Tuesday, July 22, 2014

5 Things That Are More Fun than a Tonsillectomy

I've lived about half of my life, and I've had a bunch of unpleasant experiences. These are things I would rather do again before I would ever have another tonsillectomy. (Thank goodness you can only go through it once!)
  1. That time in high school when I kicked a vending machine (that stole my money!) and my big toe nail turned black, died, and fell off. It was very painful and took months to heal. I learned my lesson about kicking things in anger while wearing sandals...
  2. Food poisoning. While extremely unpleasant, at least it only lasts about a day.
  3. Root Canal- I've only done this once, and it was awful. I couldn't let them put the wedge thing in my teeth to help me hold my mouth open because it gags me, so I had to just hold my jaw stretched open for the full hour and a half. Fun times. Still better than my tonsillectomy.
  4. Wisdom Teeth Extraction. I like to do things the hard way, so I also waited to have my wisdom teeth out until I was an adult. I was about 30 when I finally got them out, primarily because one of them was growing sideways into a molar and had caused a huge, gaping hole to form in the molar. (Hence #3...) Following the extraction of all 4 teeth, my face swelled up and was all bruised looking and I couldn't eat or talk for a week, and then not normally for another two. After everything else had healed, I had a TON of pain where one of my stitches poked into my cheek and made canker sores. When even that was finally healed, I had a funny numb feeling in the lower front jaw area on one side. Still today it isn't normal in that area. It isn't numb, but it isn't 100% normal, either. 
  5. Childbirth. Times 4. I've had 4 babies, three of whom I had some pain meds with, but one (my biggest baby, who got stuck a little on his way out) I decided to try "natural" childbirth and had no drugs with. It was agony. But even that was better than a tonsillectomy. Plus, I got to take home a sweet baby afterwards, so... bonus!
I'm on about day 21 after my surgery, and I'm still having some discomfort in my throat. My uvula is still swollen and I keep feeling like I need to spit out phlegm (TMI, I know), but spitting doesn't help. I can only assume this is scar tissue or the last, lingering scabs coming off. It's been an awful, horrible, terrible journey. One I'm glad I will never have to take again.

In a few weeks, hopefully I will begin to feel some positive effects from having had the surgery-- including sleeping better and hopefully my body will start feeling less fatigued all the flipping time and I can get back to living life like I was meant to.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm on day 3. Not too much pain but I, like you, am staying on top of the pain meds and forcing iced water. I found that applesauce is great to swallow pills with too! Italian ices are far better than ice cream. I tried sleeping in the recliner but could not. I found that sleeping on my side leaning slightly forward worked to keep my uvula from choking me.

Brad said...

Wow! thank you so much for sharing. I wish I had found these posts prior to my surgery but either way I still have some time. I'm on day 8 and it seems like we had almost the same experiences but one. I do not hear about people getting thrush. I got it bad and I think that made it worse for me because the whole mouth and throat are on fire. I see the doc tomorrow for a follow up on that. As for my top 5 here you go.

1) Cutting my index finger off with a table saw.
2) Getting a tetanus shot in the wound of my freshly cut off finger.
3) Getting backstabbing acid reflux- the kind that doubles you over. Hoping this is linked and goes away after surgery.
4) Food Poisoning. Sure that was way easier than this is.
5) Anything has got to be better than this!

Steph said...

Haha, thank you Brad for your 5. I hope you feel better soon!!

Ashley said...

Totally thinking the same thing! Nothing I can think of has been worse than this. I am on day 9, well wait, no day 4 because I had a really bad bleed and ended up in the icu for two days with having them re cauterized. 5 things better than tonsillectomy:
1. Getting his by a car going 55 miles breaking my collarbone and having to have a metal plate put in to fix it. 3 months later the pins worked themselves out and had to have the plate removed and the collarbone rebreaking.
2. Falling down a flight of stairs and breaking ankle. Resetting the ankle was awesome...
3. Giving birth three times, 1 normal, 2 c-section and 3 failed vbac and c-section.
4. Stitches after attempting to hurdle a bobwire fense (10 stitches and tetnus shot.)
5. All the other broken bones I have had. This is the worst and feels like there is no light at the end of the tunnel. Haven't ate food besides jello for 9 days.