You Too, Can Handle Two. A Guide of Mental and Physical Preparation For Your New Twins.

By Michelle Mandaville

Welcome new mothers and fathers to my easy to read guide on your new adventure into carrying and raising twins. Read along as I guide expecting parents of multiples from pregnancy up to 4 months of age. In this book you'll find my best advice on the items to cross off your checklist before your duo joins the world, self- care and mental preparations for the journey ahead. Make the daunting task of registering and packing easier with my recommendations on an essential twins registry and how to wisely tackle your hospital stay. In this guide I aim to help first time parents of multiples navigate the uncharted waters of bringing two babies home with tips and instructions on getting through those first months when you may feel out numbered. Learn effective ways of communicating your needs to those who want to help and get a sneak peek into what is yet to come as you survive new babies, friends and crying in stereo sound.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michelle Mandaville
• Release date: Dec 28, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370242504

Michelle Mandaville

Mother of Twins. Manager of Chaos. I've long been a fan of writing, poetry and all things fiction. Naturally I waited until my life was packed full to the brim with two new babies, work and an utter lack of time to start my first endeavor in the publication world. I slowly started my first novel, as I would chip away at it chapter by chapter, there was always a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that there was something more important I could be putting on paper at the current juncture. Cue me putting my great novel on the back burner to publish content on which I've in inadvertently become an expert on. I present to you, my first book, not a novel, not a fiction story with a protagonist, conflict and all of the makings of a beautiful story... No, I present to you: You too, Can Handle two. A guide of mental and physical preparation for your new twins. I see the same questions asked over and over again, I watch advice seekers wondering what is to come with their new surprise of being a twin parent, so I took notes, made lists of the things I did right and paid close attention to the ways I went wrong and put it all in one easy to read guide. My quest to finish my novel continues, while I simultaneously continue to advise on tackling multiples 4 months at a time, care for my two beautiful boys, walk and feed my English Bulldog named Taco, continue to be a dedicated full time employee in the advertising world of Property Management and try to Thank my husband every day for letting me chase my dreams in lieu of a hot meal on the table at night. Thank you for stopping by.

Book preview

You Too, Can Handle Two.

A guide of mental and physical preparation for your new Twins.

by

Michelle Mandaville

Written by Michelle Mandaville. Distributed by Smashwords

Copyright 2017 Michelle Mandaville

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Prologue

Chapter 1: In the Beginning

Chapter 2: The Registry

Chapter 3: Expect the Unexpected. What to pack and how to react when it it’s not all rainbows and unicorns

Chapter 4: You made it home! Now how?

Chapter 5: When can I meet the babies?

Chapter 6: The Witching hour is real

Chapter 7: Twin Guilt and letting the single(ton) life go

Chapter 8: Why I stop here

Prologue:

My husband and I sat on opposite ends of our long, worn, formula stained couch, staring each other down; daring the other one to say out loud what we were both thinking. Each of us with a sleeping baby wrapped snug in our arms. He spoke first.

I hesitate to say this out loud, but I really feel like we are past the worst of it Mike said while leaning over to gently kiss the top of his babies head.

I have Instant panic, I’ve been down this road before, you think you are out of the woods and boom, something happens.

I wish you wouldn’t have said it out loud, but I have to agree I responded while gazing at the content baby who slept with heavy breath in my arms.

I mean, can we talk about it now? He continued How bad things were for a while? The NICU stay, getting up at all hours of the night and the inconsolable witching hours? He took another deep breath before continuing. I stressed every day not knowing what sort of night we were in for.

I know! I agreed with bottled up enthusiasm It felt hard. And just like that these little stinkers slept from 7pm to 7 am. I never imagined being here today

I’m big on transparency. Twins are hard, scratch that, twins are really hard. There, I said it. Our precious fraternal twin boys are now four months old and I honestly don’t know how we did it; but we did. I’ve taken dozens of mental notes and had a million thoughts of ‘I should have done this before’ or ‘I wish I would have registered for that.’ I fantasized about meeting an expecting parent of twins on the street one day and spewing all of this information out at them so it could go to use. Knowing full well my verbal vomit of unsolicited advice may have an adverse effect on that poor un suspecting expecting parent; I realized we live in a day of age where expecting parents have the means to reach their desired knowledge by simply taking to the World Wide Web. Thus I find myself putting my passion of pen to paper and newly found talent of multi-tasking tiny humans to bring you the thoughts that I have carefully collected and organized the past 13 months.

Who I am and what this book is not. It’s important I clarify before you continue down this metaphoric rabbit hole with me. I am not a doctor, I have not devoted years of study in the field of multiples. Never has a thesis paper been produced on this subject by my hand. I am in fact a digital media sales consultant in the Mid-West region of the USA. My only qualification, albeit the most important one; is my recent experience becoming a first time mother to multiples and having this journey fresh in my mind. I wish to share with you, someone who will soon become an expert in this field as well (congrats to you) my journey and instill the confidence that you too, can handle two.