Left too early

Caitlin, Erini and I are back from the hospital for the second time now. Woof, what an adventure. When the nurse from the "Healthy Beginnings" program came to see Caitlin on Wednesday 28 Feb, she wondered if there was any trouble with feeding, how many diapers Erini was going through, etc. Our answers surprised the nurse, and we kind of surprised ourselves in telling them. She had only gone through about 2 diapers that day, and one of them wasn't messy at all. If it was 3am, that would be that bad, but it was 11am, and in the past 24 hours, she had only gone through 4 diapers. By this time, she should have had 8 or so.

After a blood sample delivered to a lab via courier and analysed, it was determined that Erini's Biliruben count was too high. We were to take her back immediately to RAH so she could undergo photo-therapy in order to bring the level down. I went back to the hospital after work instead of to home.
Unlike the days following Erini's birth, when Caitlin was an admitted patient, had a private room, and I was able to sleep in the same single bed with her (that was a throw back to the newlyweds days), the only room that was available for us was the nursery chairs, or the waiting lounge where I could make a bed out of chairs. They had border beds, but they were all taken. Besides, I would not have been allowed there, and it was quite the distance from the nursery where Erini was under the photo-therapy lights.

I thought that I could tough it out in the nursery chairs, but at 4am, when there were 11 babies in the nursery, including our own, I thought I would give the lounge a try. Foolish me, I waited too long, and there were no longer enough chairs to put together a make-shift bed. So I took a blanket, laid it on the floor, made a pillow with my gloves and toque, and got a moderately decent sleep for four hours. At 8am, I tried doing the chair bed thing, and that wasn't nearly as sucessful, but at 10am, I found that I wasn't going to be able to sleep anymore. It was day time, and I had to join the rest of the world.

On the plus side, yesterday was the first day of the new fiscal year. That is the time when they reset the vacation days. Now I know I dropped the ball on applying for parental leave, yet if I do get some vacation days, and I might qualify for 8 days, I could take that pretty quick here to help out with Caitlin and Erini. I could have applied for Parental leave, yes, but I have to do it at least 2 months in advance. Hmmm... Let's do some math. If my parental leave started on 24 Feb 2007, the day Erini was born, then my last day to apply would have been Christmas Eve 2006. I HAD A FEW THINGS ON MY MIND AT THE TIME. I think. Or I could have put the application to start on March 6. Then I could have put the application in by the new year.

I think, at this point, it's vacation days or nothing.