Emergency circumcision recovery advice

[tallyoh]

My 4 year old DS has had to have an emergency circumcision due to phimosis. It was absolutely not what I wanted for him but there was no choice as he couldn’t pass urine safely. We’re about 36 hours from the procedure and he’s miserable with pain. He won’t lie down or have anything touch his privates at all. He finally fell asleep on a potty chair with his head on my shoulder after nearly 24 hrs awake, then woke screaming after 15 minutes.

It’s so traumatic to see him crying out in pain.

Has anyone had this with their DS? What can I do to make him comfortable?? Please help if you can.

Take him back to the hospital and insist they give him pain relief

Ring 111 for advice.
I think you should take him to a doctor to check there is no infection or other problem.

He’s not in permanent agony, but it’s very uncomfortable and he doesn’t know how to deal with that because he’s 4.

We called 111 yesterday morning and they said it sounded normal because he had no temperature so offered no more help. We briefly panicked and called 999 over night but they told us to take him ourselves if we were worried and honestly that would have been more than he could handle. We’ll try and get another emergency appointment today if we can, but I’m hoping someone has experienced similar and knows of ways to make him more comfortable at home.

What pain relief are you giving him?

Nurofen and calpol on rotation according to a schedule so he’s getting medicine roughly every 3 hours. This is what we were advised.

In that case, if he’s genuinely in that much agony, id be taking him to a&e.

He has now managed to fall into an on off disturbed sleep in child’s pose in bed. Everyone keeps telling us what a common routine surgery it is for boys his age but I just want to make it easier on him.

In my experience you won't get anymore pain relief. Keep up with your Ibruoprofen and paracetamol. Wee in a shallow bath so it doesn't sting and use lidocaine cream which you can get from the pharmacy which numbs. Any sign of redness or changing colour then go back to the hospital as could be an infection.

Thank you. I’m not sure he’d let us put lidocaine cream on as he won’t let us (or anything else) touch it at the moment, but I’ll get some just in case. They said to keep it dry for the first 48 hours but we’ll try the bath thing after that if it’s still sore. Weeing is actually a lot better than pre-op but he’s got a lot of fear.

it’s so hard to know how much is acute pain and how much is normal post op discomfort experienced through the lens of a distressed and traumatised little boy. He can’t even look at himself without crying, but won’t let us cover it because it’s too sensitive.

I remember everything you're describing well,it's awful when you can't help. Ds applied his own cream.

He seems much better this afternoon, thankfully. I’m not sure what the night will bring, given he seems to complain more when distractions stop, but I do feel like we’re through the very worst of it. Next step is convincing him to put clothes on!

Ds lived in big baggy T shirts for a good week!

Oh poor baby! Poor you too. No suggestions, but it sounds rotten so much sympathy

This is where the lidocaine comes in handy as it's numbing .

There is a numbing gel called Instillagel that can be used.

We actually had some of that to supposedly help the pain when weeing before the surgery but it didn’t help. I think we kept getting the timing wrong because he was withholding as it was so painful. I could try again now the pain is more external than internal. But he might be too traumatised from the time I held him down and squirted it on while he screamed. God this whole thing has been horrible.

Let him put it on himself so he's in control.

Hi @tallyohI hope your son is Ok now. My 9 year old has just had to be circumcised due to similar issues. I'm just wondering if you've any top tips?
Op was this morning, he's back home now & we're alternating the calpol & ibuprofen. Did you get numbing cream? Not lookimg forward to tonight 🤦‍♀️ as I can imagine its going to be rough.
Grateful for any advice!

Poor wee thing. Hope he feels better soon. Does he understand why he had to be circumcised?

Hello, I’m sorry you’re dealing with this, was he in a lot of pain going to the toilet? I think a lot of the problems we had were due to trauma from fear of weeing as much as it was actual pain, so you may find it easier with your DS being older.

We didn’t go for the numbing cream because he wouldn’t let anyone near him to touch it and wouldn’t touch it himself either. Given he’s older you could give him the choice? The key thing that helped us was making a sort of tent in his bed so nothing would touch him. We used my toddler DD’s wooden climbing arch which happened to fit perfectly in his bed, but a big cardboard box might work.

Also, we kept up the medicine on a fixed schedule, at first we were waiting for him to be in pain, but then it took a long time for him to calm down.

He didn’t wear anything except a big tshirt for about 3 days and then we moved to oversized joggers inside out (so no seams were touching him).

One thing that might be trickier for you, we went back to using a potty in his room as it took the pressure off going to the loo. Maybe you could fashion some kind of commode?

Lots of people suggested baths, but he only wanted showers for the first week so we went with that.

He really turned a corner around day 3, and was almost completely back to his normal self by day 7.

Oh all screen time rules went out the window 🤦‍♀️ he spent most of the week in his room on his tablet (with us there) and we even let him fall asleep watching it for the first few days because he was scared to sleep because of the pain. I was worried we wouldn’t be able to put the tablet genie back in the bottle but once he wanted to run around again, it was easy to reset.

@tallyohthank you. We'd has issues for some time. Ultimately decided this would be the best option.
Its so hot at the moment I think we might be ok with the bed, in that he probably won't need a cover anyway. But good tip thank you.
Might see how we go today & if necessary go to the pharmacy tomorrow about the numbing cream.
He's currently sat naked, but is complaining its sore. Understandably.
We're keeping to the painkillers schedule. Alternating the calpol & ibuprofen.
Thanks for your advice.

Sorry, I didn't spot the date of the OP. Hope all is well now.

Yep I think we'll be doing similar! Whatever gets us all through!

I worked in operating theatres years ago and we had a urologist who would protect the penis after surgery with a styrofoam cup over it, gently taped to the groin with some micropore. It did look a bit odd, but ensured that nothing could brush against the sore areas. Dont know if something like that might be worth a try?