How to survive colicky twins

The first three weeks of the twins life was hard but they were pretty sleepy. And then it went from hard to "the days that shall not be named." We still shudder when we think about it and a newborn cry sends shivers down my spine. I actually just had a twitch thinking about it.

The first three weeks, sleepy city. Creeper photo courtesy of iBaby camera. 

Early on, we split the babies and assigned Camille to RD and Maisie to me for most nights so that if one baby decided to stop crying at least one of us would get a wink of sleep. I was actually sleeping on a pallet on the floor in the nursery and the mental image you have is as sad as it was. Fortunately, we took a crib out and put in an inflatable bed. By the way RD is a sleep training magician so maybe he'll do a guest post on how to get your baby to sleep. Genius I tell you. ANYWAY. This is what got us through those 5 weeks of intense colic, and the aftershocks that came in the months to follow.

1. NOISE CANCELING HEADPHONES - Best decision ever. We read every book and watched every instructional video on calming a "fussy" baby to no avail. Our doctor said, "you just have to put in your time." Enter noise canceling headphones. Maisie was fed, burped, dry, and snuggled into my arm, screaming, while I alternated between standing and rocking and sitting and rocking while I binge watched New Girl and 19 Kids and Counting.

RDs on double duty. 

2. SNACK BAR - Ain't nobody got time to sit down and eat with a colicky baby or two. We set up a snack bar, created by my sister Claire on the kitchen table. Bowls full of snacks we could grab a handful of and keep moving or be punished with another hour of crying. Nuts, fruit, and wintergreen mints was our diet for a couple months. Bonus if your sister can make amazing snack boxes.

3. FRIENDS AND FAMILY - This is obvious. But it's key to survival. Say yes to every meal, every offer, and never say no. Never say never. Let them hold the screaming baby because as much as it hurts to be mom and not be able to calm the baby, it will help you. My sister and I had a heart to heart after I kept saying no to her helping with the night shift, I felt like I had to do it, I was mom. But I was hanging on by a thread. She took over the night shifts and reminded me that she gets to go back home and sleep. And every meal delivered was perfection. No pictures were taken of meals because they were consumed immediately. :) Below are the brave souls who helped us conquer the days that shall not be named. Saints. All of them.

4. CUTE OUTFITS - It helps. It really does. Play dress up (which by the way boys can too, I'm referring to Jenn's valentines photos of Knox). In the mornings sometimes the thought of the day quickly overwhelmed me but then I remembered I had two little dolls to dress up. And let me tell you there is nothing quite like babies wearing cowboy hats and boots to reign in the crazy and just take it an hour (or 5 minutes) at a time.

We played a lot of dress up. We still do :)

5. STATIONS - Once they were around 4 or 5 months, we were out of the 3-4 hours of crying woods, but they still weren't super "relaxed" or "calm" babies. We'd start in the exersaucer station for 5-10 minutes. Then I'd just switch them, get another 5 minutes or so. We'd go to the mirror station and stare at ourselves for 5 minutes. During summer we looooved the front porch station to watch cars drive by. We had the photo station, book station, mobile station, etc. It helped me having some "structure" instead of frantically trying to entertain them and keep them from getting fussy.

Photo Station

6. HAPPIEST BABY ON THE BLOCK - It's not that it took the colic away but we do think it helped to lessen the intensity at times. The video on Amazon was a lifesaver as no one had the brain capacity to re-read the book that we faithfully read before the girls were born. The 5 S's, we're all about it. They are so trained to sleep with the sound machine that if it ever accidentally goes off our hearts momentarily stop as we race in there to restart the machine before their rustling turns into waking.

Getting our swaddle and swing on while shushing.

So there you have it. I never thought we would have "colicky" babies, I even skipped over the chapters about it in Babywise. While Camille and Maisie will never remember it, RD and I live to forget it. Just kidding. Mostly.