Buh-Bye Adenoids

After five long years of suffering through ear infections and chest infections, there is a light at the end of Delainey's tunnel. 

Nearly every year, she has had 2-3 MAJOR ear infections, the kind that leave blisters on her ear drums and require multiple rounds of antibiotics.  But, the frequency was never enough for doctors to prescribe putting tubes in her ears.  So each fall, winter, and spring as soon as she had a sniffle I'd wait for it to turn into an ear infection and head to the doctor for some more pink medicine.  In the last two years, her infections seemed worse.  The were more painful and often followed by chest infections like the one that had our first visit to Frankfurt last February include a trip to the Frankfurt Children's Hospital with a slight bout of pnuemonia.

Further, her pre-school teachers had her screened for speech delays and recommending getting her hearing tested last spring.  We did both, and the consensus was that she had slight hearing losses during each infection which made her learn sounds incorrectly.  So, at her latest check up here in Germany, I mentioned all of this history to the doctor who said.  "I'm fairly certain it's her adenoids."  Huh?  What are adenoids and why hasn't any other doctor mentioned them before?  I'd heard tubes and speech therapy being tossed around as ideas, but this was the first mention of adenoids.

So off we went to a new ENT, who took one look at her nose and mouth and said "Yep, they are too big.  We should remove them immediately."  Just like that, in perfect English (although not before he fooled me by saying he only spoke German, Spanish and Italian and let me falter for a full 5 minutes in German, only to laugh as I got stuck on the translation of the word "blister" and say "I'm just kidding.  My English is very good.").

So, here we are 2 weeks later, adenoid-less.  Delainey was such a trooper.  Jason took the day off and we both took her to the day clinic where they did the procedure.  She was given what we were told was apple juice in the waiting room, but was some high-test stuff based on how after drinking it, she kept falling over and couldn't walk like she had downed a few shots of vodka.  By the time they called us back to anesthesia, she was pretty loopy.  They were so good with her.  They had given me a special numbing bandage to put on at home to numb the area of the IV port so she didn't feel it at all, especially after having the magic apple juice. 

Here she is with Jason, slightly out of it already, and waiting for the anesthesiologist.

They let her sit on my lap while they gave her her "sandman milk" in the IV.  Within 20 seconds she was out.  The doctor whisked her out of my arms, promising to take good care of her, and said he'd be back to get us in 15-20 minutes. 

Only 10 minutes later, he came out and said she was done!  He took us back to recovery where she was sleeping soundly. They had covered her up with her special blanket and tucked her penguin "Petal" in beside her.  

 She woke up about a half-hour later and was given gummi bears and cookies and apple juice by the nurse.  She liked that they had even given Petal a matching bandage on her wing!

We were able to leave the clinic by lunch time.  She was a bit sleepy the rest of the day, but she was chatty as ever and her appetite wasn't bothered at all!  We had promised her ice cream and she had at least 4 bowls today!  She even ate a normal dinner.  Tomorrow, I expect her to be good as new.  She'll be staying home tomorrow and Friday from school, but I doubt she'll be feeling any worse for the wear.  

I'm hoping getting rid of those germy things makes for an easier winter on us all.  I'm also hopeful she'll begin to hear better and speak more clearly. 

She and I both felt very loved by all the prayers and good wishes we got from friends and family members.  We had messages from  bunches of people in 6 states and 4 countries, all sending their love to my cupcake.  Thank you all for thinking of her today and I'll keep you posted on her recovery and resulting improvements!