My Diary of Triplet Fatherhood

Another day of preparation today. However, we have also been trying to enjoy the calm before the storm.

Despite the doctor giving strict intructions to “not go climbing any mountains” as a condition of J staying out of hospital for another week, we went for a meal again. Only to Jino’s Thai Café in Headingley, mind, and the fact that we parked right out front meant there was probably less walking involved than going to the top of our house (which, with all those stairs, is also much more akin mountain climbing).

It was great, really bringing back memories of Thailand – a time that really contrasts with those that are to come in some ways – we had no demands, no responsibilities – but similar in many, many others – we were doing something new, each day was an adventure, we felt so very alive, like every day mattered, that every day was one to be preserved and looked back upon later with fondness.

Took J out for a romantic Italian meal this evening in an effort to stave off stir craziness and also to make the most of our last-but-one Saturday. I doubt there’ll be many restaurant visits once the babies arrive. Except maybe to a Brewsters Fun Pub.

Today was spent making last minute preparations. Yesterday we realised there wasn’t enough room for three Moses baskets in the lounge so I have been putting in a TV bracket on the wall and got rid of the table it stood on before. Tomorrow we’ll set up the baskets and a changing table in there too.

This is it. The house is almost completely transformed. We’ve thrown out loads of stuff, something I always find liberating, and replaced it with a whole load of other stuff, which is equally exciting. I have no idea to what do with most of it but then again, I have no real idea what to do with three newborn babies. The adventure is working it out.

The countdown has finally reached single figures. J will be admitted a week on Monday provided there are no complications in the mean time. I suspect that she’ll be desperate to have the pregnancy over by then. It gets harder for her on a daily basis. Not only is she in pain quite a lot of the time, especially from back ache and from where one baby keeps burying into her ribcage, but she finds it harder and harder to move about. Getting up from the sofa sometimes takes several minutes and getting into bed is more than difficult, it’s dangerous. The momentum caused by lowering such a lot of weight to the perpendicular has almost sent J flying over the side of the bed in several occassions. In fact, if it hadn’t been for my lightning reflexes last night she would have bounced back off the mattress and onto the floor when she tried to get into bed.

Despite all this, her bump looks like it won’t reach the proportions other triplet mums have reported (seventy-five inch waist, anyone?). In fact, a twins mum we met at the hospital today was already significantly larger despite being at a similar stage. Apparently being quite tall is responsible as there’s more vertical height for the womb to fill before it has to go outwards.

At the Fetal Assessment Unit this morning, the doctor ummed and aahed about admitting J next week. In the end he decided to let her stay at home, seeing as she had done so well there so far. I think that’s probably best. J is uncomfortable enough without having to live in a hot, noisy room, sleeping on a plastic-sheeted bed and eating overcooked hospital food. My only concern is that she will find things too hard on her own next week. She has to prepare her own lunch and fetch things she needs – both of which will be getting harder by the day.

“They’re moving around, they’re growing, they have plenty of fluid. They couldn’t be doing any better if you tried.”

Good news again. The babies are all doing very well, although I can assure you, J is trying.

No scan pictures again, unfortunately. The babies are just too crammed together. Even with the ultrasonographer present, I could hardly make out what was on the screen. There’s just a black and white blur of shapes that could be anything. The ultrasonographer had no trouble though. We were slightly late and she got through all the different measurements in record time. From what she told us, it seems that baby 1 (Snoozer) and baby 2 (Bruiser) are both cephalic, or head down, and as eager to be making their grand entrances as I am to receive them as they were taking turns to head-butt J’s cervix, while baby 3 (Wriggler) is transverse, or crossways, all the better to bury his head in J’s ribs. I suspect this means he has inherited either his mother’s sense of direction or his dad’s punctuality.

I have made a chart of their growth in place of pictures. As you can see, the babies are all growing well, and have been since we started being told their weights. Babies always have their own growth patterns so it doesn’t matter that they are getting bigger at varying rates. The fact that they are all growing is what’s important (especially for J, who has 11 and a half pounds to lug round everywhere she goes).

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We also got a confirmation that J would be admitted to hospital on the 8th of August. They’ll then wait for three cots to be available before delivering the triplets. Of course, it’s quite possible that there won’t be three cots, in which case they’ll have to send one or more of them to a different hospital. Hopefully that would only be LGI, across town, but quite recently a twins mother J knows nearly had to go to Liverpool to deliver her babies! I hope that doesn’t happen to us.

