this fall, two babies will be joining our family!

we feel so incredibly grateful for this healthy pregnancy. while we didn’t anticipate that we would have two babies at once, both of them are so wanted and so loved! and as we have processed the huge shock of finding out we are having twins, we have felt amazed, humbled, and excited. 

in 20 february, we found out i was pregnant! we were ecstatic. even though it seemed a little crazy, we had felt like it was time to grow our family. on 20 april, i went in for a routine 12 week ultrasound. ian couldn’t come with me – hospital policy given covid-19 allows for only the pregnant person to attend all antenatal appointments. i was soooo excited to see our baby. the kind untrasound tech put the wand on my belly and said, “there’s a baby … and there’s another baby.” i thought, “huh?” she said, “this is a twin pregnancy,” and i instantly sat up and exclaimed, “are you serious?!” then, i started to sob.

fifteen years ago, i moved in with my oldest sister for a few weeks to help her with her newborn twins (and three preschoolers). ever since then, i knew i didn’t want to have two babies at once. whenever people talked positively about twins, i would think, “you have no idea. it is so crazy and hard.” ian also wasn’t one to desire twins, and i think we must have jinxed ourselves by hyperbolically saying “noooo, thank you! we wouldn’t wish that on our worst enemies” whenever twins came up in any conversation – haha. i really loved my singleton pregnancies and births, and i was so hopeful to experience a couple more.

so there i was, all alone in that hospital exam room, with a million thoughts and feelings racing through my mind and heart, letting the tears flow down my face and pool up in my ears as the tech showed me two brains, four arms, four legs, two hearts beating inside of me. it was such an intense, overwhelming, wild experience.

since that day, a lot of processing has been happening, and it has started to really sink in that we are having twins!! to be candid, it felt like a lot of mental and emotional work for me to adjust to this new reality. but as i’ve talked with other twin moms and prayed and tried to focus on the positives, i’ve emerged from a bit of mourning what i thought would be and have begun embracing what will be. i’ve had some pretty cool experiences in this process of digesting such huge life-altering news. this is going to be such an epic adventure for me and for our family. as someone who is pretty obsessed with the miracle of pregnancy and birth, i feel awed to be able to experience a twin pregnancy and birth. and then when those babies are here, i know there will be so much challenge and stretching but also so much unique and amazing joy.

our dear photographer friend kami came over to our garden a few days after the ultrasound to take some (very socially-distanced – thanks zoom lens!) family pictures for us. i’m so glad we captured this crazy, crazy moment in time for the wrights in london.

to answer some questions that have been asked (by our friends and family and by instragram followers!):

• i am now just past fifteen weeks along, and the babies are due on 25 october. most twins come a few weeks early, so we are planning on meeting them around the beginning of october!
• we will find out the genders of the babies at our twenty-week ultrasound in june.
• no, we weren’t using any kind of fertility treatment, and no, twins do not run in our families (that we know of – we haven’t dug too deep … my sister’s twins are identical, and identical twin pregnancies are not linked at all to genetics).
• we don’t know if the twins are fraternal or identical, and we won’t unless we do dna testing sometime after they are born. our twins are what they call in the uk dcda twins – they each have their own sac and their own placenta. this is the most uncomplicated of twin pregnancies. they are most likely fraternal, but could be identical.
• we aren’t sure if/when we will move to make more space for the babies and/or to be closer to family. we will most likely stay in our current flat until after the babies are born.
• we are planning to birth the babies in the hospital. i was sooo looking forward to another home birth (moses was born in hospital; gabriel was born at home), but for me there are just too many variables with twins. i really strongly believe that every woman should birth her babies in the place she feels most safe. with an uncomplicated singleton pregnancy, i feel safest birthing at home. with twins, i feel safest in the hospital.
  i really, really hope to have a vaginal birth. of course we will do whatever is safest for me and the babies with all the different variables when the time comes for them to born, but i would love so much to give them (and me) the benefits of a vaginal birth. we are hoping to birth the babies unmedicated in the birth centre at our local hospital. we know we need to be really open to lots of different scenarios/options/needs.
• moses will be 4.25 and gabriel will be 2.5 when the babies are born. four kids four and under – eek!! moses is thrilled – telling him that there are two babies in my belly when i got home from the ultrasound was what kicked off for me moving towards happy feelings about the whole thing (ian has been overwhelmed from the moment i called him and told him, for sure, but he was instantly excited too). we have the sweetest video of when we told moses. “twins!!! yay!!! i’ve been wishing for twins!” he said. gabriel is pretty oblivious to there being two in there, but he always reminds us to pray for the baby (babies) every prayer, and is constantly pointing at my belly. the other day he looked at me with his big blue eyes and said curiously, “hold baby?” one day, buddy!
• yes, we will get help with the babies come. we are really, really hoping family will be able to come out at the beginning (with the virus situation, who knows what international travel will look like by october…). beyond that we will budget to hire help in some form or another.

so … yeah. for us, 2020 is definitely going to get even wilder. we are shocked, grateful and amazed that in the fall our family will grow from four to six. we are thrilled to meet these babies and learn from them and care for them and share life with them.