To be scared about DD having adenoids and tonsils out

[CountryMummy1]

Well, after 2.5 years of being made to feel like I was a neurotic mother we finally found out today what was wrong with 3 year old DD. Her adenoids are so big that they have completely closed off her nose and blocked her ears. She has glue ear thicker than the consultant has ever seen before. She has no sense of smell or taste, has sleep apnea, breathes through her mouth 24/7 and has only 25% hearing. All this finally explains her reluctance to eat, her tiredness, her sounding like darth vader etc.

I am relieved that we finally have a definitive diagnosis and the surgeon we saw today at Birmingham Children's Hospital was so nice. He says she needs everything out and grommets in and that she will be a changed child.

I know we have to do this but I keep having visions of them putting her to sleep and thinking that if things go wrong we will never see her again.

They are trying to get her a slot for next Thursday as she is in such a state.

Does anyone have experience of this op? Any tips? And how does anyone survive the wait whilst your child is under without going insane

My son had his adenoids out and grommets put in just after he turned 2.

It changed his life. He can hear, he talks, he doesn't gag eating, he doesn't snore and most importantly is so so very happy now. He was in so much pain with recurrent eat infections.

My daughter had her tonsils removed in January. She caught Scarlet Fever last Easter and suffered with recurrent strep A infections. She had so much energy now and has started growing again. She hadn't put on any weight at all during last year.

It is upsetting when they are put under but I just linked back the tears and reassured them and kept them calm.

My son was released from hospital three hours after coming round. He bounced back so fast. My daughter was operated on around 10am and we were discharged around 3.30pm. We kept her full dosed on Calpol and Nurofen for five days. Make sure you time painkillers for half an hour before she is going to eat. We were given liquid morfine but never needed to use it.

Good luck to your little one. I'm sure it will be a life changing operation. X

Hi, my DD (4) had this operation at Christmas for similar reasons to your DD (she is deaf and has severe sleep apnoea). The operation lasted about an hour, and was went well. The first week post surgery she was fine (just remember to keep giving the painkillers). She caught a slight infection on the second week, so we had a few rough days whilst the antibiotics kicked in. We found giving her ice cubes / homemade ice lollies made from very diluted juice helped her manage her pain levels. I can understand your anxiety about the GA & surgery, I was really nervous the first time my DD needed surgery, but we have noticed a significant difference in my DD concentration levels post this operation. Sadly it hasn't helped with her hearing, but then my DD has other complex medical challenges that are also contributing to her deafness.

Please don't worry, my DD had the same op last year. I frightened myself silly reading things on google the night before! She was totally fine in a few days. She slept through the first two days, it was easy!
If she likes swimming ask the hospital to sort you out some fitted ear plugs. They did this for my DD and she was back swimming after three weeks.

My Mum felt the same about me having the same op. She didn't let me have it. My childhood, along with my education was wrecked. All my brothers can remember of me growing up is me being upstairs ill in bed and how small and sick I was :( I can remember standing in the playground, feeling like shit, waiting for my Dad to pick me up and take me home as yet another bout of tonsilitis started and just wishing I could be like the other children.

My dd started with the tonsil curse at around 4. She had hers out age 6 and the difference, as others have said, was incredible.The dark circles under her eyes disappeared, her non existent appetite picked up and she had energy. It was worth every bit of anxiety before and during the op.

If it's any help at all, my friend's DP is a paediatric anaesthetist (sp) and he says there are so many systems in place these days to constantly monitor equipment and the patient, that problems related to GA are thankfully incredibly rare. In fact he can't remember any over the last 20 years and he's coming up for retirement now.

It's so understandable that you are anxious but it sounds like this op is really needed. Could you speak to someone about how you feel? Maybe someone can help put your mind more at rest?

It's genuinely life changing surgery. My mother remembers the change in my brother to this day and she's got hardly any memory of our childhoods due to alcoholism.

I also remember an ENT lecturer saying to my dental class that he would put money on it that no one in the room of 70 had gone through childhood with untreated glue ear due to the negative effect it has on development and learning. He was right, one girl had had grommets before she started school. That was it.

To this day my brother can't pronounce certain words properly i never mention it honest and if he had gone on for longer without treatment, maybe he wouldn't be the highly irritating successful man he is today.

My DS had tonsils out at 9yo last year. Slighlty different as he's older, but our experience....

Hospital pre-op appt was brilliant. They showed him what would happen with the anaesthetic gel (to numb the area for giving the put to sleep injection) on his arm. They showed him what the cannula thing that he would wake up like would look like and how it might feel. Childrens hospital staff are very good!

