Loving the Manning Triplets: 2013

I'm sitting in my living room on a Saturday afternoon with three babies sleeping peacefully upstairs. A lot has changed for the Manning babies and their parents in the last month. We are really beginning to feel like we have this parenting thing down. So much so that a few weekends ago Ryan went to a wedding in Kentucky and I stayed home with the babies by myself! I was worn out at the end of the weekend, but I managed just fine. I even took the kiddos to a small Thirty-One party at a co-worker's house and they behaved like a dream.

Ryan had to go into work yesterday morning, so I decided to take the kiddos to Target to pick up a few essentials. As I was walking up to the cash register, I came up behind a mother who was struggling to get her baby to calm down in the cart and she was clearly getting frustrated. As I passed, she looked over and said, "Triplets? I guess I have no place to complain. You seem like you've got it all together. How do you do it?" I simply smiled and said, "It's not always like this." Which was kind of a lie.

The truth is, we have three amazing babies. Our children are calm, our house is orderly, and my husband and I are still madly in love. To be honest, I'm not sure that we do anything special. I am certain that to some degree we are just plain lucky. The other part of that is that we never stop moving; we are working constantly. Anyhow, people ask me all the time how we do it with three babies. I thought I would share what our methods are concerning some of the big topics in parenting. These are the methods that worked for us, and they're certainly not right for everyone. There are tons of right ways to do this whole parenting thing that create all kinds of different and wonderful people. When I was talking to my best friend Jenny while I was pregnant and exploring different parenting methodologies, she said to me, "No matter which method you choose, I'll be your biggest cheerleader." That comment stuck with me and I think it pretty much sums up how I feel about parenting. As long as you're not endangering your child, do it your way.

Stay-at-Home vs. Working
As most of you know, I am not a stay at home mother. That's the case for a few reasons. First of all, I'm active duty military so I don't really have a choice. But most importantly, I don't really want to be one. I love working. I enjoy the profession that I've chosen and it contributes to making my family financially comfortable. That being said, we decided that the appropriate child care for our family was a nanny that worked out of our home. It's a little spendy, but it keeps our preemies safe from germs and gives them individualized attention. The best part about being away from them during the day, is that I'm excited to see them when I get home. I'm always refreshed and ready for play time.

Bottle vs. Breast
This is a touchy subject for a lot of mothers. I know that every time I hear the phrase, "Breast is best!" I feel a little twinge of guilt. My kids have been wholly formula fed since they were six weeks old. Just before I had them, I had a condition known as preeclampsia which leads to retention of fluids among other symptoms. I held out long enough in the hospital with the condition that I ended up with fluid in my lungs and swelling in my brain. This is actually why I had to deliver the babies so very early. After the children were born, I was given a medication called Lasix to help clear the fluid in my body. In addition to removing fluid from the places it shouldn't be, it also effects milk supply. While the babies were in the NICU, I pumped every 2-3 hours to provide them with as much milk as possible. At the height of my production, I was able to get 8 oz of breast milk in a day. In order to do this, I drank 2 gallons of water daily, made fertility cookies, took supplements, ate the foods meant to increase production and I still was unable to produce enough for even one baby by the time they were five weeks old. When the girls came home, they were unable to latch, so I continued to pump. As I became more sleep deprived and stressed, my production tanked. I was spending over 2 hours a day pumping and not even feeding one child half of what they needed. With a heavy heart, I made the decision to quit. In retrospect, it would have been virtually impossible for me to continue the pumping regimen I would have needed to be on while I worked even if I did have the adequate supply (the babes are consuming about 80 oz a day now!). While I know that breast milk is nutritionally superior, there are definite advantages to formula feeding. First of all, I know exactly how much my babies are consuming and I can chart and track it. Also, with a bottle anyone can help feed them. That's especially nice at night when my husband and I are able to take turns getting up when it's necessary.

Schedule vs. Demand-Feed
We schedule! It helps to keep things organized for us. We started with a schedule immediately when they came home from the hospital. They picked up on it relatively quickly. Eat, play, sleep every 3 hours. (The BabyWise method). We also started letting them sleep as long as they wanted at night immediately. At first, they stuck to a 3 hour schedule on their own. Eventually they began sleeping longer at night. Currently, Violet eats and goes to bed at 10:00 and sometimes wakes up for a small feeding between 4:00 and 5:00 am. About half of the time she sleeps until 7:00 without that feeding. Lincoln and Keira eat and go to bed at 7:00 and sleep until 7:00. During the day, Violet eats every 3 hours and Lincoln and Keira eat every 4 hours. So, our kids are on slightly different schedules. We made the decision before they were born to treat them as individuals. They are developing at different rates, so we have to make concessions for that.

