Family Life Triage {How moms of many, multiples, or both do it}

For many months,well, let's be honest since the twins were born nearly 18 months ago I have been asked several times "How do you do it?" I could never quite figure out how to answer other than, "By the Grace of God." or "Honestly I don't really know, you just do." Tonight as I was carrying the first of the twins ready for bed up the stairs to her crib it came to me! I finally know how to explain how it is done!

FAMILY LIFE TRIAGE is what I thought of as I was climbing those stairs with Ellie. What a catching name too! Here is how a seniro just might play out.

After a full day of activity, well who am I kidding, it could happen any day or at any time, you find yourself with 2-5 kids crying all at the same time. So, what do you do except sit down and cry with them? TRIAGE! Here is the way I like to run down the cryers as well as the rest of the gang.
In order of who gets moms help or attention first.

1. Youngest child or if hurt the child with the greatest injury.
2. After #1 is taken care of it goes up to the next oldest child in need. Again according to age and or injury.  Example: Our 7 year old may trump one of our 17 month olds if she is injured badly enough.

This continues until all crying stops. If, I am lucky enough a few stop crying on their own and realize they can cope with life without needing Mom they way they thought they did. Somtimes though more join in on the crying and the number in TRIAGE goes up. Then I just stop and cry! Haha. Oh, one more important thing to remember, enlist the help of older non crying children! My older children can often comfort a smaller sibling or help them while I tend to those in the most dire need. Side note: I can't say how many times my "big" kids help me with the twins or even Ashlyn! They are probably the reason I have not gone insane yet! haha "big" kids ROCK!

Some out there may think I am ignoring my other children who need me, but in reality I believe I am teaching them good life skills on how to handle their emotions, conflicts with siblings, or "small" hurts on their own knowing help is comming if they still need it in a few minutes. In the end every child gets checked on, tucked in bed, hugged, kissed, and told they are loved. But, TRIAGE is the way we handle multiple meltdowns that occur at the same time.

I also TRIAGE house work. Most important first and so on. There are times when an item on the list sits at the bottom of the list for days.

I want to state that I am NO supermom. I regularly have days when nothing gets done because I don't want to do anything, my kids go to sleep in their clothes and have not brushed their teeth, the twins eat food off the floor and not single dish gets washed or put away, this is just how I make it through each day.

Now you have an answer to "I just don't know how you do it!"