I hardly dare to believe how wonderfully well everything is going. I’m not superstitious but there’s a part of that doesn’t want to acknowledge how lucky J and I have been so far for fear of tempting fate. The more I read about tripet pregnancy and hear stories of other people’s experiences, the more I am aware that to have got to thirty two weeks without any complications for either J or the babies is tremendously fortuitous.

Of course, it’s not over yet. There are plenty of complications that cannot be detected before birth. But at this stage the chance of each baby surviving is somewhere around 98% which takes away the greatest worry I had – that they would come so early they would be in danger.

Now we just have to wait these next few weeks. I’m sure it will seem like it passed in the blink of an eye when the babies are actually here but right now it’s passing ever so slowly. I’m impatient to know that everything is alright, and to meet my children and see what they are like, who they are. I feel like we have been waiting for the next hurdle for an age. Which we have. Ever since being told to wait until twelve weeks back in January, it’s been one milestone after another and as happy as I am that they have all been passed successfully, I’ve had enough of milestones now.

I’m ready. We both are, I think. I want to get on with it all.

Of course, I am aware that in three weeks I will be dreaming – or rather not dreaming – of this peaceful, placid period and its uninterrupted nights and quiet evenings. But hey, right now I just can’t wait to jump right in.

Thursday morning was scan day. It seemed like ages since we’d been to the hospital – time is going somehow both very slow and very fast at the moment, probably as a result of how busy I am both at home and at work and that funny trick that waiting plays on the perception of time, I guess. Anyway, I think we were less nervous on this visit than we have ever been. The confidence and security of getting past twenty-eight weeks is still a comfort to both of us.

As before the news was good. The babies couldn’t be doing any better. They are all within the normal size ranges for their age and have grown since last time, their movements are OK (‘though I knew that, what with the kicking they give their mum all the time at the moment), they have enough fluid, their positions are OK, everything, in short, is going exceptionally well.

The babies were so entangled this week that the ultrasonographer couldn’t get any clear pictures to show us. One baby was hiding behind the others and she couldn’t even see him well enough to measure his femur. This meant they couldn’t calculate his weight so I can’t even post the graph of their weights instead of pictures.

When we saw the consultant, Jane, she was so pleased with the babies’ progress that she has pencilled us in for a delivery date at thirty-five weeks. That was something of a surprise as we thought that St. James’ hospital had a policy of delivering triplets at thirty-four. Of course, the fact the Jane is on holiday until that week may have something to do with the decision.

So that’s it. By the August 8th I will be a dad. How peculiar to know the date on which my life will so dramatically veer off in new directions.

Janet reaches thirty weeks today. I cannot believe we have come so far already but now there are, at most, four weeks left until we have children.Our instant family is almost here.

I can’t help but feeling like I’m not really ready. Not that I think that’s unnatural. Is anyone ever ready for their first child’s arrival? Even if they are, could anyone be ready for the arrival of three babies at the same time? Actually, I’m not sure there’s a great difference. After all, both things are outside the range of our experiences and so, like all challenges in life, we’ll just have to meet this one dead on and do the best we can to cope.

And it will be a challenge. I feel rather like I am on a rollercoaster, at the point where the carriage reaches the zenith of the track and almost stops. Everything is slowing down. I know there’s a rush of activity about to happen – one that’s completely out of my control – and I’m just waiting for the experience to rush upon me. It’s exciting and terrifying in equal measure. It still doesn’t seem completely real.

We’ve made most of the esential preparations we need to now. The house is a lot more child safe, J’s dad has almost finished getting a dishwasher installed, we have prams, buggies, cots, car seats, baby bouncer chairs, baby gyms, toys, clothes, bottles, steam sterilisers, bottle warmers, new mattresses, moses baskets, bibs, changing mats, top and tail bowls, baby towels, baby shawls, baby blankets, cot sheets, and all the other paraphanalia of child rearing we have had to buy in triplicate stacked up and ready, the freezer is stocked with food… once we get a MPV big enough to fit three child seats in, we’ll be ready to weather the oncoming storm. At least, as ready as buying stuff will ever make us.