Tubes Day

The tubes are in and all is well!

On Friday morning, we got up super early and headed to the hospital.  Luckily, our little peanut stayed asleep the entire way there and even for a little while in my arms in the waiting room. When she woke up, she was still so sweet and cuddly.

And then she sat up with the most confused look on her face.  haha She had no idea where we were or what we were doing. 

But it didn't take her long to break into her personality.  She started making some of the funniest faces at us... Lately this is one of her favorites..

We aren't sure where that came from. haha

Anyway, after a little wait we headed back to the room to check in.

We got MH all dressed up in her lovely hospital gown and then she played with toys while we waited on the doctor. We were so surprised at how pleasant and happy she was being even though she hadn't eaten since 9-10 the night before.

The anesthesiologist came in to talk with us first.  Unfortunately, MH had a horrible cough and tons of drainage.  She had started to develop it earlier this week, but at our ENT appointment on Wednesday, the doctor said that surprisingly her lungs were clear and that it would be fine to go ahead with the surgery. However, the anesthesiologist had a different mindset.  He was very concerned with putting her under and gave us all kinds of reasons why.  However, after he looked at MH's history, he realized that more than likely we wouldn't have a week where she didn't have either an ear infection or this nasty cold so he decided we needed to go ahead and do it.  He did kind of scare Ben and me though.  He kept telling us over and over about how her risk for complications was much higher and he wanted us to understand that she may have to stay overnight. He even mentioned the ventilator a couple of times, which totally freaked us out. He did tell us we had to cancel the auditory brain wave test though because that would have added 20 minutes to the surgery and he didn't want her to be under that long.  Our hope is that the tubes will make her hearing better and she won't even have to have that other test done. But, if she doesn't pass the follow up hearing test in a few weeks, she will have to be put to sleep again to have it done.  I'm realllly hoping that doesn't happen.

When he listened to her lungs, he said he heard a slight wheeze and ordered us to have a breathing treatment to see if that would help open her up. The respiratory therapist came to do it for us..

She didn't really mind it at first, but after a minute or two she wanted nothing to do with it and kept pulling it away. Fortunately, we got through it enough and when the anesthesiologist came back, he said she sounded much better!

Then we waited for them to come get her to take her back.  At this point, MH started to get a little cranky and we could tell she was starving.  It was already close to 8 at that point.  We did everything we could to keep her entertained... Luckily, they had these fun toys out all in the halls...

Eventually she had had enough and was getting sleepy on her own.  She was so sweet and cuddly and just curled up in my arms holding her little bunny.

And she eventually fell asleep.

Of course right after she fell asleep, the nurse came to get her.  It wasn't too fun handing her over, but it wasn't as bad as I expected.  I didn't even shed a tear!

After she left I headed to walk around the hospital and to the gift shop while Ben hung out in the room.  I was only gone for about 30 minutes and by the time I got back up there, Ben said the doctor had already come in and told him that she was out of surgery and in recovery.  I was only in the room for about 10 minutes and then a nurse wheeled MH up to the door in a huge hospital bed.  I ran to pick her up.  She was so confused and of course was screaming crying.  I could tell she was in pain. I asked the nurse for some motrin and that helped. We only had to hang out there for about 15 minutes and then we were free to go.  By the time we left the hospital, she was grinning ear to ear and was in the best mood the entire ride home.

When we got home, all three of us got in the bed and took a 2 1/2 hour nap.  It felt so good.  When we got up, MH was still in a pretty good mood but a little drowsy.  We spent the afternoon spoiling her rotten... we even had a tea party! haha

The rest of the night went pretty well, although MH still didn't sleep great because her cough got worse and she started wheezing more.  We actually had to take her back to the doctor this morning for another breathing treatment, and her doctor sent us home with some to do every 4 hours.

Overall, MH is doing SO much better.  She is like a totally different baby now! She just grins and grins, is so content, and has so much more energy! We went to dinner tonight with some friends and she sat in the high chair the entire time without making a peep.  When we got home, we put her in a walker at my parents house and she was walking all over the place, back and forth to all of us.  It's amazing how much better she feels!

We appreciate all of the prayers and are so glad that this is behind us! Next, we just hope she passes her hearing test in a few weeks!