Tonsillectomy Recovery Time
After a lifetime of tonsillitis, it was time. I made the appointment. Was I scared? Yes. Was I prepared for tonsillectomy recovery? NO. Can you be? YES!
Planning for and recovering from a tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy procedure, (often referred to as T & A Surgery), can be daunting experiences. The days leading up to your surgery can be frightening. If you haven’t read up yet, you can find information on tonsillectomy methods, risks, costs, adult tonsillectomy, sleep apnea, and numerous tips for tonsillectomy recovery on the other pages of this site. I’ve even added pictures of a post tonsillectomy throat by each day. Study, talk with your doctor and consult with your friends about the decision to undergo tonsillectomy and adenoid surgery. Explore the pages created here to aid in your journey.
If you should decide to have tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy, let us help you through the entire process. Whether due to problems with sleep apnea, chronic tonsillitis and strep throat, tonsil stones, trouble swallowing, or a combination thereof, you can benefit from the experience of others. My own experience taught me that, as patients, we need to advocate for ourselves. Ear, nose, and throat doctors are, by and large, extremely talented individuals. However, very few of them have experienced an adult tonsillectomy, and the subsequent recovery. I have. Many others have too. We share our experiences here at the adult tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy recovery resource center. As you’ll read in the tonsillectomy recovery forum, everyone’s experience is unique. There are many factors that influence the level of pain you experience, as well as the length of time required during recovery. The method, and skill of your surgeon can have an affect, but there are also many things within your control that will reduce pain and recovery time. I’ve tried to include as many helpful tips as possible within the pages of this online resource. Tonsillectomy recovery can be pretty rough, especially if you are unlucky enough to be an adult! It takes longer for an adult to recover from most things. Tonsillectomy is no exception. There are many things you can do to make it go more smoothly. I’ve published numerous tips here on various pages. I encourage you to read up BEFORE you are in the throws of tonsillectomy recovery.
Talk with your doctor, friends, family, and work as you prepare. You are not alone in this. Like you and like me, many others are facing or have faced a tonsillectomy recovery. I created this forum for you. The community of adults or parents of patients will amaze you and warm your heart. I read these comments every day and every day I am humbled by everyone’s story and their compassion for others in the midst of recovery, or the anxiety that often precedes a tonsillectomy. Please join in. Hundreds of other people, perhaps in your same situation, have shared their wisdom, concerns, tips, and questions about tonsillectomy, as well as their tonsillectomy recovery.
-Greg My short bio
The first hefty dose of codeine and antibiotics made me feel almost human. For an entire hour…. The last three hours have been agony again.
I’ve just had a second dose four hours on. I’ve decided to stagger the mess to try and max coverage and just nap in between like Amy. I’ll have codeine, antibiotics and one paracetamol every six hours. Three hours later ill have ibuprofen if I can eat something and one more paracetamol. I’ll be having 4 doses of codeine, 4 of ibuprofen, 4 of antibiotics nd still limit myself to 4g of paracetamol a day.
Woohoo, bleeding now too.
Ben, I’m sorry things have been so rough for you. The secondary infection enough was insult to injury, not even counting the bleeding. I hope the bleeding ended up stopping on its own fast.
Have you found out which works best for you, warm or cold things? I myself found that although cold things like a slushie would help some with numbing, but warm things like warm (not hot!) cream of chicken actually felt better once I was able to make myself eat.
Also, I’m guessing that you live in the UK or somewhere similar? I must have missed where you actually said. I finally figured out that paracetamol was acetaminophen. With how much pain you’ve said you’re in, I’m surprised your ENT didn’t give you any stronger meds than you’re currently on. Because even though yours is separated out, it’s kind of the same I was given, and that was without going back to the doctor. I was prescribed Loritab Elixir, which is hydrocodone 7.5/acetaminophen 500mg.
I must stress, though, although for the most part what you’re taking now doesn’t seem to completely cut it, do not take it more often than the minimum recommended dose. If it’s every 4-6 hours, the *minimum* earliest time you should take it is about 15 minutes before the 4 hour mark. Any sooner and it can start hurting your liver, but most immediately, it can slow down your breathing, sometimes to a dangerous leve. Not trying to make anyone paranoid, but I just wanted to stress again how important it is not to take the meds, namely pain meds, too often. It isn’t guaranteed to happen like that, but it’s best to be safe, not sorry.
