A little history...

I found out I was pregnant with twins at 9 or 10 weeks into my pregnancy.  I wasn't feeling great, and I had convinced myself I had gallstones (I'm a bit of a hypochondriac, or at least I used to be, before I had kids to distract me).  My Dr. agreed to an early ultrasound to rule out gallstones and to confirm my dates.  And there were two.  No gallstones.  Two babies.  A lot of people ask what my reaction was, and all I remember saying was 'Jesus Christ', and feeling my heart beat a million times a minute.  I don't think I really believed it, but there they were on the screen, two little fluttering hearts.  Life can change in an instant.
We didn't tell anyone for awhile, because I didn't believe it, and I worried that because we found out so early maybe it was still a possibility that we could lose one.  They say a lot of pregnancies start out as twins, and like most pregnant women, I read a lot, and then I worried a lot.  But thankfully, they stayed. 
I had a wonderful pregnancy, and I can honestly say I loved being pregnant.  My morning sickness went away at 12 weeks, I felt good, I worked until 34 weeks and I only stopped working because the books said I should, and I gained around 40-45 pounds.  My Dr. didn't seem to worry about anything.  The only bad thing was that at around 24 weeks they started doing ultrasounds every 2 weeks until the end.  Don't get me wrong, I loved seeing my babies, but making a pregnant woman hold her bladder like that was pure torture.  
I do remember being constantly stressed that I was going to go into preterm labor, because that's what all of the books warned me about.  In my multiples prenatal class, they didn't take us on a tour of the L & D unit, they took us to the NICU, because that's where most of us were going to spend some time (and I think out of ten couples in the class, we were the only ones who didn't have our babies there, so I guess I can't blame them).  When I was pregnant, a mom of twins told me that at 34 weeks, she got out of bed in the morning and her water broke.  From that day on, every morning I would get out of bed very slowly, hold my breath, and hope for the best.
It turned out we didn't go into preterm labor, we didn't go into labor at all.  When my non-stress test ultrasound at 37 weeks showed that Baby A was about 7 lbs. and Baby B was about 6 lbs., they decided that 13 lbs in one uterus was enough, so we were scheduled for an induction. The labor went relatively smoothly... I had been dilated 3 cm for a few weeks already, I was induced at 9 a.m., I was 5-6 cm by early afternoon so they broke my water, and then things got pretty intense.  I asked for an epidural at 7 cm, it only took on half my body (very strange feeling to have contraction ripping through only half of you!), so at 8 cm they had to take it out and do it again.  I was in the OR/delivery room at around 11 p.m.  There are couple of things are unique about a twin delivery.  Epidurals are VERY STRONGLY recommended.  I wanted to try without, but my Dr. discouraged it because of the risk of C/S being so high.  I ultimately decided that I didn't want to be awake for Baby A's birth and unconscious for Baby B's.  You have to deliver in an operating room, not a labor and delivery room, again because of the increased risk of C/S.  Which means you can only have one person there.  That was fine, because my husband was awesome, but I think it would have been a great experience for my mom to see her grandchildren come into the world.  I've been lucky enough to witness a few births, and it's incredible.
My babies almost had different birthdays.  I started pushing with the nurses at around 11:30 or so, but I was apparently a pretty good pusher, so they made me stop and wait for the doctor.  We hung out for a bit (with my legs up in stirrups, a spotlight on my perineum, and who knows how many people in the room - just hangin'), and then (after my Dr. had dropped a box of donuts off at the nurses desk) I started pushing again sometime before midnight.  At 12:08, I heard the most wonderful words I've ever heard:  'It's a girl!' and 8 minutes later I heard them again:  'It's another girl!'.  It is difficult to keep the sexes of twins under wraps until delivery (especially with 10 ultrasounds), but we managed to wait for the surprise.  My future flashed in front of me briefly, and I was so, so happy.

First time blogger

I've been thinking about doing this for awhile, for a couple of reasons.  One, when I first found out I was pregnant with twins, I was desperate for information on everything twin-related.  There was never enough, so I decided I would share.  I'm sure with the skyrocketing twin births now that blogs like mine are in abundance, but I thought I would put my thoughts out there anyways.  Which brings me to my second reason; writing down my thoughts.  I've never kept a journal, but I want to start writing things down, because I'll forget them.  I know I've already forgotten cute things my daughters were doing just months ago, because at the time I either thought they'd never stop, or that I'd never forget.  Boo.  So hopefully this will help me to preserve my beautiful memories (and perhaps some not-so-beautiful ones) that time will otherwise undoubtedly wash away.