Monday December 16th. I knew it was the day that I would have to
leave the hospital and be farther away from Nathan. I didn’t want this day to come, but I guess
it was time. My parents and
Father-in-law came to the hospital that day to help me pack. My parents were heading back to Columbus that
day as well. They had been staying in
the same hotel room that Kevin and I stayed in when we first arrived in
Cincinnati. My Father-in-Law was going
to stay in town for one more night.
Kevin and I spent as much time in the NICU as we could
before it was time to leave to go to the hotel.
We were in the NICU around noon when Nathan’s nurse said that we could
do Skin-to-Skin again! I am one lucky
mom! Two days in a row! I asked Kevin if
he wanted a turn to hold his son. He
said that he wasn’t going to take away something from me that made me so
incredibly happy. He was such a good
husband (still is) and I was not going to argue with him. So we did the same thing. We put curtains around his incubator, I got
prepped and I held me baby for another hour.
That time spent with my son was so special to me. His skin against mine felt so natural and he
had that new baby smell. I kissed his
forehead multiple times again and just was completely in the moment. Nothing could bother me. It was just me and my son.
Mid-afternoon came and it was time to get my discharge
papers and head out. We told Nathan that
we would be back later that night to kiss him Goodnight but we would be gone
for a good 5 hours or so. Kevin and I
only packed a little bit of clothing when we originally came down to Cincinnati
because we weren’t planning on being here for this long. Throughout our time in L+D, my mom was taking
Kevin’s clothes to a laundry mat because he only had a few items. So with that said, we had to run to Target
and get some clothes and essentials such as underwear, socks, some shirts and I
needed some nursing bras because I clearly didn’t have any since I wasn’t
planning on pumping 3 months early. I
also had some prescriptions that I needed to get filled.
My nurse that day went through all the discharge papers with
me. We made sure we had everything out
of our room, we hugged all the wonderful Labor and Delivery nurses that had
helped me and we left the hospital. Two
of the nurses, Bridget and Becca gave me their phone numbers. They said if I needed anything, to give them
a call. If Kevin was back in Columbus
working and I needed to be driven somewhere, they would take me. That just goes to show how much these people
became family during my time in L+D.
There was also a nurse, Alicia that was one of my very first nurses in
L+D. She was the one who tripped over my
monitor chords that first night. Anyway,
she came up to me and told me that she had Fraternal Boy/Girl Twins. They were born at 27 weeks and her daughter
didn’t make it but she still has her little boy. She cried to me and I cried with her. She
gave me her email and told me to contact her if she ever needed to talk. I had heard other stories throughout my time
in the hospital of twins being born, whether they had TTTS or just being born
premature, and one twin would survive.
So hearing those stories gave me so much hope for Nathan.
As we were walking out of the hospital, I realized that this
was my first time feeling fresh air since December 4th. I had been on the L+D floor, which is also
the floor the NICU is on since December 4th. So for 12 days, I had not left the hospital. We drove 20 min south into Covington, KY to
get to the hotel. Upon arrival, we were
supposed to have a hospital grade breast pump waiting for me. I asked the front desk if it had arrived and
it had not. We got up to the room, and
we called the DME (Durable Medical Equipment) provider to see where it was. I was due to pump and was going to need it
soon. The people at the number we called
didn’t really know what we were talking about and seemed to have no record of a
pump to be delivered. I started freaking
out and thinking that we were going to need to go back to the hospital and
sleep in the NICU because they had a pump.
I called Bridget and asked her if I could borrow a pump from the
hospital. She told me to go to the
Nurses Station when I got back to the hospital and they could rent me one. At least I had a plan, but I was going to be
a bit uncomfortable until we got back to the hospital.
Kevin went to his dads’ hotel room for a little bit to have
a few beers while I put all my clothes away.
We were going to stay in that hotel until we figured something else out
or got into the Ronald McDonald House.
We were on the waitlist so we didn’t know how long it would be until we
got in. I relaxed for a bit by myself
before I got ready to go to dinner. The
plan for the night was to go to dinner with my Father-in-law and then head back
to the NICU to spend an hour or two with the little man.