Day of, all ok. Staff again very good at keeping them distracted (my ds was told to wiggle his finger to make the finger heart monitor flip about while he was having the injection). There was no 3.2.1 pretty instant pass out, there was no real time to get upset before I was ushered out. (Good thing......I felt he was in safe hands).

Waking up....some children are very upset, some not at all. My ds was just sleepy and not at all upset. The upset apparently is just the anaesthetic wearing off and not really to do with pain - plus if they are upset I'm told they often don't remember afterwards.

First few days fine. Told there would be an increase in pain at around day 4 or 5, which there was. Bit hairy, but just keep on top of round the clock pain relief for the specified time. My ds had ear ache at around this time too and was in quite severe pain, but it didn't last long and this hospital were brilliant at providing post op care and advice.

My friend's ds had an adenoid and tonsil op at around the same age as your Dc. He had sleep apnoea, glue ear, etc. and always looked tired and peaky. He coped with the operation really well, better than my ds. I think there is a bit of variability in how well they manage. My friends ds was transformed by the op. My ds is doing so much better without his manky tonsils too!

Just seen your post re how to cope whilst they are in surgery. This was my DD 6th surgery, so we've had a bit of practice!. I switch my phone off, take the pager they give you and, depending on the weather, either go and sit in the gardens or find a quiet corner of the coffee shop and read a book. Anything to stop me sitting glued to the waiting area constantly looking at the door / clock, and imagining how the surgery is going. Good luck, I'm sure your DD will be fine, our children are a lot stronger / braver than we think!

DS1 had his tonsils and adenoids out age 2.8, because of severe sleep apnoea. He used to snore so loudly (so I totally get the Darth Vader reference!) ad his breathing stopped so many times a night, always ending with him waking hysterical each time.

He was only down for an hour, stayed overnight in hospital with DH, and they let him home next morning after he demolished 3 slices of toast and 2 cups of milk!

They told us to give him lots of scratchy food (to help scrape the gunk from his throat and prevent infection), so plenty of toast, crisps, etc. also, keep giving the pain relief which was brufen alternated with paracetamol.

They said day 5 would be the worst in terms of throat pain and they were right, but he recovered well from there on. The nurses also gave him a lip balm as his lips were dry after surgery and they said it helped with reducing soreness and encouraging eating. He thought that was the best thing ever!

The improvement in his breathing was instant. DH text me the first night in hospital saying he couldn't hear him breathe at all, and was breathing through his nose for the first time. We do still have issues with his sleep in terms of frequent waking, which must be because he got so used to it, but we are making steady progress with that.

Make sure you have something to do while DD is in theatre - we had something to eat because we didn't know when the next meal would be, so by the time we had a sandwich and coffee and headed back to the ward, theatre were ringing to tell us to come down as he was out.

OP, I just wanted to say I'm so pleased for you and your daughter that you've finally got the help you/ she needs. I read a couple of your other posts/ threads and it was heart breaking to read how worried you were and how difficult life for you both has been. So glad for you that you have a proper diagnosis and that the surgeon was so nice. I wish you and your daughter all the very best and I'm hoping all goes well. I'm sure it will, and I'm sure it'll change her and your life. Sincere good wishes to you both. I'm so sorry you've had such a bad time up to now, but I hope this is all going to change.
and to you x

Thank you so much. I keep telling myself that the fear of this op can't be as bad as the day to day limbo we have been living in for years.

I had the same operation at 3. I can't remember m ch except the pre-med tasting foul and getting to eat loads of ice-cream for a week.

I can remember the awful ear infections and tonsillitis that I used to have, my adenoids and tonsils were so swollen I was struggling to breathe when I had an infection and they didn't have time to go back down before I had another one.

Since the operation I've had a handful of throat infections and since I was about 7 hardly any ear infections.

Seeing your child have any operation is hard but from my experience, this operation will be a life changer for your dd.

I'm another one who's had this op and is still here to tell the tale! I remover holding my breath when I was given the general anaesthetic so I wouldn't go to sleep and then watching He-Man in the ward afterwards. Good times

Seriously though, it'll be fine, it's a pretty routine operation and the benefits of it are huge.

Hello,

Your DD will be fine. They are very good there at looking after children and at looking after anxious parents! My DD has been an inpatient there a few times, and had surgery there twice (grommets). I suspect I know who the consultant is, if I'm right he is the same one as my DD is under. He is a good guy, you are in safe hands with him. Promise.

It is not fun when your child has an operation - they will let you go into the anaesthetic room with them and cuddle them while they go to sleep. Then give them a kiss, and then they will take you back to the ward. I cry every time I have to leave her in the anaesthetic room, I think it's normal. But try and occupy yourself while she is under - I take Graham Norton downloaded onto my tablet to watch - it helps, it's irreverent.

