After Teaching From Her Hospital Bed, Janet Udomratsak Grateful This Thanksgiving For Healthy Baby, Reunion With Family
LOS ANGELES (CBSLA) - A Lancaster teacher who spent weeks teaching her elementary school class from her hospital room is thankful to be home celebrating Thanksgiving with her family.
Janet Udomratsak was hospitalized last year for pregnancy complications during the height of the pandemic. She was on bedrest alone in her room for weeks unable to see her husband or her family.
"It was the hardest thing ever. To not be able to get up. To not be able to do anything. Not being able to see family," said Udomratsak.
Udomratsak, an elementary school teacher, was determined to keep working converting her hospital suite into a virtual classroom. She had a laptop and white board inches away from a hospital monitor and rolling bed just out of frame for the students connected to a video class from their computers at home.
She even timed lunch breaks with doctors making their rounds. To keep her students from worrying, she kept it at a secret for as long as she could - until one little girl noticed something funny.
"I slipped my hand under the document camera as I was writing and my bracelets were on and she caught on to it and she was like 'Ms. U, how come you have hospital bracelets?' And I was like that's nothing, that's nothing. And I just kept teaching."
Janet made it home from the hospital with quite a story to tell and most importantly a healthy baby boy.
"I am truly grateful to have my family. To actually be here."
Janet is also back in the classroom teaching at a new school and is grateful to be able to greet her students in person rather than through a screen.
