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| Best. Pajamas. Ever. See the connection?? |
My mom was a complete rock star and extended her weekend stay to help me with him before and after his surgery. Mike went to work as normal; click here if you need a refresher as to why he was excused from surgery duty.
Landon’s surgery was scheduled for 10:25 am, which had all of us petrified because he couldn’t eat after midnight. Fortunately he did pretty well – he fell asleep during the hour drive to the hospital (do not miss our old commute route one single bit) and there were toys to distract him once we arrived.
The surgery process is long and boring. I don’t know how the little kids manage without melting down! We arrived at the hospital at 8:25 a.m. as instructed, and from there it was 1 hour in the main waiting area and then 1 hour waiting in the pre-op area. Having my mom there was the difference-maker – two adults to occupy and distract him worked well.
The surgery itself took less than a half hour. While he was in the first part of the recovery area (sans us), a nurse poked her head in our post-op room and asked if he typically held his breath and stopped breathing when he got mad. Umm, definitely not. She said he was starting to wake up but was not yet with it and was “quite mad.” Poor Landon! She asked if we wanted him with us, or wanted him to stay back with the nurses a while longer. I definitely wanted my little guy at that point!
So in he came and we got him arranged on my very limited lap space. He had a tough time waking up from the anesthesia! It was about a half hour of moaning/crying and not being quite awake or aware of his surroundings. He set off the alarm for not breathing once, but it wasn’t scary because the nurses had assured us it was not a big deal if it happened. We were supposed to blow in his face if he looked like he was holding his breath, and that prevented the alarm from going off again.
Eventually we got him to drink a bit of liquid, at which point they took out his IV and pretty promptly discharged us. I guess they don’t want parents lingering all afternoon with their groggy children!
Landon was still pretty out of it and was clinging to me like a koala bear. If you think a 35 pound toddler is heavy, try a 35 pound toddler affected by anesthesia. There was no way I could carry him out on my own, so they put me in a wheel chair and wheeled both of us down to the car!
My mom left shortly after we got home, leaving us on our own for the afternoon. We managed just fine! Landon laid on the couch for a while, then staggered over and wanted to curl up next to me. Seeing as I am usually sloppy seconds to daddy, I was seriously enjoying his snuggles.
We watched the same episode of Bubble Guppies several times before I scored a major victory and convinced him we should watch an episode of Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood. Pretty sure that only happened because he was still out of it, but I’ll take it.
He asked for something to eat and in the course of a half hour consumed:
- Several gummy worms
- Large quantity of Teddy Grahams
- Package of fruit snacks
- Lunch of cheese slice, shredded chicken and Ritz crackers
- Lemonade and apple Juice
Soon afterwards he was ready for a nap and slept for 2.5 hours. Mommy did a few things for work, and then took a much-needed nap!
He’s done great in the two days since his surgery! He’s been happy and agreeable, and seems to be pretty much back to normal. We’re limiting his exertion and making sure he gets lots of fluids. Today he went to school in the morning and did great, so tomorrow he will go back to his regular schedule.
(One week update: He's still doing great! We had one night of a croupy/junky cough, but other than that he's been healing exactly as expected. Only tough part has been the 2x daily ear drops, which have completely traumatized him.)
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