Tyler's surgery

Tyler had surgery this past Tuesday, April 13th, 2010. We (or at least I) stressed out about it for the 3 weeks before, but we knew it was the way to go for him. On his last ear checkup and hearing test we discovered he had lost quite a bit of hearing. We had the feeling that this was the case since we had been noticing lately that sometimes he didn't seem to hear us when we spoke to him. So his doctor said he needed another set of tubes in his ears so that the built up fluid will finally go out, and also he would take his adenoids out.

A couple of days prior to surgery we read him a couple of books about going to the hospital. I strongly recommend the "Franklin goes to the hospital", featuring Franklin, a turtle. So we read them to him and explain that Franklin had an owie just like him and he went to the hospital and then he was all better. Last Saturday Tyler had to get his first blood test (for the surgery) and he was really brave. He then told daddy that he went to the doctor and had an owie (they put a bandaid where they poked him so he called that an owie).

The morning of the surgery (Tuesday), I took Isabella to daycare while Rich went with Tyler to the hospital and then I met them there. They had explained to us that one adult could go in with him into the surgery room until he fell asleep. Everyone I've talked to told me that this is really hard, to see your kid fall asleep with the anesthesia and I was really fearing I wouldn't be able to handle it without crying so Rich said he would go in with him. Tyler was SO brave the whole time, we are so proud of him. The surgery went well, he woke up a bit disoriented and took a while to comfort him but I held him and he slept on my shoulder for a while, then he had a popsicle and some water and home we went around noon.

I am amazed at how fast kids just bounce back....even the afternoon of the surgery he wanted to go outside to play!!....we didn't let him because he needed to rest, but yesterday he was outside, went to the park and had a lot of fun with Rich and grandma who came also to see him and stay with him for a good part of the day. He has a bit of a sore throat and he is taking some pain medicine still, but he is doing really well....now if we can get him to start eating normal again, that would be great.

I think that he really did a lot better than I did with this whole surgery thing. Hopefully this will put an end to his multiple ear infections and stop his hearing loss for good!

Here is a picture of Tyler (Dr. Tyler, since he brought his medicine kit with him to the hospital) before going into surgery, brave kid!