Etta's T&A

After much anticipation and anxiety, Etta finally had her surgery to remove her tonsils and adnoids yesterday. Her surgery wasn't scheduled until 4:15pm!! I felt SO bad not feeding her all day that I got us both up at 5:30 yesterday morning to feed her a pb&j and a pediasure before the 6:00am food cut-off time. She was allowed to have milk until 8:00 and clear liquids until noon. So, to keep her mind off of her hunger, I took her out of the house for about an hour (to a local consignment sale) and by the time we got back home she was tired enough to go down for an early nap (at about 10:30). She slept until I woke her up at about 1:20 to put her in the car to drive to the hospital. We had to be there by 2:15. So, she never REALLY had a chance to think about how hungry she was, which worked out. 

Etta copying Keith. It was cute.

After we got to Vanderbilt and got registered and stuff, they took us back to a pre-op area. (wow. just typing about this is giving me anxiety again...) They put us in a little holding room and had us change her into her hospital pajama get-up and lots of people came in to ask us lots of questions about her health history. While we were waiting for her to go back for surgery, we came across a cozy coupe (car) in the hall and she had the best time playing with that. She drove it up and down the hall and beeped the horn and got in and out of the door. (note to self: buy a cozy coupe).

Then, they took her. That was really a bit much for this emotional mama and I am SO grateful it was over so quickly. They put us in a sub-waiting room and 15 minutes later the ENT came in to say he was all done and she did great and that her tonsils were fairly enlarged and her adnoids were moderately enlarged. Another 15 minutes or so and they called us back to post-op/recovery area. We could hear her crying before we could see her. That was also a bit much for me. It's hard to see your kid disoriented and in pain and obviously wanting her momma. They just kept pushing pain medication until she chilled out and we were eventually wheeled into her room. They switched her over to loritab every four hours and it has worked like magic! She had a couple of rough moments last night with break-through pain as the loritab was wearing off between doses and neither of us got much sleep with all of the beeping monitirs and the 1:00am fire drill and the helipad on the roof RIGHT above us, but we catnapped together all night. Keith went home last night around 10:30 to take care of Ferris and to get some sleep so he could go to work today.

Finally, it was a new day and I could tell Etta's pain was being manged. She napped a lot today and her most vigorious crying fits happen when they have to force feed her the loritab. Apparently it DOES NOT taste good (plus she hasn't wanted to take much by mouth yet). I hope the pharmacy will be able to flavor our prescription when we go home.

In an attempt to get her to drink, they took her off of the IV fluids this morning and told us we could walk around and maybe she would work up a thirst. Well, of course, she LOVED this! We walked up and down the halls and she thought it would be great fun to race, but I was so afraid that she would fall that I kept stopping her, which kind of made it a game and she wanted to run even more! We came across a little green car and that kept her from running, but I had to bend over to push it which was no bueno.

Later in the afternoon, we went back out, but this time I hunted down another (pink!) cozy coupe so I could push it without bending WAY over. So, anyway, all of this activity worked (some)! As soon as we would get back to the room, Etta would take a few gulps of juice from her cup, but then she didn't want to drink any more after that. So, small steps, I guess....

Momma's belly = pillow. ;)

She went to sleep around 6:30, right after Dr. Wooten (Etta's ENT) rounded on her this evening. He was cautiously optimistic that we'd head home tomorrow... as long as she continues to drink. I also asked him to change the parameters of her pulse-ox machine. It beeped anytime her oxygen saturation dipped below 94 last night and he agreed to lower it to 87. (It's been hooked up for over two hours now, and I've only heard it beep once!) Keith got here around 7:30 and brought some dinner for us and then I got to take a shower (aaaah!). He's planning to stay here with us tonight. I hope it's a more restful night than last night!