Last Friday, August 19th, Shelby had her tonsils and adenoids removed. She suffered from severe sleep apnea as well as multiple sinus infections. When we took her to the ENT, he said the exact same thing as when we took Kadence to him, "WOW, have you seen these?!" He had me take a look and pointed out how her tonsils were squishing her uvula from each side. He said they were pretty big and they needed to be removed for sure. I was pretty nervous because Shelby hasn't really had anything done before. The only time she was put under anesthesia was for dental work and she woke up very very angry. I also was nervous about how well she would go back since we couldn't go with her.
I spent the next 2 weeks between the appointment and the surgery talking it over with her. I explained that we couldn't go with her but that she could take a stuffed animal to keep her company. (She chose her hippo, named Hippo) I also explained how she would wear a gown, how they would use a mask to put her to sleep, and after she woke up that they would get us. She seemed like she understood it all very well. Kadence kept reassuring her that the Dr's and nurses were all very nice and would take good care of her.
We arrived at the hospital and Shelby didn't seem nervous at all. She liked the gown because it had tigers on it.
She absolutely loved the slipper socks and kept testing the non-slip bottom to see if she would slip.
She went back to surgery without a single tear. The surgery went well and the Dr told us that she had a large amount of adenoid tissue and the already mentioned large tonsils. He said she didn't bleed much and was recovering just fine. I was sure that when they brought her to her room she would be hysterical, but she wasn't at all. She was just sitting up in the bed looking around as she took her ride through the hospital. She was in a daze, but overall doing really well. She was excited to get her prize for being brave and ate a popsicle so they sent us home.
At home she did great! She played and played and if you didn't know she had surgery you would have thought it was just a normal day for her. She even asked to eat a cheese sandwich! (And did!) She had a restless night, but never fully woke up. I slept her in our bed anyways because she kept moaning in her sleep and I couldn't leave her. The next day and night were almost completely normal. The 3rd and 4th day were rough. She didn't want to drink much and was just kind of sad all day. After day 4 she started to improve and improves a little more each day. Two night ago she woke up completely freaking out. We never did figure out what was going on, but it was really scary. She was hyperventilating for about 10 minutes and we thought we were going to need to take her to the hospital because she just couldn't breath and nothing we did would calm her down. We finally got her calmed and she was restless the rest of the night, but woke up completely fine. It was scary and kind of weird. Today (Day 8) she randomly will start crying so I know she still isn't healed, but she is about 85% of normal. She really wants to eat "crunchy things" and can't wait to "use a straw." She makes me laugh! I can't wait to have my Shelby back to 100%. I am however grateful that we never have to have another tonsillectomy again in our household. Oddly enough we have all had our tonsils removed by the same Dr.
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