recovery

Grey Bear walked down the stairs at about 5:20 Thursday morning with the sweetest smile and his happiest "good morning" I've ever heard. We had to leave at 5:30 to be at the hospital at 6 a.m. I'm so glad we took his Leapster because it kept him distracted for a while. 

He was the youngest that morning so we got to go back first. He was pretty gung ho at first until they put the pulse thing on his finger and had us take his Woody p.j.s off to put on a hospital gown. He was not into that. The nurse that was prepping him brought him some Toy Story stickers and that cheered him up. At this point he was starting to understand a little better what was going on. 

We distracted him with talking about colors in Spanish and finding rojo (red) and azul (blue) all around him. He enjoyed that. They gave him a little sleepy medicine and about 5 minutes later he told us his tonsils fell out, rolled away, and we weren't going to be able to find them. He also told us that cowboys, cowgirls, horses, and bears do not have tonsils. Every time a nurse or Dr. Clyne came to talk with us, Grey would ask if they already took his tonsils out and if it was time to go home. Finally by the time they rolled him away from us he was pretty out of it!

We were extremely pleased with Dr. Clyne. He was very personable and really took the time to talk with us right after surgery. I knew I liked him from the one time I met him!He gave us excellent instructions on what to expect and we felt confident after talking with him.

We were called back to Grey and I was not prepared for his state coming out of anesthesia.  That has probably been the worst thing so far! He just cried and cried and cried. I really felt horrible for him. He had no idea what was going on and would NOT have anything to do with having even a sip of juice or any of a popsicle. He had to do one or the other before we could leave and he just wanted to go home. I don't blame him. I finally got him back to sleep and the second time he woke up, he ate half of a popsicle. 

We finally got to leave about 10:15 to come home. We really weren't there for too long but it sure did feel like forever. We set him up on the couch with pillows and popsicles and Woody and movies! He was in heaven except for the fact he was still in a little pain. He finally fell asleep on Thursday about 3:30 and slept until 5:30. He had a few sweet visitors that cheered him up and he wanted to do all of his new crafts that evening!

Here is a picture of him upon coming home. It's fairly pitiful but he wasn't like this for too long.

I have been waiting for things to get bad and they haven't yet. Now we'll see when Matthew's at work and I'm here with Grey and Tuck tomorrow. Grey has actually been wanting to eat lots of things and we've given him as many soft, healthy, and filling things as we can. He's taking just regular tylenol. I'm pretty sure the prescription they gave us kept him awake and possibly made him hyper. The tylenol is working very well and he is really doing fine only taking it about 3 times a day!

I was a little nervous about the recovery due to the fact that he is fairly dramatic when it comes to pain. He has handled it about 5 billion times better than I ever imagined. We have been having to settle him down a bit more than anything. He even "worked" outside with Matthew and my dad this weekend to put our new patio in! 

A big shout out to Barry and Cheryl for keeping little Tuck man from Wednesday until Friday! I will say that Grey was extremely concerned and did not like that Tuck was not here. He had to ride with Matthew to pick him because he missed him that much. It was quite the blessing to be able to focus on Grey in the time he needed us most. Let's just say things got a little more rowdy and loud around here when the Tuck Monster came home! 

I will be planning lots of fun, relaxed things for us to do this week while we're here at home. Overall we are so grateful for a healthy, recovering little Grey Bear and are hoping for even brighter days ahead!