Star Patient

Exhale. :) Not that I was holding my breath, but I feel an all-encompassing feeling of relief as today's procedure is done-- and Dr Krakovitz feels that today's surgery was a big success. Turns out he had a lot of fluid in his ears-- not just trapped in his middle ear, but also in his inner ear. This explains the hearing loss levels shown in his hearing screen. Its also suggests that the loss shown on the test was caused by the large amount of fluid (not something else....*sigh again*). This is all really good news. His adenoid was very large, just as the doctor suspected. It was clearly blocking his nasal passages and was rather enflamed. So, he feels Jack will definitely feel a whole lot better once he heals. We asked how quickly Jack's hearing would show improvement--and the answer was "as soon as later today." Wow. Won't that be nice!

After our conversation with Dr Krakovitz, we went into the recovery room to see our star patiend. It took Jack a little bit to wake up from the procedure, but he did great. He was a bit out of it, which is totally normal. Once he did awake, he was very cuddly. That was fine with me because all I wanted to do was hold him...so that's what we did in the recovery room. I rocked him and held him close and as he went through varying phases of grogginess. He was really sweet...snuggling his head into my arm, making a couple big sighs, and then a few yawns. He would slowly blink his eyes and stare at me, then close them back up and rest a little more.

Once he felt up to it, he had some juice. Once he showed that he could keep it down, they cleared us to get ready to be discharged. Little kids heal best when they are in a non-stressful environment, so the surgery center tries to make it possible for patients to get home as quickly as possible. We took the IV out and slowly got him dressed. Then, they helped me get him situated in his stroller and we were ready to head home.

As for his recovery-- he's going to be a little sore for a bit-- and we need to keep him very hydrated for the next few days, even if his throat doesn't feel so great. So, anything liquid is fair game: Bring on the milkshakes! We picked a vanilla shake up for him on the way home. I mixed it up with milk and put it in his sippy cup. He loved it!! Lets hope we can make him as comfortable as possible as he gets better.