DD's Tonsillectomy

[inigomontoyahwillcox]

Am putting here as for all intents and purposes DD is an adult, well physically (she has ADHD so executive age is a couple of years younger) - she's 17.

She's suffered from recurrent tonsillitis for years now, but never hit the magic number for a referral to ENT (7 infections in 12 months) until now and she has been booked in for a bilateral tonsillectomy in late Feb (super quick as we only saw the specialist 2 weeks ago).

I know she needs it; one of her tonsils is always the worst affected and she now struggles with tonsil stones as well as the tissue has developed pockets in it due to the recurrent infections, plus she looses a lot of time off school/college when she comes down with another infection. But as she is my "precious only child" I am very typically having a minor meltdown and jumping to worst case scenario.

Has anyone here or their child had the op at a similar age? Any words of wisdom? Were there any complications (e.g. post op bleeding), how long did it take to recover?

I had mine removed at 19 (many years ago). There were no complications, my throat felt sore and the corners of my lips a little cracked.

It was such a relief as I had suffered for many years and also had quinsy. Ice cream lollies etc will help but after the first day it’s no worse than she has felt before.

I had a 2 weeks off work but I was fine after 1 week.

Good luck

My DH had his out at about 34yo. The older you are, the worse it is because of well established blood flow at the tonsils. It wasn’t an easy recovery for him. Hopefully it will be easier for your DD being much younger.

DH did have a post op bleed at about 10 days. I’m not in the UK so medical things might be different there. In my country we’re advised to stay within a 30 to 45 minute drive of a major hospital for the first two weeks in case of a post op bleed. When we realised it wasn’t just a little bleed and that it wasn’t stopping I called an ambulance in the middle of the night. A surgeon was already heading into hospital for someone else with a bleed. DH was in a worse condition so he was in the operating theatre first. He was home within about 3 or 4 hours. In many ways his recovery had to start again. He had to go through the rescabbing of the wound and healing up again.

It took probably at least 4 weeks for him to be able to eat comfortably and without pain relief. He had opioid pain relief. It would have been about 2 weeks but he had the post op bleed and that basically restarted his recovery.

Despite the pain, the bleed and the tough miserable recovery he has zero regrets about getting his tonsils out. He was very relieved to get rid of them. He was constantly getting sick and he had tonsil stones that really stunk and he could taste them. They were so bad that I couldn’t even kiss him because of the smell. For a few months it was a very brief peck on closed lips and that was it. Once he was healed up it was so nice to be able to kiss him properly again and no tonsil stone stink. For a few years afterwards he had the best health he’d had in years.

Try not to worry too much, be prepared to look after and support your DD, and stay within a close drive or quick ambulance trip to a major hospital.

See if they can have them lasered off rather than removed. My 2nd child had his lasered and it made such a difference in the recovery.

Thank you for sharing your experiences - the good and the bad. I’ll be prepared for any eventuality as much as I can be. We’re about a 20 minute drive from the hospital so not too far if she did bleed.

Think I’m extra nervous as I had major complications from surgery a few years back (entirely different surgery) which I nearly died from and often think to myself “if only I made the decision not to have the surgery”. Obviously I can’t transfer my fears onto her, and it’s very much her decision and she wants them removed.

I didn’t know lasering was an option, so I’ll definitely be asking about that.

I had mine out at 16, and though I did end up at a&e twice afterwards with post op bleeds I don’t regret it at all. It had got to the point where I was on antibiotics once a month for it, so much time off school in the middle of my GCSEs and couldn’t cope with being so ill anymore. If she does go ahead, make sure she is aware of the possibility of the post op bleeds though (at least tell her after the op!) my mum had been warned but I hadn’t. I woke in the middle of the night, ran to the bathroom and spat then vomitted blood everywhere. The bathroom looked like a murder scene and I remember sitting on the bottom stair holding a sick bowl, ready to go to a&e thinking why on earth is my mum just pottering around whilst I’m literally sat here dying 😅 she was obviously pre-warned and not quite as worried as I was… it stopped itself pretty much by the time we got to hospital, then another milder one a couple of days later. I don’t regret any of it, other than not being made aware of the possible complications 🥲

My nephew had his out at 17 after multiple episodes of tonsillitis and also quinsy. Slightly longer recovery than mine and much more painful (I was sent home with tramadol, his was paracetamol/ibuprofen many years after mine, push for decent pain relief), also had to go back due to post op bleed. He was aware of possible complications though, told after the op but before being sent home so knew what to look out for.

All of that said, I don’t regret mine at all and pretty sure my nephew doesn’t either. They say recovery is worse the older you get but nothing that you can do about that now.

In fact, my 5yo DD suffers as well and having just finished antibiotics today for yet another episode, we have a follow up ENT appointment soon in which I will be pushing hard for them to take them out. I feel the couple of weeks recovery is the lesser of the two evils than battling recurrent tonsillitis, possibility of quinsy, becoming antibiotic resistant, etc.

Wishing your daughter all the best. 15 years on and I truly feel her pain! ❤️

I had mine out at 18, no problems.

I had mine out at 14. I developed a post op infection that made me sick which hurt like hell. I had it done in 2001 when you got 2 weeks off school with it. The second week was like an extra holiday as I was now feeling back to normal. Recovery from the tonsillitis was longer then the tonsillectomy!

Turns out DD is supposed to have her mock (redoing her maths GCSE) the day after. Good timing!

my daughter had her tonsils removed in September and she is 17. Multiple rounds of tonsillitis and then hospitalised in April with quinsy. She had stage 3 tonsils so surgery was quite quick.

after the procedure she was in a lot of pain so stay on top of pain management, get lots of cold drinks/ice lollies. I also ordered an ice pack for around the jaw and this helped massively. They say 2 weeks of rest and no work which I doubted but she genuinely needed the entire period to recover.

good luck!