I do hope you’re able to get everything under control soon!
Hi Sagal, love your pic heh.
As to toast, it depends. They generally advise to stay away from dairy products during the early parts of healing since they can cause sickness if they interract with your meds.
Therefore unless you ABSOLUTELY need it, I’d forgo butter until something like Day 7 (no butter = dry toast), or whenever you feel that you’d just like to taste something a bit different and can stomach it.
Otherwise litterally just do the toast as normal in the toaster, cut it up into small pieces, CHEW WELL (small bites, but not tiny, whatever you can swallow) and eat it, washing it down with water after each bite. Without the butter it’ll not make you as sick and it will be a bit drier, this will be most important between days 4/5 – 7 I think when they scab up horribly, but the toast also helps to get something in your stomach and soak up the bile if you’re ill.
Basically just the act of swallowing it helps as it keeps your throat muscles working and the dry texture of the toast rubs off the scaps without ripping them fully off, I was advised toast, biscuits, crisps (with SALT on, are they INSANE? XD), by the hospital, I just stuck to toast without butter, then had some with butter about day 7/8, by day 9 I felt like eating something more substantial.
Its all about what you think you can manage really, but the dry toast does certainly help.
Actually, Bob, I’m not trying to call you out or make myself seem like a jerk, but I believe you’re a bit off about the reason for no dairy. It’s not because it’ll interact with your meds, but because dairy causes an increase in mucus production, which just makes life harder overall when recovering.
There really aren’t that many meds that you’d be prescribed post-op for a procedure such as this that has a dairy interaction, and if the medicine does interact with dairy, it doesn’t really cause you to get sick as much as the calcium in the dairy binds to some of the drug, making the dose not as efficient as it should be.
I myself didn’t have much dairy the first part of my recovery, but that was simply because I wouldn’t really eat or drink anything. About 3 days in I tried eating some ice cream and it didn’t cause any sickness, instead there was more mucus to deal with. That plus the fact I already didn’t want to eat or drink anything had me just eating a few bites here and there until things changed some. For how bad I was at following doctor’s orders, my recovery wasn’t too horrible. I don’t know if it was luck or thanks to my doctor, but it makes me feel bad that I didn’t have it as bad as most of you. Not that I can remember, anyways.
Again, though, Bob, I am not trying to come across as a smartas*. I just finished an intense semester of Pharmacology in Nursing school back in Mid December, and from what I remember and saw glancing back over my notes, dairy doesn’t actually interact with near as many meds as most people think. However, I am just having to go over a general range of drugs, since I don’t know if there were any specific ones you were instructed to avoid dairy with, so I can’t look them up. Just going off the assumption that most people came out with something like I did (Amoxicillin and Loritab Elixir), those types of things aren’t affected at all by dairy. By all means, though, if someone was given one of the few drugs that are affected or I missed something looking over my notes and in my book, I do apologize.
Thanks Bob,I took the pic in Paris ( the three musketeers)
I’ve been munching on the dry toast as often as I can,seems to reduce the white stuff on my throat( are those the scabs everyone is talking about?)
I’m on day 6 of my recovery and I can’t wait to get back to my normal self.
I’m in paiiiiin!
Heh no problem Jim, was just forewarning you if you didn’t know. Its all good if you’re ready and prepared for it, should make your healing process slightly less horrible.
I was going to do the day by day thing too but couldn’t even muster enough energy to post till day 5 or something heh, was too busy puking before that.
Otherwise the general gist of them seems to go something like:
“hah, I’m fine!”
“Hmm, starting to hurt a bit”
“OH GOD WHY?”
“Urrrrghhhfhf”
“Feeling tiny bit better, yay!! <3"
XD
Thanks for your reply Bob. I know that it is coming. My surgeon said that the second and third days will be better than the first and that once the scab starts to fall off on the fifth day, I will be in much much much more pain. I just figured that I would do a day by day account of my experience for people to read.