Misinformation... or why it is good to take a nap before you get in front of a camera.

Whew!  Another whirlwind of a week and I still have not been able to sit down and blog about the happenings of the last two weeks.  I so want to share (and to get everything down "on paper" before I forget it) with our family and friends about where the journey has taken us in that time.  But before I can feel comfortable doing that, I want to correct/add to the news reports about us of the past week.

First of all, we are doing the media "thing" for two reasons.  The first reason is that it was to serve as a platform to give credit where credit is due and to offer up our thanks and gratitude to the different people and organizations that have supported, educated, and loved our growing family since we announced that we were expecting triplets.  Because there's a lot of you!!

We absolutely could NOT have made it to this point without our loving (and lovingly chaotic) and involved families, without our supportive friends (who really helped us find the humor in the craziness of it all), or without our coworkers' patience/understanding/excitement.  There is NO way we would have been able to nurture these munchkins without the concerted efforts and attention of my doctors at the Perinatologists Group of Sacramento, the entire staff at the Sutter Moms of Multiples program, and the absolutely amazing doctors & nurses at Sutter Memorial Hospital.  I'm getting teary (and not just because of hormones anymore!) thinking of how much everyone has given of themselves to get these babies here.

And even though I firmly believe that is where the true story is in all of this-

that it not only takes a village to raise a child, but that it also takes a village to go through a multiples pregnancy prior to the birthing of the children

-it seems that not everyone agrees with me.  Sigh.  So I'll continue to talk about how thankful we are for  all of these people when I'm doing interviews, and I'll continue to know in my heart what the real story is.

The second reason for doing the interviews is to have something neat to share with the boys when they get older.  We're collecting copies of the papers, news stories online, and videos to someday share them with the munchkins.  I envision that my boys will someday have a pretty easy time finding something to take to school for "show n' tell" time...  :)

These little munchkins mean the world to Jason and me, so if someone else wants to share in the sheer joy that surrounds these little boys... I want to share our personal joy with others.


One of the biggest things, though, that is eating away at me (pun totally intended here!) are the different interpretations of my comments in regards to the meal plan I chose to follow for this pregnancy.  I have been very distressed to see some of the spinning of my words that have come out in the media (to be sure- I can understand how and why it happens.  Humans are humans, and my anxiety/exhaustion/ridiculousness have definitely been a contributing factor).  It worries me because I don't want to give false information or ideas to other moms of multiples.  I also worry about any negative feedback for the talented dietician that the Sutter MOMs program has if people were to attribute the info in the news reports as her exact words and ideas.

For the record, let me clear up a few things as best as I can.

-The "6,000 calories a day" thing...
I happened to randomly do a calorie count for myself one day during the pregnancy, and it came up to just over 6,000 calories.  I wasn't consistently hitting that number everyday (sometimes far more, sometimes less).  And to my recollection, the dietician NEVER gave me a true calorie goal to meet- mainly because to my understanding, there isn't enough research to be able to definitively say how much a pregnant mother of higher order multiples (three babies or more) should eat.  So the 6,000 calories thing?  Just a number that I had for one particular day... and people ran with that.  Totally understandable as to why they did.

What I was truly told was that it is almost physically impossible to consume the calories that a higher order multiples pregnancy requires for a few reasons (slowed digestion related to hormones, the physical challenges of a belly full of munchkins that leaves little room for gastric expansion, etc).  THAT statement was one of the biggest take-away messages that I got from my meeting with the dietician.  As for what transpired after that (how I chose to take that message and put it into action), good or bad, right or wrong... the responsibility for that rests solely with me and my grocery bill.

And the dietician worked with me to find healthy ways of slamming the calories into my body- she wasn't telling me to hit up the fast food drive-thru everyday (this would have been an easy way to get the calories in and I do love me some french fries... but without the solid nutrition that the munchkins needed).  In fact, she helped me to find great alternatives to the "easier" ways of packing in the calories- foods that still got calories into me without sacrificing nutrition (think whole fat dairy products and healthy nuts, whole grains and oatmeal, etc.).

-The "12 eggs a day" thing...
Now, this one is totally my fault.  The dietician never told me I had to eat a dozen eggs everyday.  What I was told during my meeting with her was that I needed to really increase my protein intake.  The growing munchkins needed all the protein they could get to be able to grow and develop.  What I thought I said in the interviews is what I've been saying all along- that I've been trying to eat THE EQUIVALENT of a dozen eggs a day.  But as Jason and my mom informed me- I actually said that I eat a dozen eggs a day...  oops.  Major oops.  So I have no one to blame except for myself on this.  The news reports have actually been reporting my incorrect words correctly, and for any misconceptions that this has caused, I take sole responsibility for that.

While I did eat just a ridiculous amount of eggs (quick, easy, tasty, great protein), I also got my protein in lots of other ways- meats, dairy, nuts, edamame (it was not unheard of for me to polish off an entire bag of edamame myself!).  I also ate a lot of protein bars as well- for whatever reason, I never really took to the protein shakes.




I'm sure not everyone agrees with the safety, efficacy, or tastiness of my pregnancy meals and snack plan and I definitely wouldn't recommend what I did to everybody.  But it was MY interpretation of the excellent information and education that was provided to me by the Sutter MOMs program.  Anything that is good about the plan came from them.  Anything that was not so good- I take full responsibility for.  I feel so badly about these things, and I have been losing a little bit of sleep over how my words and actions have contributed to any misinformation out there...