Rooming In and Going Home!

After passing the 24 hour on demand we knew we were on our way home. Because Joshua was coming home with oxygen for feedings we had to stay one more night at the hospital to practice using the oxygen and the monitors. Even though Joshua had not had an apnea or bradacardiac episode in weeks he had to come home with a monitor because he was on the oxygen.

That day Joshua was moved back upstairs into the NICU to make it easier to find him for paperwork and things. They also took out his feeding tube. Brian worked and also worked on getting things ready for Joshua to come home. I hung around the hospital and nursed. That night the oxygen guy came by and showed us how to use everything. Then we were put into the rooming in room.

Before I did the rooming in, I imagined it as we stay in there and if we have problems such as Joshua turning blue or something we have nurses 100 feet away. But every time we fed Joshua, or changed his diaper, or the monitor went off we had to call the nurse. The monitor was really touchy and we hadn't learned how to keep the leads on well yet and an off lead will make it go off. It was disappointing to me because I imagined this as the first night I could take care of my baby, by myself without supervision, and I had to wait one more night for Joshua to be just Brian and mine.

The night spent rooming in was the worst night for sleep that I have ever had with either of my children. The feedings and phone calls were bad enough, but in addition to that Joshua made a ton of noise. Preemies tend to be grunty and he grunted and groaned noisily all night long.

The next morning at 7:00 people started coming into our room to get things ready to grow. After no sleep the night before we were moving kind of slow that morning, not to mention Joshua still needed to be taken care of, and one nurse openly wondered why we were going so slow. But the nurses also gave us this adorable card and wished Joshua a happy 2 month birthday. Joshua was in the NICU exactly 2 months or 61 days going home July 9, 2008.

We spent the morning filling out a ton of paper work. Then we waited, and waited, and waited for the pediatrician to give us the clear to leave. Finally someone that wasn't Joshua's pediatrician came and signed the paper work for us to leave.

Then we could finally leave. A nurse has to carry the baby carrier out to the car*, and then I had to ride in the back seat with Joshua to make sure he didn't stop breathing or something. And we were finally free.

*When Minna was born they had me carry her out of the hospital myself when I had given birth 3 days earlier and was being discharged myself.