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
If you are like most people, it’s going to get much worse. Day 2 and 3 weren’t too bad for me, even ate some crispy fried chicken without too much problem. I began to cut down on the dose of Oxycodone and then the evening of Day 5 was absolutely hell on earth for me. Couldn’t eat a thing. My throat felt like someone was scraping a piece of glass against it and the back of my tongue on the sides felt like someone had taken a sledgehammer to it. I think I made a mistake by cutting back on the meds during the day because the evenings it caught up with me. Pure hell. I’m going back to taking the meds during the day tomorrow, altho I’m told on day 8 things should begin to turn around. My advice to anyone having this operation is to not get complacent. I seem to be textbook, day 5 thru 7 is just terrible. Do not cut back on the meds. I have a few stiff drinks at night, then a few meds before I go to sleep and that seems to knock me out until about 5:00 a.m. My mistake is I quit taking the meds during the day. Don’t do that. Just keep taking them. Do what you have to do to get through it. Best of luck to you.
Hi All,
Had my tonsillectomy yesterday and so far so good. Haven’t had any nausea or sickness at all yet, also been able to have a sandwich for lunch and eggs for breakfast. The surgeon gave panadeine forte, antibiotics and an anti-inflammatory to have for the next 2 weeks, spent a night in hospital on a morphine based tablet but they didn’t prescribe it for home unfortunately :(. He said some people get a lot worse but others don’t have too much of a problem. As someone who has suffered from tonsillitis almost 10 times a year, so far the pain isn’t that bad!
Any tips for the rest of the week would be great but heres hoping it doesn’t get too bad!
James
Hey, James! I’m glad it’s gone smoothly so far, and I hope it continues to do so! It probably will get some worse, but you’re off to a great start. I could barely force myself to eat about 2-3 cans of soup in 3 days time right after mine.
If you look back a little ways you’ll see a ton of good tips. I know there’s been a ton posted since I had mine out on the 3rd. The biggest ones are:
Force fluids. This helps keep your scabs from drying out and helps with the pain, plus it helps keep your ability to swallow good and going. Though you seem to be fine on that front with eating already.
Most people recommend a humidifier to use either 24/7, or at least while you’re asleep. This also helps keep your throat moist while you’re asleep.
Don’t be afraid to take your pain meds, especially the first 5-7 days. Don’t even think about getting addicted to them, because if you only use them for this recovery period, it’s not long enough for an addiction to really start. Plus it’s easier to just keep the meds in your system than to play pain catch up. But do not take them more often than prescribed (if you want to hear the reason, just find teh post I made just a little while ago explaining why).
If around the end of the week or so you start having a problem with your mouth (note mouth, not throat) feeling sore and raw, look to see if your mouth and tongue is white. If so, call your ENT and let them know so you can get some meds for it. It’s just thrush, a type of yeast infection that can take place in your mouth from antibiotics. It’s no big deal and within about 2-3 days on the meds you’ll feel better.
And most importantly, take it easy. Adults don’t bounce back as fast as kids, since it’s harder on the body. Plan for a minimum of one week downtime, maybe even stretching to two.
And if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to post them. Everyone on here has either gone through it, are currently in recovery, or are getting ready to join the crew, and we know what you’re going through. 🙂
Um, Amber, yes I agree some need to take the opiates, talked to a patient while waiting for my surgery– he got hooked and the doctor was working with him. Opiates are bad , and some cannot tolerate them. Never say, oh they are ok, as they cause many side effects with the chance of addiction. Good luck everyone, and yes as I said , read back for tips.
I don’t think the toast scratching the scabs off is more painful than anything else so don’t worry about it. 🙂 (Unsure about crisps though with the salt content, but warm salt water was definitely fine and did help soothe it and remove some of the horrible taste / gooeyness from my mouth in a morning).
I was concerned at first when they told me to eat it cause it did sound like the last thing I’d want to do, but it DOES help, (though I told them bugger off (not litterally) when they tried to feed it me the morning after my op). Easy to stomach and quick to digest if you’re having nausea trouble too, when I was throwing up I was paranoid about losing the single slice of toast I’d been able to eat all day, but fortunately when I did it was just bile so I’d managed to digest it already.
