Post T&A Update

The surgery went well. Dr. I didn't take the lingual tonsils but that doesn't surprise me since we went in for a T&A in 2009 and didn't get the tonsils out. I knew "I'll take a look" meant it wasn't likely to happen. That's okay. He said that her tonsils were bigger than he thought so who knows, maybe it will help. We'll see.

He also said her pharynx was collapsing so he stitched it up. What we aren't clear about is if that was a result of the adenoidectomy or not. We'll have to ask when we have an opportunity. He didn't say much else  about it.  There was some sort of mix up and even though we went to the waiting area when we were paged somehow we missed him and sat in the "orange room" waiting for him for an hour before we figured out what happened and then he came to meet with us a second time.  He'd done another surgery in the mean time.

We recently had some difficult trach changes so he checked out her stoma but it turned out to be fine.

I was called into post-surgery because Ainsley was pretty upset. She needed a lot of suctioning. There were a few scary episodes when her eyes kind of closed in a non-responsive way and she appeared to stop breathing. The nurse was quite concerned about these apneas and he called in the anesthesiologist and surgeon. In the end we decided we think she was just finally relaxing from me being there. Sometimes I think the monitors are misleading. It was a little frightening to see her respiratory rate drop to 4 (breaths per minute). She had a couple good naps and hasn't had it happen again since we left.

Ainsley's front two teeth have been loose for a year or more. Now her front top 4 teeth are loose. Then two more of her bottom teeth became loose. With every surgery I've been expecting to lose a tooth and finally we did, but it wasn't one of those darn top teeth. The adult teeth have been pushing them forward and they now look a little funny and I was finally ready for them to come out. Funny how that works.

See it there? They saved it for us. Apparently the tooth fairy at the hospital works really fast.

Here we are earlier in the day killing time. She was so cute.

She was so happy to watch a movie in the car on the way to the hospital. I haven't had a chance to talk much about it but she really seems to be paying more attention to things, videos especially. I think she can see a whole lot better after the frontalis sling surgery even if she has to use her brow to do the opening, it seems to make a difference. When we were at the RFC for Adrian's birthday dinner she was also wide eyed. And not as fearful of the animatronics. I think she could see better and was more intrigued and less scared. She isn't fully healed. It's only been just over a month so I suspect we'll continue to see a small degree of improvement.  Last time we saw a big difference at about 1 year post-op.

Patience pays. We'll have to wait to see the results of today's surgery. For now I'm just going to baby my baby as she recovers. Evie is away at horse camp and Adrian has baseball camp during the days so it will be a little easier to devote my attention to Ainsley. Steve and I were remarking how nice it is to have a surgery without a lot of blood or gore. I think it's misleading though since all the tissue removal happens inside the body. She's in a lot of pain. This is one time when I am thankful for our g-tube and that she doesn't have to eat by mouth. They gave us lots of pain meds so I'm hoping with a little TLC from mom and a few doses of good meds she'll have a good night.