A Compromise, of Sorts

The night of my last post I decided to go see the ladies, Jeni and Ling, of the magic hands. I am a big believer in massage therapy and I usually go see them when I'm feeling poorly. Sure enough, Jeni cleared up my sinuses as well as giving me some amazing pressure points massage in my arms because she said I had so much stress.

That night I slept well, but I woke up the next day feeling even worse as the toxins were working out of my body. Thank god for HN, because I slept all day, waking only every 4 hours to feed the boys, pump and try to eat something myself before going back to bed.

It was a tense day full of F-Bombs, as in "I'm not fucking going." Because really, when you feel that bad, you cannot even fathom the idea of going, no matter what. There was more....it was a bad, bad day.

I kept loading up on liquids, started taking a massive amount of probiotics (for the Thrush) plus a Vitamin B12+Folic Acid (B for the Thrush and also my blood levels came back as deficient in B12 and Folic Acid). Every feeding I dunked my booby in a hot water bath spiked with vinegar and made sure the nips air dried as much as possible.

I woke up on Friday feeling much better. Whew. Bullet dodged.

I proposed the plan of us leaving Saturday night instead of Friday night and Chicken was fine with that. It worked in our favor for a number of reasons:

• It gave me an extra day to recover
• I didn't get to do the packing I was supposed to do Wednesday and Thursday as I was sick (and I am the packer of the family. Chicken tries, but the last time she packed her stuff, she arrived in Italy with all tops and no bottoms. Not a good look. I took over from there so we didn't have to buy half a new wardrobe every time we traveled. She has been known to once get on a plane asking, "Where are we going and what did I bring?")
• I didn't get to run the last minute errands
• And most importantly, we could leave a little bit earlier.

This last point was the most crucial because check in for the condo was between 3:30-5 on Saturday. We wanted to leave earlier all along, but it didn't make sense because if we got here and had no where to go after 12-14 hours in a car...well, that would suck mightily.

If we arrived on Sunday, it wouldn't matter what time we arrived and other people would already be here to help us unload the car and give us a hand with the boys--Oh, and FEED us!!

So, we packed it up on Friday and did some last minute things. On Saturday, Chicken took the morning shift and I napped while I did her the favor in the afternoon.

The plan was to eat dinner as soon as the boys went to bed at 6pm and go to sleep ourselves shortly thereafter.

Chicken went to sleep at 7:30pm and I pumped and then....tossed and turned. I couldn't fall asleep no matter what I did.

The longer I thrashed about the more stressed out I got about the road trip and how I couldn't do it without sleeping.

Finally at 11pm, I said screw it. Got up, pumped again, got something to eat, went to get the car that Chicken's brother had parked a few blocks away and brought everything downstairs. Left the hazards on and went back up, woke up Chicken and the babies, gave them bottles and put them in their car seats.

Normally at this night feeding they are so sleepy, but as we took them down in the elevator they were wide eyed and alert. They were so cute as they quietly took in everything around them as if asking "what are we doing now Mommy?" No crying at all and zoom, we were off.

The car is a Toyota Matrix and it is so tiny we don't even have strollers for the week. We have 2 suitcases, one backpack, one diaper bag, 2 car seats, 2 Ergos, a laptop bag and my handbag. And we are packed to the max! ***This is also the reason we could not bring HN, as many of you suggested we do, but the main reason is that it would've cost us a cool grand for her fee as there are 7 overnights involved. NOT happening!***

For some reason, even without sleep or caffeine I drove through the night from 12:30pm to 4am. At that point we'd made awesome time, pulled over in Maryland to get gas and BF the boys, and then I continued on to Virginia.

At 5:30am the state trooper clocked me at 84 in a 65, I couldn't find the registration for the car that isn't even MINE and I looked a mess having not slept a wink now and driving all night now.

Did you know it's a misdemeanor in VA to go over 80 and is punishable by a jail time up to 2 years and a $2,500 fine?? Holy Shit.

He let me go without a ticket and only a warning. Can you say L-U-C-K-Y??

I slowed down from there, Chicken took over at 6:30, the boys slept til 7:45 and we made another hour long stop to feed them, ourselves and stretch a bit.

All was going well until we got turned around in NC and went almost an hour out of our way.

The boys broke down at the very end. It was horrible. More F-bombs and diaper blowouts and I've now slept 40 minutes in the last twenty-four hours.

Why anyone wants to drive all this way when there are perfectly fine beaches along the way....? Family tradition, it is what it is.

So, long story...we are here. I sucked it up. The trip was bad, but not as bad as I thought it might be. I really don't want to do it again, but we have to get home somehow!

Grunter and W2 are doing really well, with naps, with the rented cribs, the changes in their schedule--everything. I am SO relieved! And everyone is so happy to meet them and play with them. It IS much better than I anticipated and I'm glad we came in spite of it all.

Chicken told me that she owes me a big, nice vacation because (a) the hellish trip to Florida to see all of her family when the twins were 3 months old that I didn't think we should go on.

(b) the fact I had to sit in the back seat of the car for 3 days while were we drove through the mountains in Argentina because it made her carsick and (c) this 12.5 hour car trip.

I have already picked out the location and it makes me very happy just thinking about it.

I'll give you a hint. It's very far away, involves scuba diving, we've never been there and Islam is the main religion.

Now I'll leave you with some photos of the boys in the swimming pool for the first time--they loved it!