Under the Knife

Man I can't believe it's been over a month since Em had surgery.  I started writing this post on May 13th (her surgery was on May 10th) and now it's June 11th.  Huge slacker over here!!!!  So let's pick up where I left off......

Everyone knows that we've been facing some challenges with Em's health.  Friday was the big day.  Em's adenoids were finally coming out and we could get back on our journey to normalcy.  I was in full on nurse mode for most of the morning.  Surgery wasn't scheduled until 1:45pm, which I was not thrilled about.  She couldn't eat after midnight but could drink clear liquids and have popsicles until 10:45am.  Well let me tell you...she woke up demanding food.  I've never felt so bad for anyone in my life.  She had no idea why she couldn't eat breakfast like any other day.  It was so bad that I made the Hubs got to Publix and buy popsicles for her.  She ate about 3 for breakfast, which she thought was pretty cool.  But then the hard part came when she couldn't have anything else.  That was the longest few hours of my life. She just cried and would get mad and not understand.  But we all stuck it out and survived!  We loaded the car and headed to Brandon to have her surgery.

Not happy to be going to surgery

Google Maps gave me the most ridiculous directions to the surgery center but we found it no problem.  She was all excited to go in and play.  We waited for her name to be called and finally we headed back to meet up with the doc and anesthesia.  Let me tell you, Dr Vaughn was awesome!  Not only was he great with Em, he was very knowledgeable and very nice on the eyes!!! I know that shouldn't make a difference but it helped.  Plus a good friend of mine used to work with him and spoke so highly of him.  I was blessed that he would be the one managing our sweet girl. Both he and Dr Andrews (our surgeon) explained the procedure, we signed the consents and Em walked off to the OR hand in hand with Dr Vaughn and never looked back.  I kid you not, about 5 minutes later, Dr Andrews came out and was finished!  He said to prepare for about 15-20 minutes and it might have been 10 tops.  He said it was HUGE and that she'll finally be able to breathe out of her nose.  My poor baby hadn't been able to breathe normally for years!!!  I felt like the worst mom on the planet.  He said she'd be as good as new in a few days but she'd have a cough and runny nose for a few weeks.  He headed back to the OR while we waited to be called back to Recovery.

Hanging out, waiting to go to the OR....she dressed herself for the occasion

When we got the call to come back, the minute I opened the door, I recognized the screams.  Em was not a happy camper.  She and anesthesia don't mix too well.  She was sooooo mad that the nurse took her IV out and put tape on it instead of a bandaid.  She constantly asked us to take her "out of this place" and to take her home.  She refused to drink a thing and when it came time for vitals, you would have thought we were killing her. I think they discharged us from PACU because they couldn't handle her screams anymore!!!  So off we went on our journey home.

She got hungry and thirsty about 15 minutes later so we stopped to get her whatever she wanted.  She didn't have her tonsils removed so she didn't have a diet restriction. What did she pick? Chips and Coke. And of course her Daddy got it for her!  She ate like there was no tomorrow!  She took it easy the rest of the day but really, you wouldn't have been able to tell anything was wrong with her.

Left: leaving the surgery center
Right: about 30 minutes later, enjoying her chips

She did an amazing job and was so brave!  I'm so thankful for the amazing work her surgeons and surgical team did.  We are truly blessed to have such amazing doctors in our area!

Our road to recovery definitely doesn't end here but it's a very long and emotional one for me that's best left for another post......