She might be upset when she comes round, it's normal. They will probably get you to go to recovery to fetch her and give her a big cuddle.

Glad you've got some answers.

I had this op, or very similar, way back when i was 5ish, in the early 80s

No memory of it other than my first time on general anaesthetic but no issues that I'm aware of and that was 30 years back so i expect surgery and safety has improved.

She'll be fine OP, I get why you worry but try and focus on the positives, your little girl is going to be all fixed and can listen to frozen songs all day long and hear them much better (hang on, you sure you want this.... )

Good luck and get her to pick a present before she goes in to surprise her with. Just about my first memory is a pile of star wars figures when I came around!

Snotty Sundays - it's Mr Kuo. Hope that's the good guy you are talking about. We liked him over the other ones we saw as he spent the 1st 10 mins ignoring us and talking to our DD as well as playing princesses!! He had her completely diagnosed from those 10 minutes! He was great!

Don't b scared, my son had this op in jan aged 3. So very few children have this now, it will definitely be needed. The benefits have been enormous - he is sleeping better, not dribbling or snoring, and finding it easie to eat. He is much more confident due to not dribbling and better speech. His sleep apnoea is gone, so he is not stopping g breathing potentially 20 times a night. The first 24 hours were hard, seeing him in pain but after 2 weeks off pre-school (recommended cos of infection risk), he was absolutely fine.

Do ask if you have any questions. X

Oh and no ice cream! They must eat hard, crunchy food like toast and crisps - it pulls the scabs from inside the throat apparently and helps it to heal quicker.

Well, it's all go for the operation. It's on Thursday. Being done at the Priory private hospital so only a few minutes from the Birmingham Children's Hospital in case of problems.
I am so scared! I haven't eaten since I was told today she is definitely on the list for Thursday. I feel sick and weak from the stress.

Aw bless you, please try not to worry.

I had them out when I was younger and it wasn't bad at all. I threw up for a bit after because of the general but then I was fine and eating toast.

She will LOVE you for bringing her nice cold drinks to sooth the sore throat I and many other people have after having it done. I remember to this day thinking mcdonalds coke was magic because it 'cured' it. (Mum bought me a happy meal as a treat when I came home)

Best of luck

It sounds dreadful OP, but it will be worth it in the long run; poor little thing. As pp have said, take books, food and some moral support if you can; but you might just have to write it off as one of those Awful Days.

But! It's only a day and she'll be a new child afterwards. And she won't be the nervous one: it'll be worse for you! (That's meant to cheer you up...)

BTW, I think everyone cries when they come round from GA; it's not the pain, they just do. I just wanted to warn you.

I am really glad you have posted this. my little girl (4) is having the exact same on the 8th April and I'm petrified. Message me if you like x

I had my tonsils out on my 18th birthday, I had, had tonsillitis on and off (mostly on) for 2 years.

I was on a day surgery ward where part of it was for children, all 6 of the children in that day we're having tonsils removed and were operated on before me, I watched them all go down and come back about an hour later awake and asking for ice cream and bouncing around, they were discharged a couple of hours later.

I on the other hand took ages to come round, felt sick and dizzy, could barely swallow and didn't want to sit up. I was discharged after 8 hours.

Children are remarkable and bounce back quickly and her quality of life will improve greatly.

2 best things I've ever done is having my tonsils out and having my wisdom teeth removed.

Me too, I had this as an 8 year old in the 80s. It was day surgery for me, and apart from the grogginess and pain of coming round, I had a great time! I still remember the day vividly because all the staff made me feel so special. Staff on children's wards are wonderful.

I had this as a 7 or 8 year old in the 90s. The only bad thing I remember about it was being sick twice during the night afterwards and the nurse deciding that meant I didn't deserve a new blanket the second time, so I had to sleep with nothing covering me and I was cold and had no-one to get me a replacement.

I had two different ENT operations after that, the third of which (lasering of the passages) finally sorted the problem. That was nearly 15 years ago now and I feel like I might need to go back and see if there's anything they can do, I've got a handful of niggling, abnormal ENT issues again that have slowly been building up. I'm a med student now though so I figure if I can hold out till I have a bit more of a clue, I might just find out what my options are that way anyway so lazy

Oh and re. GA: I think I've always cried when I've come round. Not that I have any recollection of that - and I mean any. And that's not due to it being lost in the mists of time, I was 13 when I last went under. I do remember feeling horrendously thirsty though - the way you do when your throat is utterly dried out so if you try to swallow everything sticks and you feel like you might choke/puke. But that's over quickly enough.