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The Pam Gannis Story
Two Cakes and a Wealth of First-hand Experience By Charlene Torkelson
Rising at 5 a.m. each day, Gannis got into this early morning habit when the twins were born. Now this allows her to get her medical transcribing started before the boys get up for school. But as a new mom she discovered that sleep is not something that comes easy with babies in the household. The one regret Gannis has in hindsight is not putting the twins in their own rooms as babies. "When one woke up during the night, the other woke up too," she says. "If I had put one in older brother Scott's room, that probably wouldn't have happened, and I would have gotten much more sleep myself."
Gannis was put on bed rest for the final nine weeks of her pregnancy, and although the twins were born two weeks early, they were each over 7 pounds. "That was difficult," Gannis recalls when reflecting on carrying all that baby weight. One of the twins had a condition known as hydronephrosis a shut down of the kidneys. Everything in the body is, of course, connected, and that shut down affected his heart and lungs as well. "Thank goodness he was a heavier weight when born," she says. That extra weight helped him to get through the crisis. After that first touch and go year, Chad recovered and is a very healthy fourth grader.