The 24 Hour Request

I am writing this post from "Sleep Room B" in the parents' lounge at the NICU. The NICU has several sleep rooms so that moms can spend the night if they're going to try to feed their babies during the night. In my little private room I have a bed and a tiny bathroom. When Hyrum wakes up for his feedings tonight the nurses will call me and I'll go down the hall and take care of business.

This is what's called a "24 hour request." Before Hyrum can come home, he has to be able to take all of his feedings orally. In order to be sure he can handle it, I am basically on-call for 24 hours. Instead of the nurses waking Hyrum up for his feedings every 3 hours, they let him sleep and whenever he wakes up and is hungry, I go feed him. They don't let him sleep longer than 4 hours, but since it could be anywhere from 2-4 hours between feedings I am on-call and sleeping at the NICU.

This is a huge step for Hyrum. Earlier in the week he was getting all of his feedings through the tube in his nose, and now we've worked our way up to today--8 oral feedings. He nurses really well (at least, I think he does...I guess I don't really have anything to compare him to...). If he can keep it up we should be able to bring him home really soon!