Triplet State of Mind

No one has ever had my back like my friend Ron has my back.

Minutes after learning I hadn't received a job I'd worked very hard to get, he began working the phones on my behalf.

He once drove into town from his farm 60 miles away for a 6:30 a.m. breakfast he'd arranged for me with a prospective employer. And he all but shrugged off a tragedy in his own life to help celebrate the miracle in ours.

He's the guy you can tell anything to and ask anything of. Never, ever judges.

So it is no surprise that on Friday night, as we discussed the joys, and perhaps more to the point - the extreme difficulties - of having triplets, Ron picked me up once again.

As the babies' first month at home melts into the second, and the shiney newness has begun to soften just a bit, the adrenaline that carried us through the first several weeks has begun to dull a bit too. The nights are longer, with less sleep. As we get more tired, the boys seem to eat more slowly. The feedings stretch from one early-morning hour into the next, and we wonder how long we'll have to pat their little backs before the burps come.

And believe me, you want the burps to come. If a baby doesn't burp, the brothers don't sleep. And if the brothers don't sleep, the parents don't sleep.

Every morning, after the 5 a.m. feeding, I put the baby I'm holding back into his bed, and I trudge down the stairs to get ready for work. There is no end to the routine. Some nights, it seems there will be no reprieve.

Ron knew I was wearing down. He probably saw it in my eyes. Maybe he heard it in my voice. Maybe it was that I mashed up chords to songs we've played together 100 times. After we'd packed up our gear and headed home from our Friday night gig, he did what he always does.

Sometimes it's tough to know when he's holding me accountable. He never rebukes. He doesn't criticize. He simply reminds me of important, basic truths in his forward-looking, ever-optimistic way. Like, knock off this obsessive focus on how difficult things are in the short-term and focus instead on the long-term, the big picture, the incredible family that needs me to keep my head about me.

He said, in other words, that my problem was my state of mind.

It had to be the timing. This was stuff I already knew. But, as always, he said what I needed, when I needed it. So I woke up early Saturday morning and happily fed all three boys by myself. Then I shuffled my wife and daughters off to the Cheyenne Frontier Days parade, and I cleaned the house while they were gone.

It felt great. It was, as I told my wife that afternoon, the easiest work I've ever done. When I stopped complaining, for just a moment, about how tired I was and instead focused on the wonder in my life, my little boys began to look like miracles again.

Now I'm aware that sleep deprivation is often used as a form of torture, and I have become reacquainted recently with its very real physical impacts. But dealing with it, for me, is a matter of the mind.

Sometimes I just need someone to help make the obvious clear again.

Thanks, Ron.

The Call

If you are familiar at all with the geography of Wyoming, you know that the 100-or-so miles between Casper and Shoshoni is perhaps the most desolate stretch of highway ever constructed. Endless desert plains, dotted with sagebrush and antelope. Nothing more.

You do not, therefore, want to receive this voicemail on your cell phone when you are some 30 miles out of Shoshoni:

"Steve, you need to call me right now. I've tried to call about 15 times, and you're not answering. Jack has a hernia and the doctor says it is life threatening. I'm on my way to Denver and I need you to call me right now," through sobs, the screaming of a baby in the background.

You've got just enough cell service to hear the message, but you're about 10 seconds away from losing the signal. No context. No explanation. Just the fear that you may lose your son. Again.

Last time this happened it was a surprise only in the sense that we didn't even know our twin boys were mono-amniotic/mono-chorionic - a very high-risk twin pregnancy. When we saw them motionless on the ultrasound monitor, neither heart beating, we were stunned silent. But we had known it was high risk.

This time, our boys had arrived healthy. So the prospect of a life-threatening condition six weeks into Jack's life was a shock. Particularly since I received the news with no way to ask any questions or gather any more information.

My wife did get Jack safely to the hospital in Denver. And the most astonishingly selfless group of people I've ever known moved into our house and took care of our five other children until family arrived, and until I was able to return from my business trip to the northwestern-most corner of the state.

In the meantime, we learned that Jack had an infected lymph node, and that although it could have serious implications if left untreated, it was not likely to be serious at all. My wife stayed with him in Denver for two days, and she, Jack, and I all arrived home at about the same time on Friday afternoon.