We had reservations at the Moerlein Lager House at 6:30
pm. It was on the river and all the
nurses said it was a good place to eat.
Kevin and I would drive separate from Dad so he could just go back to
the hotel after and Kevin and I could go to the NICU. It was 6 o’clock and we pulled out of the
hotel parking lot. I had Kevin’s phone
in my hand with GPS on it to lead us to the restaurant. Within 10 seconds, his phone rings with a 513
area code number. This interrupts the
GPS so Kevin misses the turn. I answer
it because any 513 number could be the hospital and something could be
happening to Nathan so it is important that we answer those calls. It was actually the Ronald McDonald
House. They said they had a room open up
and they wanted to know if we were still interested. We told them ‘Yes’ and then they asked if we
could check in that night or the next morning.
I told them we would be there the next morning. We had just gotten settled in the hotel for
the night and I wasn’t about to take time out of visiting my baby to go to the
Ronald McDonald House (RMH). We had to
tell them a time they would expect us so we just told them between 9 and 10 in
the morning. At that point, Kevin had
pulled into a parking lot since the GPS was being interrupted by this phone
call. We got the GPS running again and
we got two blocks and RMH was calling again.
I ignored it and let it go to Voicemail because we needed to find this
restaurant. Then my phone rang and it
was the hotel. They said that my breast
pump had arrived so that was a big relief.
We got up to the restaurant and Kevin dropped me off so I
wouldn’t have to walk very far from the parking garage. I was still healing from the C-Section so I
couldn’t do a lot of walking if I could avoid it. As we were waiting for our table to be ready,
Kevin said that the guy who called from the RMH REALLY wanted us to come that
night. Kevin told him that his wife was
really tired and we were going to visit our baby that night so we wouldn’t have
time. He wasn’t thrilled by that
response but too bad.
We had a very nice dinner that was not hospital food and it
was nice to have a change of scenery. We
had the view of the river from our table and the lights of the buildings were
reflecting off the water and that was very pretty. But as nice as this change of scenery was, I
couldn’t wait to get to the NICU to see my baby. There was no point in rushing because we
couldn’t be there before 7:30 anyway so we just took our time.
Dinner was over so we paid the bill and Kevin went to go get
the car and pull it around. We were on
our way to see our baby and Kevin’s dad headed back to the hotel. We got to the NICU and I was so happy to see
my sweet boy. Elizabeth was his nurse
for the night. She was a younger girl
only a year or two out of nursing school but she seemed to be really good. I helped, once again, with Nathan’s care and
we hung out for about an hour and a half.
Elizabeth was kind enough to take a family picture. Although we were missing a piece of the
portrait with Colin being gone, we knew he was there with us.
 |
| Nathan and his parents (it is kind of blurry) |
 |
| Nathan holding Mom and Dad's Hands |
I didn’t want to leave the NICU. I was going to be sleeping 20 min away from
Nathan rather than down the hall. He was
doing well so I wasn’t completely nervous but I know in the NICU, anything can
happen. I was glad that we got into RMH
and would only be a few blocks away starting the next night. While in the NICU, I was able to pump and
since the pump was delivered to the hotel, I didn’t have to go to L+D to get
one.
It was time to say goodnight to my sweet little boy. I told Elizabeth to call me if anything
happened but hopefully everything was going to be fine and Nathan was going to
have a good night.
When we got back to the hotel, we picked up the pump at the
front desk, I took a nice hot shower in a spacious shower and I crawled into
bed. Since they were double beds, I
asked Kevin if he would be offended if I slept alone in one bed. I just didn’t want him to roll and hit my
incision. And it was still painful to
transition from lying to siting to standing so I didn’t want to bother him when
I got up in the middle of the night to pump.
So we went to bed and it felt so good to be in something other than a
hospital bed and I am sure Kevin enjoyed sleeping on something other than a
stiff pull out couch. But even so, I
wish I were still in a hospital bed, still pregnant with my boys.
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