Recovery: Days 1-3 (Tues, Wed, & Thurs)

Ok so put together the stress of the anticipation of the surgery, the fact that Chris, Annie, and I have had really really bad colds, and getting over the flu, then watching Mason go through the surgery process, coming home and dealing with Mason's recovery, this has been the hardest thing I have gone through as a parent.  

When we got home from the medical center, things were going pretty well.  Mason ate a popsicle and then rested for a while.  My mother in law, Mary, had taken Annie up to her house that morning so she wasn't there when we got home.  Mary dropped her off at about 12:30 when we learned that Annie had thrown up at her house.  Later that afternoon, because I slept maybe an hour or two the night before the surgery, (because of an awful cold/super scratchy throat + nervous for the surgery), I went upstairs to take a nap.  Mason was sleeping and Annie was just hanging out watching TV so Chris was good with that.  Soon after napping, Chris came up and said he needed help.  Annie had thrown up all over Chris, herself, and the couch and was waiting in the bath to be cleaned.  Mason had just woken up from his rest and was very upset crying on the couch.  So while I bathed Annie, Chris calmed Mason downstairs.

  Mason eating a popsicle right when we got home from the surgery.

Annie and I came downstairs and the next few hours were basically just taking care of Mason who would cry now and then but was still pretty out of it from the meds, trying to get him to drink which was kind of impossible but luckily he liked the popsicles, and taking care of Annie who still had the flu and a bad cough/cold.  Pretty bad timing for us to all have bad colds, huh?  Thank goodness Chris had the day off.  Chris' sister, Hillary was nice and stopped by with some extra popsicles and jello for us.  I ran to the grocery store a little before 9:00 PM to get some Panda Express to eat.  We hadn't eaten much that day and it sounded really good.  You could call it a pregnancy craving.  

Resting on daddy after getting ear drops the first evening after surgery.

That night Chris slept downstairs with Mason.  Annie went to bed at 8:30 PM and the rest of us went to bed at 10:00 PM.  At 11:30 PM, Chris woke up Mason to take his next dose of pain medicine.  We were told by others to not skip a dose, even during the middle of the night, so we thought that's what we should do.  Big mistake.  The nurse had mentioned that we don't need to do that and that it's ok to let him sleep and from then on we took her advice and we would let him sleep at night and only give medicine if he wakes up needing it.  I went down to help Chris and it took over an hour to get him to take his medicine.  At 4:00 AM, Mason was throwing up.  The medicine makes you nauseous with out food and Mason hadn't eaten anything.  So that was awful.  We decided to switch to regular children's Tylenol to avoid the nausea.  Again, it took about an hour for him to finally take it.  He was just in SO much pain and SO tired.  

Day 2 (Wednesday) was still very hard.  Luckily Chris had that day off as well.  I don't know how I'd do it alone.  He and Chris got up at 10:00 AM.  Annie was up at 7:30 AM so her and I hung out on my bed upstairs watching movies and playing games so they could sleep.  He woke up with a fever of 100.8 and it's not supposed to get over 101.  That worried me.  He went a long time with out meds so once we got Tylenol in him it really helped.  We got him to eat a popsicle in the morning.  Taking pain meds was taking 20 minutes to an hour every time to get him to take it.  Getting him to eat/drink/take medicine has become a nightmare.   

My parents stopped by around noon.  That was fun for the kids to see them and they were excited because they brought some special gifts from their trip to Hawaii.  Mason got an awesome Hawaiian sea life activity book that he spent a lot of time with later that day.  He also got a sea turtle stuffed animal which he didn't let go of for the rest of the day.  Annie got a cute pink hat and 2 pretty shell necklaces.  Chris and I got some coconut syrup that I'm excited to try.  The meds started wearing off while they were there and he started feeling yucky again.  But it was nice to have them visit for a bit.

  

The day continued to be up and down.  He felt good about a half hour after taking medicine and then about 2 1/2 hours after taking it, he'd take a down turn and we'd just have to get through the time until we could give him more medicine.  Annie seemed to be feeling better.  Still a cold but no more throw up, however she did complain about her tummy hurting a few times.  That afternoon we had some good moments.  Mason had another popsicle, some tips of juice and even had some top ramen.  That night my sister was so awesome and brought us dinner which was very much appreciated.  My cold was finally starting to go away, thank goodness.  Mason wanted some chocolate pudding and was really excited about it but after one bite, he cried and said it tasted yucky.  :(

Wednesday night (night #2) was rough again.  Chris slept with Mason again and even though we gave him Tylenol at 10:00 PM, he cried most of the night.  At about 4:00 AM he was nauseous and threw up.  That's when I came down and took over while Chris went to bed upstairs.  We couldn't get him to take any medicine at that time so he slept the rest of the night without it.  He tossed and turned the rest of the night but didn't actually start crying till we had to wake up at 7:30.  So I gave him medicine and he started doing better.  

Thursday:  Chris had to go to work.  :(  Mason was hungry and wanted some bread.  The first bite he spit out and cried because it hurt so much to try to swallow it.  That was really sad because I could tell how frustrated he was.  Chris got to come home for a few hours which was SO nice.  Tag teaming with both kids sure helps more than I can say.  Chris went back to work and I put Annie down for a nap.  We have a fridge/freezer full of ice cream, popsicles, yogurt, puddings, jello, and Mason wants none of it.  He wants regular food that hurts too much to eat.  I tried scooping out the beans from a bean burrito.  He ate a couple bites but the beans turned out to be too hard for him to eat.  Poor guy.  More tears of frustration for him.  After lots more tears, I was finally able to convince Mason to eat some "chicken with stars" soup.  He loved it.  Hallelujah!  He also started holding a water bottle and has been sipping all day.  My dehydration worries are thankfully gone.  

Mason fell asleep for about an hour later this afternoon.  He woke up very upset.  He seemed kind of confused.  This was weird-when he woke up he started scratching the couch as hard as he could with a very angry face and then started scratching at his arm.  Freaked me out a little.  It took a while to get him to take his medicine.  He slept through when he should have had the dose so I know he was in a lot of pain.  It took him a while to feel better from waking up and for the medicine to settle in.  Eating has been an issue since eating his soup earlier.  We can't get him to eat anything.  He says he is starving but everything either hurts or has a yucky taste according to him.  He keeps saying his stomach hurts and says it's getting worse.  We think it's because he's so hungry.  But we can't get the little guy to eat.  Nothing we have sounds good to him.  My mom was SO SO nice and brought over some yummy Hawaiian pizza with salad, soda and brownies.  Mason smelled the pizza and really wanted some.  Chris tried blending in up in a blender for him but that was just gross.  We tried cutting the crust off and giving him teeny tiny bites but after one he said it wasn't going to work.  More and more tears of frustration.  Chris had a great idea to make mashed potatoes and Mason enjoyed helping him make them.  This was so awful because he was so excited to eat them and after one bite, he started crying because he said they tasted super yucky.  Chris and I both tried the potatoes and they were delicious.  We're wondering if this yucky taste in his mouth is normal or not.  I'm waiting to hear back from the doc about it.  Poor Mason went to bed very sad and absolutely starving with a bad stomach ache.  We'll see how he is in the morning.