I’m not exactly sure why scratching them off is important, I’m guessing it’s removing the dead skin and so on, it’s a tad stingy after but I believe it did really help. Someone with medical knowledge may be able to comment a bit better, but it’s probably to stop them building up. I think it’s also what produces the horrible taste in your mouth too.
Also Amber haha yes I agree, I was wondering what the heck all these wierd medicine names that people were coming out with were, till I realised they were American brands. I’m not sure about a fever but I do know my stomach was allover the place and litterally just getting up to go to the toilet made me puke (due to my uvula hanging into my gag reflex constantly).
Fortunately now though I’m onto day 13 of recovery (a week since my op itself, though that was the late afternoon) and I’m feeling pretty good now. Only slight pain when I swallow, ears and everything else seem fine. Still problematic and very painful when I yawn though and I can’t open my mouth too wide or it feels like it’s tearing inside my throat. I also think I’ve lost some throat height as my uvula looks to be normal size now, but I can still feel it in my throat and on my tongue. 🙁 (just not right down to my gag reflex at least thank god). But especially in comparison to how I was, I feel great otherwise. I still have a bit of a wierd taste in my mouth sometimes though, and the worst thing that’s broke my heart is that chocolate tastes horrible now! I hope that’s only temporary. 🙁
Still taking it easy until I’m back to work next Monday, but I think I’ll be ok, my recovery was horrible in the first week, but picked up fast afterwards.
Amy, yeah I’d be concerned about the leg swelling too, sounds strange. Hope the doc doesn’t find anything too wrong, I guess it could be a reaction to the meds but I have no idea to be honest, I do know there were worries of this in the actual operating theatre though, but didn’t think it would be a problem afterwards. Ben, hope your infection clears up soon too, can’t be good putting up with that as well, I’m guessing you’ll experience some bleeding due to it, hope it clears up fast if so. Gargle with some ice water if so, suck ice at night before sleeping etc, get straight to the A&E if the blood gushes or doesn’t stop. Otherwise hang in there everyone!
I’m a little puzzled about the dry toast scratching the scabs off. That sounds so painful, as if this isn’t painful enough. I did try a bit of light gargling and spit up some white stuff so I’ll keep trying that. This is day 7 for me. I was worried about getting hooked on the oxycondone so I stopped taking it during the day, only to be rewarded with the pain coming back in the evenings like a bat out of hell. Complete agony. My suggestion now to anyone who is having this operation, is when you get to the really bad days (mine started at 5), don’t worry about how many drugs you take. Do what you have to do to get through it. Tomorrow is day 8 and it’s supposed to get better. We’ll see.
Just ending my 5th day after surgery. Pain has definitely increased, I had chicken soup this morning which was basically chicken broth with a few noodles. Once I finished that my throat started stinging like you wouldn’t believe. I stuck to water thinking the salt content may have been higher but I decided to get a flashlight and take a look at my throat. A lot of the white filmy stuff had dissipated revealing actual dark brown scabs beneath, so I figured this was the cause for the stinging. (the white film later partially replaced itself, hopefully all this is normal).
What’s odd about all this is my throat hurting wasn’t the worst of my pain today. Before when I swallowed, I’d get pain shooting pain up into my ears, this greatly intensified today. Another issue is I think I may have strained the back of my neck somehow because it really hurts, giving a bolt of pain followed by weakness when I tilt my head back to empty a cup. As if all this wasn’t enough I developed probably THE worst headache I’ve ever had, that thrummed when not moving and pulsated to dangerous level when moving around. This is the kind of headache that blocks out all other thought, makes it hard to see and disorients what you do see, and ultimately makes you wish you didn’t exist. It of course has subsided on it’s own, though it’s not gone completely.
