At long last, after 6 days and change of hospital stay, we’re all home.  Seton was most generous in letting us occupy our room for so long, and it really helped.  As much as I detest hospitals, the staff was extremely friendly and I can’t imagine having had to sit around the house waiting for an update.  Anyhow, those of you in town, feel free to schedule a visit.  2 rules: no kissing, no pinching.   Speaking of the baby here, of course; you can always pinch and kiss me.

Well, I have been in the hospital for almost a full week – one day for labor, two for postnatal care, and another three days nesting and looking after Ro in the NICU. As Dave mentioned, we are still borrowing our mother/baby room from Seton, and I have been pretty much living between the two floors. It did not help that I was not able to walk for the first 4 days, but time is a pretty good healer and I am now up and around. So, lunch today will be my foray out of doors.

As for the title of this post, I am finding the round-the-clock pumping not as bad as I thought it would be, and I am wondering if that is due to my aforementioned limits to one small room (I have had some practice living out of hotel rooms for two weeks), and your body does seem to adapt to power napping when it is needed. I can see myself looking forward to a full night’s sleep though (many months from now ).

One last thing – Dave and I just had our first 3-minute conversation about poop today, something we would not have even contemplated before. Also, more people have seen my naughty bits in the last week than in the last 37 years; modesty and parenthood do not mix! I will leave it up to you to decide which is better.

Well, Seton hasn’t ousted us just yet, which is good since Ro isn’t quite done with the phototherapy. Her bilirubin levels have dropped about a point a day for the past 2 days, so we’re on our way, but it’s still a long, agonizing wait.

Breastmilk anyone?

Our days right now revolve largely around us traveling back and forth a floor for feedings in the NICU every 3 hours or so. Sometimes bottle, sometimes breast, but Mindy’s been doing a lot of pumping to cover the couple of feedings we can’t make it up for. Meh, it’s a routine, even if one we hadn’t counted on. It’s been kind of nice in one respect; we’re basically getting full time nursery service so we can skive off and get some sleep. Still, it’ll be nice to have her out of there.

I promise I’m not trying to keep Mindy from y’all, but my service as press secretary is allowing her time to take care of various mommy and convalescence business. I tell you, once you learn to live with a breast pump regularly around, truly very little will strike you as strange anymore.

Overpopulation in many parts of the world is a fact, but after you’ve seen a NICU in operation, you wonder how our species could be considered so durable and weedy. Newborns look fragile enough without seeing them in that state. It’s like a nursing home I suppose, only the specter of mortality is strangely twisted up with the hope of potential. The staff nevertheless keep a fairly upbeat energy about the place. Very odd that, optimism is not generally my strong suit.

Anyhow, Mindy is discharged, but still gimpy. Ro is still doing light therapy in said NICU, but looking steady overall. Seton has allowed us to “nest” here in our recovery room for an extra day or two so we can continue to visit Ro on short notice, be around for feedings and such. She is the largest baby in the block by far, most of them up there being preemies and, not to draw any hard conclusions here (as the hospital is an especially metropolitan place) very frequently non-white, FWIW. For those various reasons, we feel a little out of place up there, but the folks up there in the NICU have been pretty nice to us, and quite helpful. It helps the staff all seem to like her, but I suspect her charm is just a powerful, sinister ruse.

Well, sorry we don’t have many more pics as yet.  We’re dealing with a little jaundice situation, involving an IV (which necessitated her getting moved to the NICU) but Aurora is responding well to treatment, so hopefully get some more good news on that today or tomorrow.  Mindy’s doing better as well, though still on the antibiotics.  It’ll be nice to get away from the damned IV pole at some point, hopefully tomorrow.

—

I’m not much for Bible quotes, but our recovery room here at Seton has a pretty good one posted:

Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord,
the fruit of the womb a reward.
Like arrows in the hand of a warrior
are the children of one’s youth.
Blessed is the man
who fills his quiver with them!
He shall not be put to shame
when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.

Apparently some translations say “sons” instead of the more contemporary “children” interpretation, and some say “contend” instead of “speak”.  To which my friend Nate summed up: “Sons: they killz your enemiez.”  Heh heh, gotta love that Old Testamenty material.

-D.

Check out the “Baby Baby Baby” set on the Flickr page.

-D.

Well, very long story short, after 22 hours.  Anyhow, we’re all more or less in one piece, more updates, including pics, to follow once we’ve gotten some sleep.  7 lbs. 5 oz. at 1:26 AM Aug 15 for those of you keeping score.

-D.

Hour 13 and no news yet.  Looks like we’re in for the marathon.  More to come. -D.

Well, 8 hours and no progress, so it’s Pitocin time.  I reckon we’ll be trucking along here shortly.

Well, we made it to the hospital at 3:30 AM after Mindy’s water broke.  Things are still heating up contraction-wise, but we’re definitely doing this thing.  Aurora’s on the way!  -D.