Hannah has had many sore throats since this past August. The last one lasted over a week. Once or twice she has had strep, but according to the pediatrician most were, "just viral." She has missed several days of school due to sore throats. She does NOT like to miss school. Both of my girls have been in tears before for because they were too sick to go to school. They just don't like to miss, so when one of them asks to stay home, I know they feel awful.
After waiting out the last sore throat for a couple of days, I got her in to see the doctor. There are two pediatricians in this practice and a couple nurse practitioners. I do not like seeing the nurse practitioner. Fine. The nurse actually does a throat culture to test for strep and the nurse practitioner can prescribe meds if needed, but beyond that, she is pointless. That is always the chance we take when making a same day appointment. This appointment we saw the nurse practitioner. I was all geared up to ask a lot of questions when I was told, "It is just viral." Of course, there was no strep and I was told it is just viral. I asked how many times Hannah had had strep in the past calendar year. She found two in the records, but admittedly told me their records weren't entirely accurate as they had switched computer systems. However, twice sounded about right. I asked if we should do further testing to make sure there wasn't something else going on. I'm not a doctor, but I have always heard that the tonsils are a good warning system and chronic sore throats could be a warning sign for something more serious. She just smiled and shook her head.
I left the pediatrician's office and called and ENT's office the next day. They made an appointment for the following morning to evaluate her. I told the ENT Hannah's history and explained that I understood the pediatrician had told me that Hannah had to have strep five to seven times in a year before getting a referral to the ENT. However, I just wanted him to take a look and make sure we weren't missing something. If he had said, "It is just viral" we would have gone on our merry little way. He was wonderful. He told me the practice of waiting for a child to get strep five to seven times in a year without taking action for chronic sore throats is basically old school. He also said there are many other bacteria that can infect the tonsils that aren't strep and won't show up on a strep test. I wanted to jump up and hug the man. (Easy...I didn't.) I had to fight back tears, too. I hate when a doctor blows me off. As a parent, you know when something just isn't right or normal and to be blown off makes me mad. The ENT took one look at Hannah's throat and said, "Those tonsils need to come out."
We had to be at the surgery center at 6:30 in the morning for her surgery that was scheduled at 7:30. The nurse told me kids usually just wear their jammies. Hannah took along this stuffed animal.
As the nurse was prepping Hannah for surgery, she asked Hannah why she was there. Hannah said to have her tonsils removed. The nurse looked at me and asked, "Adenoids, too?" The ENT told me that with children Hannah's age the adenoids are usually removed at the same time as the tonsils. The adenoids shrivel up by the time we are older teens and are useless anyway. I hadn't mentioned that to PK, but it didn't really register as I knew that was a common practice.
When the nurse left the room, PK asked, "What else are they taking out?" He looked at Hannah and said, "Are they taking your pinkie, too?" Of course, she just giggled.
She is faking being asleep, but this is how they both felt.
Hannah was less than happy when the nurse told her to put on the hospital gown. Luckily, this one had tigers which goes along with Hannah's jungle life theme.
She didn't want to sit on this bed and really wanted me to stop snapping pictures.
Then the nurse brought her a blanket that was fresh out of the warmer and she decided the bed was quite nice.
The anesthesiologist and a nurse rolled her back for surgery. I thought she might be scared at this point, but it didn't seem to phase her. PK and I sat in the waiting room and did what you do in a waiting room...waited. The doctor came out and told us everything went well. He said her tonsils were a lot larger than we could see. After little more waiting, the nurse came to get us to go back to the recovery area. Hannah was crying a little, but wasn't fully awake from the anesthesia. She kept trying to sit up and the nurse would raise the bed a little. She was quite confused. I was standing in one spot slightly bent over trying to comfort her when all of a sudden I felt light headed and had a wave of nausea. I told PK, "I don't feel well." The nurse heard and grabbed a chair. Then I got sick. I was embarrassed to say the least. I am usually good in these situations. I'm quite certain I had locked my knees in that one spot and I had a completely empty stomach.
The nurse asked Hannah if she wanted a popsicle and her eyes got really big. Once she was coherent the first thing she said was, "Kayla was right when she said it would smell like markers." She was talking about the anesthesia. I emailed Kayla's mom to let her know Hannah thought of her first.
Once her pain level was down a bit which didn't take long, we headed home and got Hannah situated on the couch. Kayla came by that afternoon and brought Hannah some popsicles and a stuffed animal.
