6 September 2022

In July 2017, I went on my final holiday at 28 weeks and on day one of the holiday to Spain I went into Labour- I flew back to the UK.

My babies, Effie and Ruairí,  were born at 29 weeks + 4 days one vaginally and the other via c-section, they spent 6 weeks in the NNU. They were born at St George's but there were no NICU cot spaces for them so they were immediately blue lighted to St Helier in Sutton. I did not get to meet them for a further ten days as I had managed to contract a chest infection during the 10 days I was in labour.

The NNU experience was obviously not pleasant, having to pay for taxis to and from the hospital every day, costing £60 per day, simply to see my babies struggle! But the neonatal unit got my breast milk going and I was able to exclusively pump for the next 8 months.

We were expecting to be in until at least the due date so when at 35 weeks we were told we could go home after a couple of nights of rooming in as they were both without oxygen and growing relatively well. We went home!

The neonatal units had the babies in the best feeding routine (every 4 hours) and they slept beautifully and have done ever since. So the silver linings in this tale are pretty sparkly! To have twins who slept so well from day one was genuinely incredible.