Ambient noise?

Things I've learned in my longest hospital stay ever:

1. Nurses are chatty, which I suppose is a really good thing. They also seem to be making some sort of statement about the differences in nursing education - the RNs wear little red 'RN' tags. I, of course, used this an opportunity to work on Harry's reading skills.

2. When a girl has labor and deliver in her future, it's really unfair to put her in a position to hear other's labor and delivery noises. (Although, I will admit that some are a little funny.)

3. In your standard hospital room, there are lots of buttons for 4 year old boys to discover and push. Sadly, a bed cannot be turned into a carnival ride, no matter which button you push.

4. My local public radio station's live stream is really quite good. (But, I still maintain that if they spend time on the air talking about their 'cancelled' on air fund drive, it's really more of a mostly cancelled on air fund drive.)

In the meantime, I'm feeling well and the baby is doing great. We are doing fetal monitoring 3 times a day which watches the child's heart rate and movements. There are 2 little circle things they strap on to my stomach with precious pink and blue elastic/velcro straps - one to measure the heart and the other contractions (see #2 above). The test lasts 20 minutes and a passing test will show the child moving and a heart rate acceleration and deceleration after each movement. A healthy baby will get excited about something, move, and have the appropriate biophysical reaction to the movement - accel/decel - and then the heart rate will go back to normal. Our child's heart rate is usually in the 140's.

On Monday my labs will be repeated: blood draw to measure my platelet counts and urine collection to check for protein levels. I'm hoping the labs show some improvement and we can make it to 36 weeks, as the child will be better able to breathe and eat on it's own and doubtless have a shorter hospital stay.

The boys are doing well, Harry has a sad moment when he leaves and I stay at night, however it is quickly forgotten when he remembers the ride in the elevator (see #3 above).

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