How do you eat enough???

[caheinz]

OK, we just found out that what we assumed was a singleton due Oct 23 is actually a set of identical twins (measuring over a week early, and presumably coming out in under 40 weeks).

DH bought the Barbara Luke book, and I read a lot of it since he picked it up yesterday. But, I'm a little freaked out -- I'm currently about 5lbs below my pre-preg wt, and between 12.5 and 14 weeks along (see above).

We went to the store today and loaded up on stuff, basically. Some granola bars, slim fast shakes, Ben and Jerry's ice cream, more meat than we've bought in a long time, dried cherries, some sweet potatoes and other good veggies, and so on. I'll hit Trader Joe's tomorrow, where I hope to have more luck finding full-fat yogurts (the local store had NOTHING), some quick yummy things like frozen enchiladas... And I changed our milk delivery to bring whole milk for me tomorrow in addition to the skim for DH and DS.

The books says I should have gained about 25lbs by 20 weeks... and I don't see how this is going to happen. (30lbs in possibly as little as 6 weeks?) I'm trying to pay more attention to and recognize my hunger cues today, and am eating more, but the sheer amount of food I feel like I should be eating is daunting...

BTW, I'm starting at a "normal" range BMI -- neither over nor underweight. I had a nasty cold for about a week about 3 weeks ago, and that was the beginning of the weight loss. By now, I'm guessing I'm just in a serious deficit for everything... protein, calories, carbs, nutrients... everything.

[SammyeGail]

Well, you just found out so don't be hard on your self about not having the exact weight gain by Luke's book. Think if the mom's who had morning sickness their entire 1st trimester trying to gain weight. I luckly had light nausa, and ate what I could. Around 25 weeks is when it got hard, that's when my stomach started getting compressed. I would eat several small meals a day. If I felt I didn't get enought in, I would drink an extra Boost. Some people don't like those but I loved them.

Just try to shovel in what you can now before it gets to hard to eat. I lowered my activities extremely so I wouldn't burn any extra calories.

You are doing very, very good by getting the book and listening to it. Gain what weight you can. You'd be surprised, lol.

I started at 147 lb, 5'6. When I gave birth at 33.5 (pre-eclampsia-the boys were great) I was about 207. My arms and legs were bigger, but overall I didn't get huge, but my belly did, lol! When the boys were about 4 weeks old after the swelling and water retention went down I was down to 170.

I think the Boost (or Ensure if you like--does she say slim-fast? I gave my book away) were the best for me, packed full of everything in that little bottle.

Congradulations and take care of yourself and your little babies

Samantha
Noah and Jonas
28 month old twins

[SammyeGail]

FYI: I did get down to around 155 within 3 months, so I didn't have any extra baby fat. Before getting pregnant I always floated between 150-160 so I was back where I was before. I didn't do anything special, just avoid junk food.

I was on a few twin pregnancy boards and then newborn twins boards, I don't remember anyone complaining about alot of baby fat, not with twins. I met a friend of a friend and she never got rid of the extra 10 lbs, but to me that would be worth the health of my babies.

I totally respect Dr. Lukes book and her advice. It would be extremely difficult to meet all her expectations, but I think her advice is valid.

At 33.5 weeks the boys weighed 4.8 and 4.10. Thats pretty good. A friend DH worked with wife had her baby early, 32 weeks and he weighed 2.9.

I went into PTL when I was around 5 months, my oldest sister had a terrible loss with her twin pregnancy (this was 19 years ago in a small town), so yes, I advocate the Luke book strongly.

Samantha

[gatorsmom]

Congrats on the twins! How exciting!

I am a big believer in the Barbara Luke book. I had 2 previous singleton pregnancies and had a different "goal" for those pregnancy- namely to eat healthily and in moderation. When I found out about my twins pregnancy, the Barbara Luke book changed the way I thought - suddenly moderation wasn't a goal AT ALL and I was forcing myself to drink water (even though I hated to have to pee all the time). I'm so glad I followed her advice (even though my OB told me to watch how much I was eating) because at birth my twins weighed a healthy 6lbs and 6.5lbs. I was so afraid they would be too small for the infant carseats we had or worse that they'd end up in the NICU. As it turns out, they never spent a minute in the NICU.

Try now to eat things with high calorie content. Do you like milkshakes? Malts? At least you are getting some calcium in there too. Trail mix usually has a lot of calories as well as dried fruit. Nuts are great for you, have a lot of protein and are usually high in calories.

I'd just try to keep munching on stuff like that all day long. And yes, you will get big, but just keep thinking "its for the babies." They really need those calories.

[caheinz]

An update:

I replaced the battery on the bathroom scale, and it looks like I'm up about 10lbs total at 14.5 weeks, so not bad. (After actually losing weight between the 8wk and 12wk visits...)

I'm amazed at how protein-starved I've been -- particularly shocking after spending 15ish years as a vegetarian! But, I've added pretty much all kinds of meat back into my diet, at least for the next few months... I don't know how else to get all the protein and iron that's necessary for two.

I'm going to try to follow Luke's plan for weight gain at this point. I want to talk to my OB about the supplements and vitamins she recommends, but I'm between appointments, and the next is with a new doctor. (Last one was with a doc who told me that carbs were the devil and that I only needed to add 300 calories per baby total... but that was another post!)