My wife and I got married in our early 30s and didn't know whether to have kids. In the end we didn't start until I was 38 and she was 43. We obviously had to use fertility treatment, and it took several attempts and in the end used a donor egg.

They use two eggs to increase chances, and she got pregnant. Once egg split so for a while we had twins and a single. Unfortunately the single didn't make it and got consumed by the body. But she gave birth to identical twin boys at 37 weeks.

One went into the NICU immediately because of twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome, but fortunately pulled through. We took the other home after a couple of days and put him in his crib, thinking "so what do we do?" - like all new parents, I'm sure.

A week later #2 came home, and then started the hardest three years of my life. It was rough and suicide was a thought in my head nearly every day.

They are 3.5 now, and diagnosed with autism, which explains a lot about the difficulties we had with their early development. We have no family or friends and living in a foreign country, so raising delayed autistic twins alone has to be one of the toughest things parents can do.

I regretted it often. It was a constant battle of despising the situation I was in without wanting to despise the children I brought into the world. Some days I would have given them away in an instant. I cried a lot, a grown man, but my wife and I talked through many things and we just gave each other enough love and support to carry on.

Today is better. I finally actually feel happy with the boys. They are still delayed in communication and social skills, maybe 6-12 months behind, but they are in a lot of therapies and special classes. They are pretty smart and have an infatuation with numbers and letters turns out they are hyperlexic . They wouldn't talk to you, but could say their alphabet when they were 2. That first time they recite the alphabet backwards brings a confused smile to your face.

They are reading, writing and spelling at 6yr old level, but if you ask them what they did today, you always get a stock answer. You can't have a conversation yet. We have to teach them the appropriate way to respond to a question. They say it, but seems like they don't know why.

Anyway, the road is brighter and each day I'm glad we're all still here.