Bye Bye Tonsils

We spent the summer waiting for one appointment or another for Lucas, which finally led to the removal of his tonsils and adenoids on Thursday. There was no doubt this needed to happen, from the pediatrician's first look in his throat, to the two ENT's who each saw him one time.  It was just a matter of making sure the ENT we wanted was the one who did the surgery and that took some extra time.  Poor little guy has had very impressive tonsils that are prone to infection.  Once inflamed, he stops eating, snores quite loud (may have sleep apnea), and has tummy troubles.  Thankfully this only happened a couple of times this summer but it was miserable for him.  An equal concern is that he has not gained an ounce of weight since the beginning of this year though he has grown in height.  With the surgery behind us now we hope to see that situation improve.

Lucas was quite the little trooper.  He had a great attitude about surgery given what he knew about it.  He was excited to wear new pajamas and stole everyone's hearts once we arrived.  

 He looked a little unsure when they wheeled him our of the room, but was quite interested in the anesthesiologist who was giving the bed race car sound effects.

The surgery took about an hour, and afterwards the ENT said, "Those were VERY large tonsils and adenoids... It is good to get them out!"

The nurses told us he did GREAT... in fact better than any other 3-year-old they had seen!  When we got to him he had already taken two drinks!

 He has a difficult first hour or so and was clearly in pain.  He settled down well and dozed after each of two small doses of morphine.  After that he just laid in my lap and watched tv.  His IV didn't seem to bother him, nor did the blood pressure cuff.  He spoke occasionally and took sips of his drink whenever we asked him to.

 He sat with Daddy for a bit while I ate my lunch in a chair next to them.

 He was eager to get home but was a good sport about hanging out at the surgery center.  About 1/2 hour before discharge he got upset briefly and vomited.  Otherwise our hours there were pretty uneventful.  He watched when they unwrapped his wrist and took out the IV... didn't even flinch.  Again, comments about how he was SO good ("crazy good"), and they've never seen such a young kid do so well with an IV removal. 
We were so proud of our little guy!
One of the nurses asked if I stay home with him. When I said yes, she commented that she can really tell when kids have had a lot of love poured into them.

And so recovery begins... with lots of Gatorade, ice cream, popsicles, and chocolate milk!  In his first couple of hours at home he had two popsicles, some Gatorade, drinks of apple juice and later he ate some jello!