Cloth vs. Disposable
We cloth diaper our little ones. For lots of reasons. Health, environment, cost, etc. If you've ever had a fleeting thought about cloth diapering, just go ahead and do it. It's really not hard. Just make sure you are well-informed and you have good products. Ryan and I took an intro to cloth diapers class at a local cloth diaper store. That really helped us choose what kind of diaper, how many, and taught us how to wash them properly.

Our cloth diaper drawer.

Co-Sleeping vs Sleeping on Their Own
From the time we brought them home from the hospital, our children have done all of their sleeping in their own cribs in their own room. Co-sleeping wasn't really a consideration for us. We wouldn't have felt at all safe with three medically fragile babies in our bed. We never even put multiple babies in a crib together. We decided that it would be easier to separate them right away instead of putting them together and separating them later. Now they fuss and moan if we put them in a crib together. They all like having their own space.

Baby-wearing vs Stroller
We kind of do a combination on this one. We have a single stroller, a double stroller, a front carrier, and a back carrier. They are still too small for the back carrier, but when we are able to wear them in it that will open up more options for us. When I go out on my own, I take a double stroller and I wear one baby. Usually I wear the baby that is being the neediest that day. It changes frequently. When I'm out with Ryan, we travel a few different ways. We can take a double and a single stroller. We can take a double stroller and wear one. When we go to the store, we usually wear one, take a single stroller, and put an infant seat in the cart. We find we get less attention when we don't take the double stroller. As parents of triplets, we are always looking for ways to not draw attention to ourselves in public That's probably the main reason we don't have a triple stroller. Also, they are crazy expensive and we don't have a car large enough to accommodate one without disassembling it. We never did get that van everyone told us we absolutely had to have.

Being parents of triplets is loaded with challenges. But, fortunately for our sanity, it's rewards are just as big. We're having fun as often as we can and tackling the hard stuff as a team. These little guys have made us a stronger couple than we ever realized was possible. And now a whole bunch of pictures from the last month with guest captioner (is that a word?) Ryan Manning.

Violet plotting our demise. Good thing she has a fluffy white cat to add to the mix later on.

Violet in her sleep sack, enjoying her mom.

Me hugging the girls in their Halloween outfits.

Happy Lincoln was Raphael for Halloween.

Girls hanging out on the couch as they wait for trick or treaters.

Just another Sunday trip to the grocery. Left to right - Keira, Lincoln, Violet.

Keira, Lincoln, and Violet cuddling in the living room. Violet's still skeptical about this whole camera thing.

Violet's made up her mind, she doesn't like the camera. And she's converted Lincoln. Keira just doesn't care.

Sweet Keira, so content when there's been lots of food and sleep.

Violet getting some forced tummy/back work in. She seems ok with it.

It's hard to get these appointments to not overlap someone's feeding time.

"I'll eat my hand if you don't feed me with a bottle… SOON!!" (Violet)

Lincoln getting his eyes checked out.

Oddly enough, this is how most play sessions end up when I'm involved.

Lincoln being cute before an outing.

Violet all prepped and ready to go out on the town.

Keira waiting patiently for her turn to be fed. Patient... yeah, right!

Violet looking happy and hanging out.

That girl from The Exorcist has nothing on my girl Keira.

I'm wondering which one is most like daddy and will always be The ONE person in a group to ruin a picture. Money's on Violet as a front runner. (left to right - Keira, Lincoln, Violet)

Lincoln, too cool. Checking out what's going on in the kitchen, and looking for a pie.

My dad (Mark) watching t.v. with Lincoln, while Violet sleeps (rare moment).

Does this feel like a bar graph to anyone else? (Left to right - Violet, Keira, Lincoln)

Who would have known that I'd be so happy to hold two little babies? (Violet and Keira)

Reading time! Holy crap, two someones' paying attention. Violet… not interested.

Lincoln cuddling with his fluffy protector, Luna.

