Why You Were Taken

Journal entry 12 December 1987

Westville

In the news: A group of police officers are fired upon by freedom fighters from a moving car in Soweto; two police officers are killed and four injured. In Melbourne, Australia, they are attempting to understand the Queen Street Massacre: why 22-year-old Frank Vitkovic killed 8 people in a post office building before jumping from the eleventh floor. Microsoft releases Windows 2.0.

What I’m listening to: U2’s ‘Where the Streets have no Name’

What I’m reading: ‘Tommyknockers’ by Stephen King.

What I’m watching: Flowers in the Attic. I’ve read the book before, but now that we have babies we just found it too creepy, P had to turn it off!

We brought the twins home this week. They keep us very busy but not-busy at the same time. Sometimes when they are both sleeping, P & I just sit in the lounge and wonder what to do. Other times they are both crying at the same time and we feel totally overwhelmed.

P has a pair of red DIY noise-cancelling headphones (that he uses when he does drilling etc.) which have come in very handy at bath-time!

I feel so attached to them that I want to be with them all the time. When we settle them down at night for their longer sleep I don’t want to leave the nursery. Once I’m out I feel relieved that I have some time to myself but miss them immediately. Sometimes when I’m not with them I catch myself looking at photos of them. Crazy!

We are totally in survival mode, sleeping when we can, showering IF we can, eating take-aways when we run out of 2-minutes noodles. I feel so consumed by the feeding and caring that I feel like I hardly exist. Or at least, the person I was before, hardly exists. I am just a vessel. A milk machine. As for P and I – we are like ships passing in the night.

We keep the babies next to our bed at night so that I don’t have to get up to feed them every 2 hours. Then if they cry I just reach over and pop them in bed with us and snuggle while they feed. I feel very protective of them. Tiger mother.

It’s almost Christmas and I think it will be, like, the happiest Christmas ever.