Hellobee

At this moment my babies are about 19 months and 3 months old. For the first 6 weeks after Iris was born she lived in the NICU and my mother stayed with us to help care for Roman. For the next many weeks after her homecoming, my mother and mother-in-law took turns staying with us to help me care for both babies at home. For the past couple of weeks I’ve been doing it on my own, and at this moment I’m a little in shock. All of those weeks with help had me feeling like this was something I could not imagine doing by myself. We eased into the new arrangement. The first couple of days my husband left for work after helping Roman get his breakfast and making sure things were under control. He came home a little early here and there. Now we’re in the full swing of things, and it is going SO well. Too well maybe, I keep expecting some sort of major meltdown to shake me out of this two under two bliss, but it has yet to come.

Roman has recovered from his phase of crying hysterically every time the baby cries, or reaching for us to hold him to steal our attention when he knew she needed us. He seems to have completely tuned out her fussing. He is suddenly much better at entertaining himself. His imagination keeps expanding and he is just full of joy as he bops around the house. He even cooperates with diaper changes all of a sudden. It really feels like he understands that I have to take care of him and his sister, and he’s on his best behavior to help.

He loves her. He has complicated emotions about her presence, and he gets frustrated and clingy at times. He doesn’t usually like for my husband to hold her, or for anyone who’s visiting and playing with him to pay her any attention, but he seems to understand that I need to hold her and feed her and take care of her; he never gets upset about that. His new favorite books are all the books with “babies” in them. He likes to pat her on the back to “burp” her, and pet her head. He looks at the picture of the four of us on my phone and says, “Mama, Papa, baby” excitedly over and over. When he sees her things around the house he says “baby” and brings them to her.

The most challenging part of the day, the part I thought would be impossible, is getting Roman down for his nap. Roman sleeps on a floor bed, we read him stories and sing him songs until he wrestles himself to sleep. I wear Iris, sometimes feed her, while I read his stories and sing his songs. Sometimes she fusses and he just keeps on cuddling his pillows. Some days it takes an hour to get him down, but so far he has done so without tears or frustration. I envisioned the two of them would be simultaneously hysterical every afternoon for this process and thought my husband might have to plan to come home for lunch to help, but it’s all working out so much better than I had imagined.

Some days I’ve even managed to get dinner started, laundry done or dishes washed. Some days I’ may have resorted to bribing Roman with “cheese sticks” (string cheese) and “shows” (Bo on the Go and Super Why).

Each day Iris and I get up first, make my coffee and Roman’s smoothie, and make sure she’s fed and in the carrier before he wakes up. (I use the baby K’tan, the Baby Bjorn miracle carrier, and the Ergo.) He walks down the stairs now holding my hand while I wear her. Sometimes he looks a little disgruntled by her presence when we greet him, but he accepts it merrily when I ask if he wants to go downstairs and drink his smoothie.

We eat breakfast, play, have a snack and then go back up for nap three to four hours later. I enjoy two hours of just Iris time and then we fetch him again and feed him lunch. We play until their father comes home and Roman clings to him as if there is a magnetic force between them. The recent purchase of this “Kitchen Helper” has helped a bit. Preparing meals is now much easier and much more fun. Also, he can play in the sink for hours and hours.

I think we were lucky that Roman already had such a strong attachment to his father and is overall very adaptable. We’ve been very careful about giving him attention and being patient with his emotions while he adjusts to his growing family. Having his grandmothers here to dote on him those first few weeks was invaluable. We seem to suddenly have hit a sweet spot with his age and development. As soon as the next molar starts to break through, I’m sure I’ll be singing a different tune.

Iris has been home for almost two months and life is starting to come together and move along again. We’ve ventured out for lunch and dinner about a half dozen times now with great success. Our dense schedule of doctors appointments has finally thinned out. (Those were the worst — SO many meltdowns.) The initial transition to a family of four is over and I must say, at this moment, I am feeling pretty great about this 16 month sibling age gap!

Any experience or advice about new sibling transitions or caring for two babies at home? What surprised you about your sibling age gap, or having two at home?