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Episode 106 of the Dad’s Guide to Twins Podcast Show Notes
Listen as we discuss:
- Dealing with jealousy between twins
- What to do when twin child care costs are too much
- Fellow parents share what they love most about having twins
Mentioned in the show:
Last episode with twin dad Andy Shaw
Should both parents keep working after twins are born?
Join thousands of other twin parents on our Facebook page
Transcript
Hi there, and welcome to the 106th episode of The Dad’s Guide to Twins Podcast. This is Joe Rawlinson. As always, you can find me on the web at twindadpodcast.com, where you’ll find much more information on having and raising twins, along with the Show Notes and transcript for this and all previous podcasts episodes.
I’ve made a great deal with Audible where you can get a free audio book version of my first book, Dad’s Guide to Twins, at freetwinbook.com. Once again, that’s freetwinbook.com.
Hope you had a wonderful holiday season, welcome to 2016. I’m excited for a new year sharing tips and tricks with you and your family to help you be a better parent of twins.
If you missed the last episode, the 105th episode, go back and listen to that with Andy Shaw who shares his experiences as a father of twins and some of the crazy adventures they had in getting their twins into the world and healthy with their family back at home. You can check that out twindadpodcast.com.
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Now, today we’ve got three great topics from comments from you and questions from you. I want to go through those today, because I think they’ll benefit all of us regardless of the stages that we’re in with our twins.
How to Deal with Jealousy Between Twins
The first question comes to us from a mom who’s worried about the jealousy between her twins.
Click here to read the full transcript of her question and Joe’s response.
Handling High Costs of Twin Child Care
All right, the next question comes to us from Tim. He wrote about the extreme cost of childcare per month. He wrote that they’d had a nanny and he had to consider getting a second job to cover the expenses of childcare. Childcare of twins can be exorbitant. As you look for different options for your children, you can have in-home care like a nanny or an au pair, or a day care type center. There are several options that you can look for.
Consider the fact that you have a huge amount of money going each month to childcare, you need to reconsider all of your assumptions that you’ve made. Is the current situation that you have the best for you and your family? If you have this huge financial strain and you’re having to seek out another job, it may not be the best option to have that childcare at that point.
I have discussed this in the past and I’ll link to it in the show notes some tips about this. These include, should both parents be working, and how that interplays with getting childcare for your twins.
There are several questions that you will need to ask yourself and your spouse about the type of parenting relationship you want with your kids during the day. Would you prefer to have one of the parents home while the other works because the cost of childcare may approach the need for both parents not to have to work.
If most of the money of one parent’s income is going purely to childcare, I feel that it’s probably advantageous to leave one parent at home to care for the twins because you’ll save that money, and you get to have extra time with both of your kids to bond with them, and to nurture that relationship.
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If you find that you’re really worried about the cost of childcare, and you think you may need to get an extra job, I invite you to reconsider the assumptions that you’re having of, is that really a necessary expense, and is there another way to work around that either with one parent staying at home, or with cheaper childcare options which you have may not considered previously.
What do you love about having twins?
Our last topic today is a fun one. I recently asked on the Facebook group that you can find on Facebook.com/dadsguidetotwins, “What do you love the most about having twins?”
I wanted to share several of the comments from parents like yourself, to help encourage you as you go into this new year, and you’re facing some of the struggles of parenting twins which are very real, and help give you, a light at the end of the tunnel of what you can expect. Some of these happy moments that make it all worth it because when you are in the trenches and you are overwhelmed by the pressure of parenting, or even the logistics of caring for twins, sometimes it’s hard to look ahead to see, yes, it’s going to work out, it’s going to be okay. That is the reality, it’s going to be okay, and it’s going to work out. And over time, you’re going to look back and be able to cherish some of these moments that you have with your twins.
Heather says that her twins are five-months-old, and she loves that they play together on the ground, and they crawl around, and they make each other laugh. I’m with Heather in that. I love to watch our twins interact with each other even from a very early age, just fascinating to me to study their reactions, their facial features, how they interact and they touch each other, how they communicate with each other which is very fascinating to me. You’ll find moments of joy in watching your twins do the same thing.
Jennifer writes, she says, “My husband and I look at each other constantly and say, it would be so boring with just one child.” This one made me laugh because it’s true. We had two singleton boys before our twin girls were born, and it’s just kind of night and day difference as far as the sheer amount of work and responsibility of caring for twins, versus a singleton baby. I could see in the past maybe being bored or not having something to do when we had just the one child, having twins opens up a whole new world of never being bored as a parent.
Mandy writes that she loves double the smiles. This was one of my favorite things when I would come home from work is, I’d see my two little babies, their smiles, their expressions, so excited to see daddy when he came home from work, and that just warms my heart every time.
John writes that he loves everything, he loves the challenges and the rewards. I agree here with John because having twins and raising twins is full of challenges, but at the same time you have lots of rewards. You get lots of milestones, you get double the milestones, double the joy, and you get these two special little people in your family that you can love and you can share memories with. The rewards are you get to see them develop, you see their differences and their similarities. It’s just an awesome journey as a parent of twins.
Jenna writes that she loves that her girls will have a friend forever. In our family we’ve seen this with our girls. Our girls are the best of friends, they play with each other constantly, they have a great relationship. Now, our girls are only seven and we’ve seen that from an early age where they’ve been very friendly and play with each other very easily, and I look forward to that relationship developing and growing over the years to come.
(NOTE: Still expecting? 
Get weekly updates on your twin pregnancy here.)
Zack adds that he loves being able to share a child with his wife, and he loves being able to constantly give attention to a child without having to wait his turn. This one made me smile because Zack is right on the ball. When I was a father of just a single child, a single baby, I felt like I was kind of on the outside looking in because my wife would be breastfeeding the baby, and I couldn’t really do much to help in that situation. She bore the brunt of the care almost all the time purely out of physical necessity.
When we had our second child, our second son, it was the same kind of story but at least I could pay attention or help with our older son when my wife tended to the baby. But then the twin girls came along, and just like Zack noted here, it was all hands on deck. My wife and I got to each take a baby, we each got to feed and care for the baby, and it made it a lot easier for me to be involved as a father with our twins simply because of fact that we had the two babies, and they both needed attention at the same time. I loved being able to share those moments with my wife in the middle of the night taking care of our twins, and each of us taking one of the babies to change diapers, and bottle-feed, and take care of them.
Being able to share parenting duties is one of the great joys of being a parent of twins. As you go into the New Year, I invite you to think about what are some of the things that you love most about having twins. Let that kind of be the light at the end of the tunnel when you’re having a really rough day, when the twins are really crazy, when you’re waking up in the middle of the night. When all these challenges are falling down on you, just remember, these very happy and great moments you’re going to have, or that you already have, and look back on those or look ahead to them. They’re going to bring you great joy in the journey with twins.
Don’t forget that you can get a free audio book version of my first book, The Dad’s Guide to Twins, by visiting freetwinbook.com. Thank you so much for listening, and I’ll see you next time.
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