It’s been over a month since I last posted. At that time, it was just me and the girls at home. So many things have changed. First and foremost, Lincoln is HOME! Little man joined us at home exactly one month and one day ago on August 24^th. After his urinary tract infection healed, he began eating better and finally worked up enough strength to come home. His discharge weight was 6 lbs 12 oz. As expected, he is thriving at home.

I went back to work on August 20^th. If you’re taking note of dates, you’ll notice that I had to go back to work while my son was still in the NICU. Emotionally, this was a really difficult time for me. Although it was only four days, each evening I had to go home and take care of my daughters and feel guilty about not being able to visit my son. Ryan made it a point to go to the NICU every night during this time, so Lincoln was not forgotten. But my heart ached to have the family whole.

Shortly after Lincoln arrived home, Ryan and I were put into crisis mode over a huge childcare dilemma. Due to their premature status, the NICU doctors advised strongly against taking our children to daycare. We had already put ourselves on the waiting list at the Air Force Academy’s on-base daycare center, so we had to forfeit our three slots and seek an alternative. We decided to tighten our purse strings and hire a nanny. Before Lincoln came home, we interviewed and hired a lovely woman to nanny our children. She was everything we had hoped for in a provider for our children and she was due to begin when my parents left, on August 28^th. On August 22^nd, she called to tell me that she was unable to accept the job because her mother had been diagnosed with terminal cancer and she needed to take care of her. My heart sunk and I began to panic. Over the next five days we began an intense nanny hunt involving multiple ads, sifting through applicants, phone interviews, and in-person interviews. Thank God my parents were there or we never would have been able to cope. We narrowed it down to three candidates by August 26^th and hired one nanny to be trained in the evening on August 27^th and begin work on the 28^th. An hour before she was scheduled for training, this nanny called to say she was unable to take the job due to a family emergency. This is the night before we needed a nanny. After we both flipped out, we called our second choice nanny and she arrived at our home within the hour and began work the next day. Turns out she should have been our first choice all along. She is amazing with the kiddos and takes such wonderful care of them. I never have to worry during the day.

Taking care of the girls was tough, but when they awoke at night we could divide and conquer. Each of us changed and fed a baby then returned to bed. When Lincoln came home, our situation became exponentially more difficult. For the first few nights, my parents were there to help us get through it. Unfortunately, they had to leave after only four days of Lincoln being home. The next few weeks were extremely taxing. Feeding three babies with two people two times per night means virtually no sleep. Lincoln was still not a strong eater when he came home, so one of us would feed him while the other fed both girls. With all of them still being new at eating by mouth, it was important for us to give each one our undivided attention while they were being fed. That meant we would often sit there in our sleep-deprived state trying to focus on the baby we were feeding while the third cried. When you’re already worn out, that’s a difficult thing to handle. Twice a night. Every night.

Finally, the day came that I broke down. It was the day after a doctor’s appointment that had lasted nearly all day. It threw the kids off their schedule so badly that they cried all night and I didn’t even get the three hours of sleep to which I had become accustomed. When I got to work that day, I was scolded for not contacting the proper people the day prior when I was at the doctor’s office. Also, I had been five minutes late that morning. In my fragile emotional state, I couldn’t take it. I was a wreck all day long after that. By the end of the day, I decided I needed to do something for my sanity. I elected to take one day off a week for the next four weeks to rest and recharge so that I could work and give my kids the love and attention they deserved while I was home. That has helped tremendously with my sanity.

A couple of weeks ago, two wonderful things happened simultaneously. The children began occasionally waking up only once at night and my mother-in-law arrived. She has been cooking us meals and helping with bottles and feeding the kids with us at night. Now they are consistently waking up only once at night between 2:30 and 3:30 for food. It is starting to feel manageable. The thing about triplets is that it’s a constant job. It never ever stops. Right now, the kids are tiny and need to eat every 3 hours. That means we clean and make 24 bottles every single night. The washer and dryer seem like they are always going with the constant barrage of towels, sheets, blankets, clothing, and diapers. Someone’s almost always wanting attention when they should be napping. Sleep when they sleep? That’s cute. I know that someday soon, they will begin sleeping through the night, they will eat fewer times in the day, and they will be able to communicate a little better. Until then, we’re trying our best to enjoy their sweet innocence without wishing their little lives away.