As I've written before, there is simply no thanking the people who helped us through this. Except to be first in line when the next set of parents needs help. Be assured, we will be standing at the front of that line.

And there is no fear like the cold panic that seizes you when you think your child may die, and you are too far away, and too disconnected even to offer comfort to your family.

We think often of Jeremiah and Jacob. We hang ornaments on the Christmas tree each year to help us remember them. And we thank God that their three brothers and three sisters are here with us, safe, sleeping peacefully in their beds tonight.

I suspect this fear never truly fades.

She's Right

My wife and I have a running argument that I think most parents will recognize. Her proposition: men are just not tough enough to bear children.

My response: the two genders have different roles to play so I don't accept the premise. It isn't necessary for men to be 'tough enough' to deliver babies, because our biology prohibits the need. We just don't have to do it, so the argument is nonsense.

But, I always hasten to add, we could do it if we had to. After all, we smash our fingers under the hoods of cars, suffer the searing agony of ripping athletic tape off our hairy legs, and survive crushing blows from large middle linebackers.

Now, I love to argue just for the fun of the argument - and for the mental exercise. But if I'm honest, she's right.

For the better part of 34 weeks, my wife took handfuls of medicine, vomited almost everything she ate, reorganized our bed 10 times a night in failed efforts to get comfortable enough to sleep, turned the heat up, turned the heat down, rocked at least three times to get enough momentum to get herself off the couch, and - wait for it - gave herself shots in her hips.

Oh, and she continued to work (albeit from a laptop on our couch) and take care of our daughters. In fact, the day she was to be admitted to the hospital she refused - she had to get back to Cheyenne to attend Madeline's preschool graduation party. She simply told the doctor she'd be back to check in later that week.

I'm bed-bound for at least a day when I start to feel a headache coming on.

Now, I suspect most politically savvy husbands who publish blogs about their families post at least one item about how wonderful their wives are. But I'm not kidding. The only differences between my wife pre-triplets and post-triplets are that she no longer gives herself shots, and she now takes care of six children rather than three. Oh, and she is doing it on less sleep.

I've always thought my wife was the perfect role model for our daughters. She is smart, bold, and accomplished. I'm certain that she will be the perfect role model for our sons as well. Strong, committed, and compassionate.

So please know, my dear Tina, that I see the exhaustion in your eyes. I appreciate your patience in soothing our boys through the night - and letting me sleep. I appreciate your boundless - if depleted - energy in caring for our daughters at the same time.

I admit it: I'm not tough enough.

You may never fully know how much I appreciate you.

Kindness

I don't think I'll ever forget the look on his face. He just sat there on the couch across the living room from me, his chin resting in the palms of his hands, his eyes scanning the floor. He said nothing.

After several long minutes, he simply stood up, and began to walk to the front door. "I'm so sorry," he said, "I just don't know what to say."

"Neither do I," I said. "I don't think there is anything you can say. But you came."

He came. My dad had died the day before, and this 17-year-old friend of mine felt moved to come sit silently in our living room. He wanted to help in any way he could, and presence was all he had to offer. It was one of the many times in my life that I've experienced genuine kindness.

Our boys are all home now. In fact, we are already in our second week of new rhythms, new sounds, and sleepless nights. The girls are adjusting well - probably a bit more quickly even than we are.

And I find myself holding a bottle at 1:30 in the morning, gazing down at the little knit caps and closed eyes, and wondering if maybe this time we've been blessed too much. Integrating triplets with three other children is as difficult as you think it would be, and then some. It takes all of my energy to be in all of the places that I need to be, doing all of the things that I need to do. And that's before the crying starts - just after the lights go out.

I've caught myself wondering if we really do have the energy to do this. If maybe this time, we have been given more than we can handle. If maybe this is a father's post-partem.

And then another in a long line of selfless people offers to help. Sincerely, and in any way they can. And then another. And then another. Like the friend on my couch, they say very little and ask nothing in return. They are, simply, very kind.

This week we began letting them into our lives, helping feed the boys, providing food to make dinner preparation easier, driving the girls to ballet. I always offer them the same line: we stopped being proud a month ago.

We didn't, of course. We still haven't. And letting people in when you are accustomed to thinking you can do everything yourself is not easy.

Like the friend on my couch, I just don't know what to say.

We are humbled, and deeply grateful.