Another complication I’ve been having since the surgery is swelling in my lower legs. The swelling has gotten so much worse since the middle of the night last night. It got so bad that it started limiting the movement of my feet. I don’t have any pain with this, just the discomfort of feeling like some injected water balloons around my ankles and calves, and it’s in both legs. I was wearing my boyfriends socks which are huge on me and they were still leaving indents around the ankle band!
So with all that I decided to call my doctor to make sure it was all ok. He thought the headache was normal and probably either a delayed reaction to the anesthesia or a hell of a tension headache, which I thought with other areas of pain and discomfort that this was entirely possible. He did not seem ok with swelling in my lower legs and seemed really concerned. He didn’t seem to think it was a blood clot because it was equally in both legs and there was no pain, but he also said he generally didn’t run into this problem with patients after a T&A. Had it been a joint replacement maybe… So I have to go back in and seem him on Thursday so he can look at me overall and determine what if anything is wrong and to see if anything in the current plan of meds etc needs to change.
That said my appetite is gaining momentum and even though it takes me a while to eat anything, I’m able to tolerate more and more. I’ve graduated to soups with small amounts of noodles and today my boyfriend made chicken and stuffing in the slow cooker. The idea was for me to have just the stuffing since it was nice and smooshy, easy to swallow, but the chicken was too enticing as it was moist and tender and fell apart so well. So I took some of the chicken with the intent of just nibbling on it just to get the flavor, but I found that it chewed up nice and soft and it was really easy to swallow, no issues. So score! I found an actual real dish that I can eat….a far cry from baby food and pudding. 🙂
It really is a good thing you called your doctor about what’s going on, especially with your legs swelling like they are. Have you been able to walk around much the last week? Since it sounds like the swelling didn’t start until you’re surgery, there is a chance that it might be a clot, and if he suspects it is after you see him Thursday, you can bet on having an ultrasound done. Although they’re scary when you think about them, blood clots aren’t necessarily as dangerous as first comes to mind. Believe me, I just had a reteaching course on them after finding out 2 weeks ago my brother has one from his hip all the way down to his ankle.
Unless your doctor says otherwise, it probably wouldn’t hurt to keep your legs elevated when sitting/laying down, and possibly try alternating warm and cold compresses to see if that helps with the swelling.
As for the white stuff in your throat disappearing and then coming back up over the dark brown, that’s not unusual. The dark brown was the tissue underneath growing. When the white disappeared, it just means something happened to knock off the scab, whether it food or whatever, and the white coming back was just the scab reforming. It’s no big deal; mine came off 2-3 times when I got sick around days 12-14.
I’m glad you’re able to eat normally, though! That’s always a huge plus!
Hi Amber Dawn, thanks for the response! Yeah I was concerned about the swelling too. I actually did have some swelling at various time through the last several years, but nothing this bad…ever. It was only small amounts and usually when it was summer, on my period, and relying too much on fast food… none of which is the case this time and since it’s more swelling than I’m used to, I was concerned. We’ll see what the doctor says, but he did seem puzzled and concerned by it. I’m sure part of the problem is I’m forced to sleep sitting up since my uvula is so swollen it acts as a flap that cuts off my airway when lying down. So during the times I’m not asleep I’ve taken to sitting reclined on the floor with my feet propped up. I can try the alternating compresses too, thanks for the tip!
So you’re saying the white stuff is the scab, then why is the brown stuff crusty? Like I can feel it scratching against my tongue when the white stuff isn’t there and every once in a while I’ll cough some of it up and it’s hard. I wouldn’t think new tissue would be hard and crusty…?
Why did you get sick around day 12-14, was it because of the white stuff or the medication?
I’m not too sure then about the brown stuff. To be honest, I didn’t look at my throat for about a week after my surgery because I couldn’t open my mouth much at all because it hurt too much. Therefore I didn’t see what it looked like until farther in the healing process.
As for the sick, that was pretty much due to not really eating for a week and a half then suddenly going back to eating. That plus I would accidentally fall to sleep not long after eating, so between those two things, my system just couldn’t handle it so I ended up getting sick.