The Eagle Has Landed

This morning, at about 10 AM, Josh arrived at the brand new Intermountain Medical Center by helicopter. One at a time, each baby was flown from LDS hospital to IMC and checked into the new NICU. This is unlike any NICU I've ever seen. It's very open, and each baby has lots of space. Even more amazing is the daylight! There are windows all around and sunlight fills the NICU. I've never seen one of these places with sunlight in them. Most are depressing, dark and crowded rooms full of babies and beeping. This is such a difference.

Josh and I had some good snuggle time this morning. He's had 4 "episodes" so far today, which is frustrating. One of the discharge criteria is that they have to go for a period of time without an episode. I can't remember how long it is, because Eric did it almost three years ago. The little guy is still on oxygen but is gaining weight and is otherwise stable. Generally, no change is a good thing, but in this case there are changes that need to be made. He has to get off the oxygen, gain weight, move to an open crib, maintain his own temperature in an open crib, take every meal orally (by bottle or breast), and I think that's it. We haven't really discussed the discharge protocol here yet because Josh is still so far away from it.

LDS Hospital is so much more convenient than this place. It was a shorter drive that didn't require the use of the freeway, and had far better parking than this place does. That's pretty sad, considering that the parking terrace at LDS Hospital is five floors high and I still had to circle for half an hour before a spot would open up. They have a separate tower for physician and staff parking too! Once parked, however, a short elevator ride and a quick trot across the narrow little street outside and I was at the hospital door. This place is all spread out. There's no covered parking (and snow is right around the corner), and the parking stretches far out across a busy street into the Trax parking lot. That's where I had to park today. It is quite a hike over here to the NICU-- where I am using the WiFi connection to update the blog. Some of these moms have just had their babies and that kind of walk is really bad for them. I shouldn't be doing this just yet, having just had a baby nineteen days ago, but I don't have much of an option.

Oh well. Hopefully it will be over at the end of this month and then I'll never have to think about it again.

Since this move, my hospital stay, the NICU stay, and having to live in two different states have eaten into our retirement funds, I'm thinking about doing a Pampered Chef fundraising show. The profits will help during the transition to living off retirement pay and disability stuff. There are so many people who have been involved in this, that I think I can generate enough business to make it worthwhile. Plus, people would be able to do Christmas shopping this way. More to follow on that.

Take care, everyone.