Thursday, May 28, 2009

Adenoid land

For Katie: Everyone give Katie and Derek (Marley) congrats on the arrival of baby boy #2, Weston.

I told Katie that I would give her a little more detail about Reed's surgery so it wont hurt my feelings if you just ignore this post from here on.

I listened to Reed snore from the time he was like a month old. It got progressively worse and was especially horrible if he had a cold. He would get mid-snore and then either stop breathing or make this horrible "water draining from the tub" sound. It was almost like the snore got stuck and he was trying to force it through. Eventually, he would gasp and kinda wake up. It freaked me out. The pediatrician gave us a prescription for Flonaise and I was supposed to squirt it up his nose at night. It was supposed to help shrink the size of his adenoids I guess. Well, that was a HUGE joke because IF I was lucky enough get it squirted up his nose, he went ballistic. All the crying just made him even stuffier and defeated the purpose of the Flonaise in the first place.

I relayed this to the Dr, who sent us to a pediatric ENT. He was fantastic (Too bad you aren't here in AZ, Id tell you to go to him). They took X-rays and verified that Yes, his adenoids were bigger than usual. Thus the surgery.

The first couple hours after the surgery were tough. He fussed and was pretty pissed coming out of the anesthesia. (Which the Dr said was normal for kids) Pretty quick though he started to get back to his old self. He hated the IV and kept trying to pull it out. But he ate better than he ever has for me at home. Originally, we were told he was so young we would have to stay in the hospital overnight, but at 6pm he was doing so well, the Dr let us go. Thank heavens.
He was prescribed antibiotics and pain killer. Which was difficult cause I had to try to find a way to hide it in his food or juice. (He wont take it alone)

About 2 days after the surgery the poor kid had meat breath. It was horrible. Most the time I was checking his diaper cause I thought he was pooey. No, it was his breath. It kinda had the smell of raw chicken that has been outside in the trashcan too long. YUCK. For a while, I had to turn away so he wasn't breathing directly at me. That lasted about 2 weeks.

There weren't any complications, it was a quick surgery, and there aren't any sutures or anything. And it seems to be very successful.

Every once in a while I hear him buzzing lightly, but any snoring (more of a hum really) is a full breath in and out. It doesn't get "stuck". I dont worry about him not being able to breathe at night. I dont stay up at night listening to him thinking, "I have to stay awake and listen or he will die in his sleep." Also, he doesn't breathe out of his mouth as much. So he looks a little less cromagnon than he did before. I think it is definately worth talking to the pediatrician about. If you have any more questions, let me know or even better email them to me so you dont have to go through the blog. blueyedmle@msn.com

1 comment:

The Marley Family said...

Thanks for this! I will definately have to get Van checked out. I've been hoping that he would just grow out of it, but I know I would feel a lot better if he were looked over by a doc.