Home call - what do you do?

[migirl]

When DH takes home call, he doesn't sleep with me our bedroom. Instead, he sleeps either in our guest bedroom or on the sofa in the family room. This is primarily as a convenience for me, since I am a fairly light sleeper and John can sometimes get 10, 15, 20 calls in one night depending on how many patients are on the service. The way I see it, there's no reason for both of us to not sleep! (Mind you, he doesn't mind this arrangement at all - he's just happy to be sleeping in his own house and at not at the hospital!)

Apparently some of his co-residents have been giving him a hard time (jokingly, of course) about this which makes me feel a bit selfish and evil. The urology service is strictly home call, so this could potentially go on for the next 4+ years. Does anyone else think this is weird? Should I feel bad? What do those of you with SOs who take home call do?

[mommax3]

My husband has home call now, as a staff physician in the Air Force, but he doesn't get nearly so many calls at home as you describe. 5 during nighttime hours would be a lot. Chances are pretty good that if he gets called, someone is in labor and he is going to eventually have to go on in.

If he was getting that many calls at night, I am sure he would be sleeping somewhere else! Don't feel evil.....if your husband isn't bothered, do what works for you guys.

Sally

[fluffhead]

Our final year will be all home call, and I understand that one gets many calls during the night. I fully intend to banish my wife to the guest room, and she totally understands. I see nothing to feel guilty about.

[Phoebe]

I would use whatever sleeping arrangements you and your husband are comfortable with during home call. DH mostly has in-house call, but takes home call as a back-up and transports a couple times a month. He doesn't receive calls most nights and if so it means they are calling him into work. He ends up falling asleep on the couch most nights anyway so whereever his head hits the pillow is where his pager ends up. It works out both ways because I have a noisy newborn sleeping next to me in the bassinet.

The only objection I have about home call is when the hospital calls on our regular phone in the middle of the night instead of paging. At least the pager won't wake up our toddler.

I wouldn't want to have a pager going off up to 15 times a night so I don't blame you both for sleeping in separate places during home call nights. Don't worry about it!

Jennifer

You've got a nice, considerate guy there!

Mike's pager plays "Old McDonald Had a Farm" (and I've been known to sing a rude rhyme that I learned in Junior High to that tune when it goes off), but I mostly sleep right through it at this point unless he gets up to go in and do an admission. And our schedules have gotten so weird anyway lately (he sometimes crashes at 9 and I sometimes stay up reading or writing until 1 or 2AM) that we've become a 24 hour household.

What really burns me, though, is when the hospital calls on our home phone looking for him and he's already there doing an admission. I've panicked on more than one occasion.

I think the only time he sleeps in the guest room is when I'm snoring...

A different perspective here. When my DH has home call he stays in the bed with me until he gets paged. Then he would take the call in the living room. A lot of it has to do with his parents' sleeping arrangements. For the latter 5 years of their marriage (they are now divorced) his mom made his dad sleep in the guest bedroom because he snored so loudly. DH always hated that arrangement because he felt like they were just roommates and the intimacy of sleeping together (not just having intercourse) was gone. And since I sleep horribly when he's not home, just having him in the house puts me at ease and I sleep much better so I hardly ever hear his pager go off. Even if I did I can usually go back to sleep right away so it doesn't affect me much. But of course, that's what worked for us - baggage and all.

[SueC]

My husband generally sleeps in our bed during home call nights and I rarely wake up to hear his pages, but if it is a very busy night, he generally moves downstairs. Your husband sounds like a considerate guy!