Toddler Tonsillectomy and Adenoidectomy

Our daughter Kate had strep throat monthly for five months.  Strep is no fun, and as a mom, it is certainly painful to watch your little one suffer.  I wanted to write this post to share our experience with having her tonsils and adenoids removed because I spent a lot of time researching and reading other mom's advice.  I'm including my own opinions and experiences.  

If your child has had strep throat 5 or more times in a year, I recommend asking your pediatrician for a referral to an Ear, Nose, and Throat specialist. The younger the child, the easier the recovery seems to be.  In asking friends, I heard some stories of difficult recoveries, but they were all from older kids or adults.  My daughter is 3 years old. We were referred to Dr. Greene with Provident ENT.  We received excellent care from the staff.

Advice:

1.   Purchase the book Good-bye Tonsils! by Craig and Juliana Hatkoff.  Of course, use Amazon Prime if you are in a time crunch.  I rephrased a lot of the sentences to make the book appropriate for my three year old.  It is a good resource, but you may need to adapt it based on your child’s maturity.

2.    Make a list of questions before the procedure.  Call the doctor and ask away.  No question is silly.

3.   Stock up on children's Tylenol and children's Motrin.  I recommend purchasing any flavor that does not have red dye in it.  This is helpful because if your child does spit up any blood, you won't confuse it with the red dye in the medicine. Don't stress...Kate only spit up a tiny amount once or twice.

4.   Young children are rarely prescribed strong pain medication, so you will likely be asked to alternate the Tylenol and Motrin every four hours.  Your child might wake during the night and need a dose.

5.   Purchase a coolmist humidifier.  My dad bought us one atCVS.  One of the main goals is to keep the throat moist, and running this at night helps because your child won’t be drinking during the night…although I also recommend keeping a drink by the bed in case they ask.

6.   Buy some of your child’s favorite soft foods, but don’t overstock.  Your child may ask for something totally out of the norm.  I thought my daughter would eat lots of ice cream, yogurt, and pudding.  Surprisingly, she just kept asking for soft hamburger buns.  Thanks Wonderbread! You can always make a trip to the store to restock on the things your child is eating.

7.   Be sure to get the prescription medications ahead of time.  We received an antibiotic to give for 10 days, a steroid only to be given once on day 3, and a lollipop with a numbing agent for the throat.  It was helpful to get these several days before so that I could read the instructions and ask any questions about them.

8.   Have help in place.  Let a few friends, neighbors, and family know what you are going to be doing so that you have someone available to help you if needed.  If they offer to bring a meal, let them!  If they offer to pick something up at the store for you, let them!

9.   Let go of your normal schedule.  Your child will likely not want to eat or nap at normal times.  Plan to be out of work for a full 8-10 days.  Kate went back to preschool just for a few hours on day 9, and then she went for the full day on day 10.  However, some kids take a full 2 weeks to recover.

10.     Be in the moment.  It’s easy to get overwhelmed when you watch your baby go through something like this.  Try to focus on one day at a time, sometimes one moment at a time.
11.   Understand that if your child is a great sleeper, he/she may not be during this time frame.  If you have done sleep training in the past, you may have to start from scratch after the two week recovery period.
12. Stock up on some little treats that you can give your child throughout the recovery period.  The Dollar Tree is a great place to get plenty of prizes without breaking the bank.  Since my daughter LOVES Barbie, I bought her a few new Barbie movies from Target (only around $5-$10 each) so that she had something new to watch while she was feeling yucky.

Our Days:

Day 1 – Surgery Day – she could not eat or drink anything after midnight the night prior, but we were scheduled to be at the surgery center very early, so she actually did not complain.  The worst part was after she finished the surgery and awoke to find an IV in her foot…the nurse explained that it had to stay in for about 20 minutes, so I was able to rock her and sing to calm her nerves.  Our total time at the surgery center was 3-4 hours.  The rest of the day was very easy…we had to explain again that she could only have soft foods, so she ate hamburger buns, drank plenty of water, played, and napped.

Day 2 - much of the same except woke up spitting up a tiny amount of blood…fortunately, this did not occur again.

Day 3 - much of the same, woke up during the night spitting and crying – the steroid that we gave her today was very helpful!

Day 4 – Today was slightly more painful for Kate.  We just watched movies, napped, and alternated the medications.

Day 5 - Today was a rough day.  At one point while she was in pain, Kate cried and said "Mommy, what if I never get better?"  As a mama, this broke my heart. I held back my tears to be strong for her & promised her that she would get better. She did have some happy moments today, and we did much of the same - movies, IPAD, ate a hot dog, and napped.

Day 6 - Today was definitely Kate's worst day.  She had a consistent fever of 101-102, her medications did not seem to be helping enough, and she was overall frustrated.  She woke up this morning at 2:45, slept again from 7:15-8:45, slept from 2:30 – 5:30 on my lap.  Things got much better later that evening.  She was so hungry.  She ate three hot dogs (no bun) and drank milk.  In addition, my mom came over today.  She helped clean our house a bit.  I normally don't ask for help, and I didn't really ask her to do this...but I also did not complain about clean laundry and bathrooms while I was holding my daughter on the couch.

Day 7 – Last night was a little better.  She awoke at 1:30 crying.  I gave her pain meds, and then she slept restlessly until 4:30 a.m.  She napped from 12 – 2ish, ate 3 krispy kreme donuts, and seemed to improve later in the day.

Day 8 - Hooray!  She slept until 8:30 a.m. and was feeling her normal self.  I couldn't believe the drastic difference.  I still kept her home from preschool today just to watch her and see how she did throughout the day.  The doctor said she could go back today if she felt up to it, but I was not ready yet.

Day 9 - Another great day!  She went to preschool for just 2 hours.  She attends Simpsonville First Baptist Child Development Center.  It's an awesome place for kids! I picked her up early so she could nap at home and take it easy.  She continued to feel great!

Day 10 - She went for a full day of preschool today.  She was doing so well, and she enjoyed playing with her friends.

Days 11-14 She continued to eat soft foods, needed less if not any pain medicine, and enjoyed going to preschool or doing fun activities with us over the weekend.  We went to The Children's Museum here in Greenville and took her sweet friend Sadie with us.  They had a great time.

Have you experienced a tonsillectomy or adenoidectomy?  If so, l'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments.  Please feel free to ask any questions about our experience as well.  Remember that this post is just full of my opinions and experiences.  I am certainly not a medical professional, just a mama who loves her sweet daughter!