Eye-watering!
My 16Lb Load!
Icould hardly contain my excitement.
‘Happy anniversary, babe!’ I said to my hubby Simon, now 32. It was October last year, and we’d been together eight years, married for three. He caught me grinning. ‘Why are you so happy?’ he laughed.
Thing was, I had some really big news…
‘I’m pregnant!’ I squealed.
Simon gave me a big squeeze.
We already had two boisterous boys. And I’d had great pregnancies with them both.
Only, I’d been huge – Joshua was 9lb 2oz, and Calum 8lb 13oz!
From the back, I’d looked normal size. But, from the side… Whoa!
‘I wonder if this little one’ll be a whopper, too,’ I laughed to Simon.
Only, this time, something was different…
When I was five weeks pregnant, I felt pain in my groin area. After a week, it still hadn’t gone, and the pains would shoot into my pelvis.
I visited my GP, who referred me to Gloucestershire Royal Hospital for an ultrasound scan the following week.
Squinting at the screen, I saw my tiny baby…and another little blob!
‘It looks like you’re having twins,’ the nurse said.
Simon and I grinned at each other, but not for long.
Turns out, the second baby was growing dangerously close to my Fallopian tube. It was potentially ectopic. And the baby was tiny.
‘It’s unlikely it’ll survive,’ the nurse said, and my heart dropped.
Simon and I were so excited to be having twins – there aren’t any on my side, though there are on his.
But it was bittersweet: I might be carrying a dead baby inside me...
So we didn’t tell anyone I was pregnant. Couldn’t face the risk of losing one of the babies by jinxing it.
After two weeks, we went for a growth scan. Both babies were healthy! And, according to the scans, they were both growing well.
There was now no risk of ectopic pregnancy.
Panic over!
We could finally tell friends and family our lovely news –
I was so big, people would stop in the street to marvel!
and go shopping! We had to go for checkups every four weeks.
‘You’re expecting boys,’ the nurse revealed at 20 weeks. ‘Not another two!’ I laughed. Simon was over the moon. By then, I was so big, people would stop in the street to marvel at my bump.
And, towards my due date, I could hardly walk!
‘Mummy’s huge!’ the boys would laugh.
I could hardly manage to sleep, and I had to use crutches and have physio just to get around.
‘They look like they’ll weigh around 6lb each,’ the nurse said at my final scan. ‘But twins are usually smaller.’
Often premature, they’re usually tiny. Knowing this, I’d stocked up on tiny sleepsuits!
Finally, on 14 May, at 36 weeks, my waters broke.
Rushing to hospital, I’d already decided I wanted an elective Caesarean…
Lying on the bed, the first baby was born, and I felt relief from his delivery straightaway. Suddenly, everyone gasped. ‘What’s wrong?’ I cried, feeling anxious. I couldn’t see a thing… ‘You’ve got a big boy here!’ the doctor said. As the nurse brought him round, my jaw dropped open. He was huge alright! But there was no time to lose, and, a minute later, my other baby boy was born. He was equally ginormous! The nurse placed the boys on the scales, but read out their weight in kilograms. I was confused until she converted it to pounds… My first, Luke, weighed a whopping 7lb 11oz. And Joseph was 8lb 7oz.
So much for tiny newborns!
I’d been carrying around well over a stone in just the boys’ weight alone!
Their stretchsuits were bursting at the seams. And nurses had to squeeze them in together in the hospital cot.
But both babies were perfectly healthy, and we were able to take them home the next day.
Watching Simon cradle them in his arms was beautiful – even if cuddling them both at once was a real workout!
Now, at almost 5 months, the boys are outgrowing their cot.
They’re sleeping head to tail now. And, of course, they’re getting bigger, weighing in at around 14lb each.
It’s getting tricky to carry both their car seats…but my biceps are coming along nicely!
I often wonder if Joseph and Luke are the heaviest twin boys ever born in the country... I wouldn’t be surprised. They’re my baby bruisers!