Tianna's surgery went smoothly on monday! We'd had some concern about whether it was a go when she was diagnosed with an ear infection the previous week and developed a cough on that saturday/sunday. But her ENT and plastic surgeon both said that her ears wouldn't be a problem-- the ENT could just clean out and culture whatever might be in there. So, she has new PE tubes in her ears (hopefully her hearing will improve again-- she had quite a bit of hearing loss to low tones in one of her ears) and her pharyngeal flap proceeded without a hitch. I got to go into the OR with Tianna and help ease her when they gave her the anesthesia. Once she was out, I went to the waiting room to wait it out while Carl went for a walk. I could sense more peace this time than on previous surgeries-- I think partly due to having been through this before and partly due to the prayers of others on our behalf! Anyway, when the recovery room paged us, we were able to be in there to sooth and console her as she was arousing and system was stabilizing again post surgery. Once she seemed adequately stabilized we moved to the inpatient unit. Tianna had to be on oxygen (blow-by oxygen, no mask) for several hours after surgery, but during the course of the night they switched the air to room air, which she did just fine with. She started arousing some later in the afternoon, when she noticed that Dragon Tales was on TV and was just awake enough to express interest in that show! By Tuesday morning she was more herself-- singing, wanting to go for walks and to assert what movies she wanted to see (and what she DIDN'T want to see!).
Tianna came home Tuesday afternoon. She's on an all liquid diet for 2 weeks and then 2 weeks of soft mechanicals after that. She has been having a bit of a hard time with this- she snuck a french fry yesterday and nearly choked on it so we're having to keep an eye out. For the most part she's been good about not rubbing the spot where she had her surgery (granted, being in the back of her throat/mouth it would be hard to get at). The real challenge has been getting her to get adequate fluid and nutrition as she has little interest in ingesting much. I tried making vanilla ice cream into chocolate ice cream (putting instant breakfast into it for more vitamins and protein) in the blender and boy was she mad about that! Hopefully this will pass and she'll be willing to enjoy these tasty treats we're trying to give her!
Kjersten and Aunt Janel both say that they understand Tianna better. I can't tell a particularly huge difference, but that may be due to her having more congestion right now and also due to the fact that i understood quite a bit of what she said prior to the surgery as well. I'm sure we'll be witnessing changes more over the long term than the short term.
Overall we're doing well- thankful to have this surgery behind us and just trying to get enough rest and all that. Nathaniel and Kjersten are both a bit needy for mommy time right now, but that's to be expected.
Well, I better get to bed so this is all i will write at the moment.