, napping, nursing and bedtime routines is no doubt a difficult and exhausting job but you need not to be a superwoman to do all that. Parents of twins are often asked, “How do you manage two where we go insane to tackle one.”
Here are few tips to raise twins and staying sane at the same time.
- Don’t overburden yourself: There are few incredible twins moms who can do everything by their own but few could find it difficult. The first tip is never overburden yourself. You need not to do everything by yourself like bathing or dressing up both the kids, make them sleep, take them out for walk or feeding them. While doing all this taking care of home as well like doing laundry or making food. You can designate few tasks to others in the family like your husband can help dressing up the baby and grandparents can take them out for walk. You can get a helper for doing household chores. You can also hire a nanny for taking care of babies etc. Those who can’t afford helpers may ask relatives to help you.
- Don’t hesitate to ask for help: Never hesitate to ask for help from friends, family, neighbours and relatives. If someone extend hand to help never say NO. For example if you have to take one baby to doctor any of your friend or neighbour or a family member can take care of other baby at home. Somebody can take care of one baby when you are trying to put another one to sleep. Taking help from everybody around you could help you to take care of your twins effortlessly.
- Try to set routine for twins: Try to set a routine for your twins for almost all the activities be it their meal time, nap time or bathing time. However it is not easy in the beginning but following the same routine and sticking to it will help you a lot. Try to feed and sleep them at the same time. This will also give you to get some time for yourself to do some other tasks. But you need to be flexible when your babies are not well.
- Sleep when you get chance: It is best to take the opportunity to get some sleep as and when your twins are sleeping. Try to put them to sleep at the same time. This will help you to gather some energy for the next task and help to reduce your stress level.
- Nursing the twins: We all know that breastfeeding the baby is very important but feeding both babies at once is very tricky in the beginning. You may need help from your family and your midwife for support. Try not to skip breastfeeding as it may affect your milk supply. You need not to feed both babies at the same time with one twin on each breast. You can breastfeed one baby and give expressed milk in bottle to the other one. If there is no lactation don’t hesitate to give formula milk to both babies.
- Treat them as individuals: You should never compare your twins. They should be treated as individuals as they have their own strengths and weaknesses. However it is difficult for the parents to give one to one attention to both the kids but you should try to spend time with each of them separately. This helps in bonding of twins with parents.
You can check our guide to know what should be the ideal weight gain of the baby in the first year. And some ways to improve baby’s appetite and help him gain weight.
Happy parenting!
– Yashoda Datta Sharma –
Mommy of twins with a passion for writing. Loves to help fellow moms in their wonderful journey of motherhood. She has done B.A. LL.B and LL.M and her hobbies include writing and photography. She also loves to travel when she is not running behind her twins.
