I am happy to report we have Kate's tonsils and adenoid surgery behind us. Recovery is going better than I had expected it to (even though she refuses to take the pain medication because it tastes so bad - her nurse is working on a fix for that as I type). Kate is mostly content to rest on her 'couch-bed' and watch movies or read books. Once in awhile she gets a burst of energy and she is ready to play house or take her bike for a couple of laps in the garage. She still hasn't eaten much, but we are definitely on the mend!
Her actual surgery day was Wednesday, July 21. It was a roller-coaster for my emotions! I'll skip past the part where we over-slept and had only 15 minutes to get out of the house in the morning and the little potty accident we had in the ditch on the way to the hospital. Long story short the ENT found a heart murmur at Kate's pre-op appointment, which he considered to be serious (although he admitted he has little experience with heart conditions and he could be mistaken). He referred us back to our pediatrician to clear her for surgery. Our pediatrician listened and heard what he called a flow murmur and cleared us for surgery without hesitation. The morning of surgery, the ENT was reviewing records and sees that our pediatrician did not order any further testing (echo or EKG) to diagnosis the heart murmur and he wasn't comfortable going on with the surgery without an anesthesiologist present. We were scheduled to have a nurse anesthetist. Who, we learned, cannot change the surgical plan without the approval of an actual anesthesiologist. As a precaution our ENT wanted to have an anesthesiologist in the surgery so if an emergency situation should arise, changes could be made on the spot. Of course there was not an available anesthesiologist at the time and one had to be called in. My mind was spinning and inventing a million 'what-if" scenarios, Kate was already loopy and telling us a whacked out version of The Three Little Bears, there was lots of "doctor, can I speak to you privately" conversations going on....it was a rough start.
I was a ball of nerves waiting for Kate while she was in surgery. 40 minutes never seem so long! Everything went just fine though! When we met with the ENT after the surgery he told us she did perfectly, they would send us up to pediatric recovery as soon as she started to wake up and we'd probably be on our way home in about 4 hours. It took her a little longer than we expected for her to "wake up". Once she did and we got up to recovery the nurse told us the doctor changed her to 24 hour observation. We didn't get any hard and fast answers as to why, but she was doing well so I wasn't too worried. We settled in knowing we weren't going anywhere for awhile.
Around 5 the ENT checked back in on us and cleared us to go home! He said since she hadn't been sick and was tolerating liquids, we were free to leave. I couldn't get out of that hospital fast enough! It was almost 7 before we finally got home, but it was so nice to be out of there. We could all rest more comfortably at home.
I have been anticipating this day for a long time. Kate has sleep apnea due to her abnormally large tonsils. She snored like an old man and a sleep study that we had done back in April confirmed that Kate would stop breathing an average of 10 times an hour. These episodes of not breathing would last from 15 to 20 seconds (at that point your brain wakes up up). That was enough to scare me! Removing her tonsils and adenoids was the recommendation from the sleep doctor and the ENT we were referred to. Here is a picture of Kate from her sleep study. Poor girl, they hooked her all up and then expected her to sleep! She did great!
I'm so proud of how Kate has handled all of this. She says she is a "brave little mermaid" (Ariel is kind of her thing right now), but honestly she is the bravest little 3 year old I know. Even the nurses were bragging that she was the best patient they ever had! I can't wait until she is back to the mile-a-minute chattering, dancing, singing, little Kate we are used to! (Oh, and just to be safe we have an echo-cardiogram set up for Kate next Thursday. I expect everything to be just fine.)
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