Marissa's Adenoidectomy

After an interesting morning getting out of the house, Marissa finally had her adenoidectomy today. We'd been on the surgeon's schedule for 8 weeks -- when we first made this appointment back in June August seemed so far away.

The most nerve-wracking part of surgery on little peanuts her size has to be how well they will take being told they cannot eat/drink for hours before, and how they will adapt to the recovery after. Marissa's last food was her dinner Sunday evening, and her last drink was supposed to be a clear liquid (water or apple juice) around 7:30 am.

She woke a little after 7:35 am, all happy, and her first words were, "Milk! Hot!" (This is how she asks for a bottle of milk, warmed up in the microwave. Yes, we still indulge her with a bottle in the morning; I don't care, don't judge.)

I said, "Oh honey, I'm sorry, you can't have milk today." She fussed about this and didn't like it so much for the longest time. I tried to coax her into some apple juice or water, but she refused to have anything but hot milk. Finally, well after the time when she is supposed to have anything to drink, she finally agreed to have some apple juice. Of course I gave her some, how can you refuse a child who hasn't had anything to drink for 12 hours and won't have anything for several more from even having a little bit of apple juice?

We got a call from the hospital at 8:30, saying that we were supposed to have been there at 8:00 (our surgery had been moved up but we hadn't known that). So we bustled out of the house as fast as we could and got there at 9:10.

This actually made the rest of the pre-surgery stuff go very quickly. We were checked in quickly, sent directly to pre-op, had a history taken, got her changed into pajamas and were seen by the doctor, the anesthesiologist and the nurse within half an hour.

When it came time for her to go to surgery, the anesthesiologist came up to her and said, "Hey Marissa, do you want to come with me?" She immediately put her arms out and went right to him with not a protest, God bless her. She knows I couldn't have taken a crying scene with as little sleep as I'd gotten the night before.

The surgery lasted around 45 minutes. The doctor told us her adenoids were only mildly to moderately inflamed when he removed them, which actually has me a little frustrated that perhaps this won't help to cure her chronic sinus infections. He did do a nasal scope and cleaned out her nasal cavity, and noted that he got "a lot of junk" out of there. Really? We could've told you that.

We waited and then were finally brought our little girl. She snuggled right on Wayne's shoulder and did not want to move, for at least an hour. She didn't want juice, she didn't want water, she didn't want anything but to sleep and snuggle. Okay, Daddy can do that.

Finally she seemed to start coming around more and finally took a little apple juice, which meant that she could be given her medicine (Tylenol with codeine), as they didn't want to give that to her on a totally empty stomach. I was afraid she would react to it as I react to codeine, but happily she did not.

Her lip was quite swollen, which we found out was from the local anesthesia they had given her for the nasal scope. She kept rubbing at it and at her nose, which, I have to say, I have never seen as CLEAN as it is today. Even when it wasn't running before, she always has a layer of mucus around the inside of her nose that we had just become accustomed to. Now it's evening and it's still just as clean, so hopefully it'll stay that way.

She came home and took a 4-hour nap, right along with Lindsey, our other sickee. I had bought balloons for both of them at the hospital and about 7 pm they both finally became enamored with them and had a good time playing.

By bedtime this evening Marissa was running around, smiling and playing. She ate some approved foods (applesauce, yogurt) and some that aren't (pasta) but she seemed very hungry and has kept all of it down. I'm sure she will have some ups and downs the next few days, but so far the outlook is good for a speedy recovery.