Keith Snyder is a mystery novelist/composer/filmmaker, the father of twin boys, and the moderator of the Multi-Dad message boards. His blog is at found at http://www.journalscape.com/keithsnyder. Here are some things he's learned since becoming a father of twins.
Balancing Work and Babies
- Until Kathleen went back to work, we were trading shifts. I watched them 8PM-3AM, then went into the bedroom where she was sleeping and told her to take her earplugs out. I put my earplugs in and went to sleep. At the first yawp, she got up and took care of them. At 10AM, she came in and woke me up. I took care of them from 10AM until noon so she could get to the gym, and when she took over at noon, I went to work. I got home in time to go on shift at 8PM. You'll find what works for you. Don't expect a solution that gets you sufficient sleep.
- Buy earplugs.
- We are now transitioning to a nanny. (It's cheaper than putting two children into daycare.) During the transition period, Kathleen has gone back to work, but the nanny has not actually started with us yet. For 3 weeks, we are trading nights: One of us takes care of the babies all night until 4 AM, at which time Kathleen gets up and goes to the gym and to work. (Yes, that means every other day, I have baby duty from 8PM until 12:30PM the next day.)
- Yes, you can get other things done with newborns, but it's going to cost you. I finished CREDO during the first months of our boys' lives, but I paid with my health. Your choice. In my experience, you can do it--and you're gonna suffer. If you can, put off those projects for a few months. I don't know if we're typical, but the 5-month mark where they're sleeping regularly, if not through the night, and Mommy's going back to work, seems to be a transition into a state of... well, not normality, but at least increased productivity and lack of sleep-deprivation-induced insanity.
- If your job lets you work off-site sometimes, or be flexible with your hours, that's a big help. When we took our boys to Phoenix for 2 weeks of free baby care from Grandma, I worked at a local Starbucks and kept my paycheck coming.
Feeding Time
- Shop for powdered formula in bulk on eBay. (Powder is cheaper than liquid. eBay is cheaper than the store.) Mix it up in Mason jars and leave them in the fridge for when you need them. By the time we hit 4 months, we were washing, mixing, and filling 20 bottles/night. Ideally our night shift begins with 20 filled bottles (fresher ones in back, since the stuff only lasts 48 hours), 3 filled Mason jars, and a newly refilled Brita filter. I found half-gallon Mason jars on the Internet. They make twice as much formula as the quart bottles and they work fine for me, but if you have small hands, it'll be hard to pour the first few bottles.
- You can pop the nipple out of an Avent O-ring one-handed, into a bowl of sudsy hot water. It'll save time when you're washing.
- Those useless caps that come with the bottles are actually useful. If you lose them, you reduce the number of bottles you can take with you when you go out with the stroller. This is because...
- Avent bottles leak in two ways. First, screwing the nipple on increases the pressure inside the bottle, so when you tip it toward baby, it will sometimes squirt him in the face like a little water gun. This can be funny, but you probably ought to prevent it. The workaround is to depress the nipple and force air out before tipping the bottle. Second, those damn O-rings either don't go on straight or aren't manufactured straight, or something, and formula will gush out when you return the bottle to upright, soaking the baby (and your hand). The workaround: After you've depressed the nipple, tip the bottle twice over the sink, in two different orientations. If it leaks when you return it to upright, unscrew it, pull the nipple out and rotate it, tighen it down again, and retest. When nothing squirts and nothing gushes, you're ready to feed the little vampires. There is no pattern or predictability to these leaks, as far as I can tell. Sometimes repositioning the nipple stops the leak. Sometimes you can reposition it all day and it still gushes until you use a different nipple. Good luck.
- It's possible both babies will not take the same formula, and mixing up bottles is easy even if you're not sleep-deprived. Keep rubber bands near the bottles. Baby X always gets a rubber band around his bottle.
- How could I forget this? Keep a feeding/changing chart!
Read more tips for dads: travel and transport, balancing work, feeding time, and life with babies.
