Remembering the Tonsillectomy....

So, as you all know, the tonsillectomy was extremely traumatic for all of us.  But, I thought I'd share a few shots from the whole ordeal and just write-up what occurred for posterity sake!

The night before the surgery, we got a phone call around 8pm telling us that instead of being at the hospital an hour prior like we were originally told, they needed us there TWO hours early...not a big deal right, well, unfortunately, Owen's surgery was at 7:30am!  I was less than impressed to say the least!

We made it, but, that just meant we had to wait and worry for TWO long hours!  We were lucky to have a coworker of Dave's wife as our pre-op nurse.  She was wonderful and between her and the other staff, it helped calm our nerves some.  We didn't think to get a picture, but, when they took Owen back for the surgery, they put him in a Radio Flyer wagon!!  It was so cute!  He didn't even look back at us!!!

From the time they took him from us to the time the doctor came out to tell us all had gone well was just under 30 minutes!  It was hard to believe that they could knock him out, take his tonsils and adenoids and be done that fast.  I barely had time to start panicking/worrying! :O)  Below is Owen after his surgery in his dad's arms.  I was the one to go back in the room with him while he came to from the surgery and it was hard to see.  But, his recovery nurse gave him a little bit of pain meds and he went back to sleep and woke up just a few minutes later back to his old self...well, as close as he could be post-surgery!  

We got him home early Thursday afternoon and started him on his pain meds...acetaminophen with codeine every 3 hours around the clock.  By Friday, I knew something wasn't right with the meds and called the doctor not once, but twice, in hopes he'd give us something else.  I was blown off both times and told that there was no alternatives and to increase the frequency of the dosages.  I was so groggy and stressed at that point that I followed through, but, I regretted it.  By Saturday night, Owen was angry and mean, he hadn't spoke a single word since his surgery...just grunted, and had yet to eat or drink anything voluntarily.  We'd gotten maybe 5 ounces of liquid down him in 3 days.  I made a command decision that he was done with the prescription meds and gave him Advil instead.  He immediately perked up and started playing and I think even ate an ice cream sandwich.  We had a good night although he continued to be in pain and we went to sleep that night in hopes that we'd turned a corner.  We continued to wake him up every couple of hours for another dose of Advil and I think it was that night that he woke up and was screaming in pain (which was typical, he struggled to deal with the pain every time we had to wake him up).  I was holding him and rubbing his back waiting for the medicine to kick in when he looked at me and said, "Mommy, you need to calm me down!".  I don't know what I was doing that wasn't adequate, but, I was just informed I had to step it up!

Here's a couple shots of the poor kiddo the days after the surgery.  We made him get out of bed and get dressed to watch movies downstairs in hopes it would perk him up to be moving around...we were wrong.

Sunday morning, just 4 days after the surgery, Owen woke-up puking blood.  It was the scariest thing I've ever seen in my life.  There was blood ALL over the bathroom and he seemed to be losing such a large volume and so fast, we weren't sure if he would make it to the hospital if we drove him.  We made the decision to go ahead and get him as close as we could and call for emergency help on the road if necessary.  He did o.k. in the truck and they moved us right through and back to a room in the ER where he started vomiting the blood again.  They gave him some anti-vomiting meds and an IV and  he was able to stop the vomiting and fell asleep.  They called our ENT who had performed the surgery, but, couldn't get an answer.  The on-call ENT refused to come in because Owen wasn't his patient.  I was SO mad and terrified.  I can't believe they'd prefer to leave a 4 year old sit in an emergency room rather than come in and check on someone else's surgical patient.  Two and a half hours later, our ENT finally called, but, didn't bother to come in to see him.  We were told to go home and hopefully it wouldn't happen again.  Nice huh!  On Monday I had to call the doctors office and throw a tantrum until they prescribed a new straight high dosage acetaminophen.  Why couldn't they have done that when I called on Friday!!

Here's our little dude in the ER.  He was so brave and even tolerated them having to poke him 3 times to start the IV!

I took Owen to see my rolfer the following Tuesday and had him use his cold laser on Owen's throat.  The results were unbelievable!  Just hours after the laser treatment, Owen was drinking AND EATING voluntarily!!!!  The first time for either since the surgery!  He was also full of energy and TALKING and PLAYING!!  It was such a relief!!  We did a second treatment that Friday with the rolfer and because Owen continued to have pain in his jaw joints, we also took him to see a doctor in our naturopaths office that does cranial sacral therapy.  He worked on the plates in his head as well as the muscles in his shoulders and upper back.  He said that they were so tight and knotted up that he couldn't believe he hadn't complained about his back.  After a couple visits with him, we haven't heard any complaints about Owen's jaw and are happy to report that he's back to himself!!  I'm so thankful for naturopathic medicine treatments/remedies!!!