Brayden's Adnoids are gone

On Monday morning we took Brayden to OSF hospital to get his nose cauterized to help with his nosebleeds and the ENT Dr. checked out his adnoids while he was asleep and decided to take them out since they were huge.  It was a long day and I'm glad it's over.   Below is more detail from the day.

After checking in and going to a room with Brayden I was able to meet with the nurse.  Everyone was interested in what her name would be.  When Shaelyn had her extra tooth pulled right before Christmas 2010 her nurse was named Hope.  So last night she said maybe Brayden's nurse would be named Faith.  Luckily Brayden's nurse was name Kara or maybe I'd say GOD was sending a sign with Hope & Faith.

Then I met with Dr. Goote.  He was as wonderful as the office visit.  Very calming.

Then Greg walked in the room.  I was glad he made it for moral support.  He arrived later since he was in charge of getting Shaelyn breakfast and on the bus that day.

Then the anesthesiologist walked in and we explained to go on the light side since we are slow to wake up and absolutely no narcotics afterwards, just Tylenol for him.  He then asked Brayden what flavor he wanted in the mask and Brayden chose Cherry.

Brayden was such a brave little boy right from the very beginning when he needed to go with the nurse to the other room.  He said,"Bye mom & dad" with a little wave and a smile and then walked off.  I think he handled it better than I did since I had tears in my eyes.  But he was hopeful that this would help him breathe better so was anxious to get it over.  We all were anxious to get it over with.

So then we were escorted to the waiting room handed a pager & a # to watch the TV's to keep up with his progress.  This honestly must give people something to do.  By the time I sat down and got all my stuff out to work on (since I can't stand just sitting & thinking in hospitals) we were paged and we were escorted to a consultation room to meet with the Dr. after surgery.  He said everything went extremely well and he did have to take the adnoids out.  He said his tonsils may have to come out in the future but he left them in for now to see if it's just from all the adnoid drainage.  Then we went back to the waiting room and our pager buzzed again saying he was starting to wake up and one adult is allowed back there to stand by his bed.  So Greg said he'd stay with the pager and I should go on back.   When I went back to be by Brayden's side I noticed a lot of kids had 2 people so I asked the nurse and she said unfortunately I didn't need a translator.  So I texted Greg and asked if he'd be my translator and he said he speaks Dr.

Many kids came out of surgery, went to this area, woke up, and were wheeled to a private room all the time I stood there running my fingers through Brayden's hair, and squeezing his hand.  Brayden looked as peaceful as ever just sleeping away.  Probably the best sleep he has gotten in years.  And we were right even on the smaller dose it took a long time for him to wake up.  Even the Anesthesiologist was thankful that we gave him so much detail ahead of time since he said we would have been there a lot longer with the full dose or the narcotics added on.  Good thing we warned him!

So finally the nurse felt he was awake enough (I think she just felt bad for me) to go to his private room where I could finally sit down and hold him and Greg could finally come in and try to truly wake him up enough for Brayden to hold & eat 6 popsicles so we could leave.  (Speaking of food- I should mention that Greg and I were trying to be really compassionate parents and not eat breakfast since Brayden couldn't eat breakfast before we left the house.  Now it was like 2pm and we were both very hungry but unable to leave to get food and I had just switched purses so I didn't have my usual stash of granola bars. And most of the people in the waiting room had like 10 family members each so they were all getting McD's & passing out food to make it even worse.)

And the end of the day when Brayden finally woke up he made it all worth is when he said, " WOW! Mom you've been sitting in this chair in this room for a very long time." It was so cute! And I had realized last he saw me I was sitting in that chair with him on my lap and now he was on my lap again with no idea how much time had passed in between.

He was very brave or just amazingly fascinated when they took all the hospital tape off his hand & arm and removed the IV.  He said, "That was it?" All he had to show the kids the next day was a dot on his hand so the nurse put a cute bandaid on it for him.

We just made it home in time to get Shaelyn off the bus at 3pm. Then we ate Breakfast, Lunch, & Dinner.

Here is a picture of Brayden recovering that night.  He got in his warm batman pajamas, his cozy sports bathrobe, and he put on his blue fuzzy slippers and played with his new cars that he had received that day for being so brave.