Tonsillectomy Recovery Day by Day
Day One -The Honeymoon
A collection of various experiences of adult tonsillectomy patients on their first day of recovery
From thousands of post comments to the tonsillectomy recovery forum, I have assembled a sampling of various accounts and impressions of tonsillectomy recovery for each day. We shall start with tonsillectomy day 1. These comments are taken from tonsillectomy patients who were kind enough to share their experiences to help others as they navigate the bumpy road of tonsillectomy recovery.
Check out our new tonsillectomy recovery video- Caution: Not always pretty
Please feel free to add your own experience with tonsillectomy day 1.
-Greg Tooke My short bio
Tonsillectomy Day 1: This is not too bad. Pussies on the forum!
Tonsillectomy Day 1:(surgery day): Thank God I woke up! Whoa – drugs.
Tonsillectomy Day 1: I had a freezie when I got home and lots of water. I watched some television and took the amoxicillin that I was prescribed to prevent infection. I decided to try to swallow the capsules because they looked small enough…BIG MISTAKE! After the first one, it felt like it was stuck in my throat, but I tried to take the second one…even bigger mistake. So I start getting anxious because I feel like the pills are stuck in my throat and not going down – even with loads of water. It turns out they did go down, but because my throat was swollen, they felt like they were just sitting there. I was prescribed liquid codeine and told to buy liquid Tylenol. However, the only liquid Tylenol my mom could find was for children, so instead, she decided to buy Tylenol caplets that melt in your mouth – which turned out to be for children as well. The first night I only took Tylenol because I wasn’t in that much pain at first. Needless to say, I was in pain during the night and slept maybe 1-2 hours in total.
Tonsillectomy Day 1: i had the surgery at 3:20 pm ( they were over an hour behind schedule).I woke up feeling like crap and the nurse had to give me lots of morphine through the IV drip. I spent the night in a hospital and it was the worst night ever. My throat was in pain all night even though they gave me the liquid codeine. There was only 2 of us in the “day surgery” ward ( where they keep the overnight patients) but the other lady was snoring all through the night! which made things even worse haha. I only got about 4 hours of on and off sleep. My mom picked me up at 6am and i went home and slept for a bit.
Tonsillectomy Day 1 : My surgery was at 9:30am ET this morning and I was home by 1:30pm which included a 20 minute drive home. I had a tonsillectomy and he just trimmed a little of my extremely long uvula. I woke right up from the surgery with no problems at all. The pain I had was a 1or 2 on a scale of 10. hardly any pain after the surgery and I was able to eat apple sauce, ice and water immediately after waking. No side effects from the surgery med’s. They did give me some anti-nausea drugs. I still feel like I have just a mild sore throat.
Tonsillectomy Day 1 : Days 1&2 were definitely the honeymoon phase. All was grand in tonsil land
Tonsillectomy Day 1 : I just had it done this morning, massively consming water, pain meds every 4 hours, popsicles, little apple sauce and trying to maintain a healthy probiotic regimine. Its weird because it feels like a bad case of strep throat….so far. But I do feel instant relief with my breathing.
Tonsillectomy Day 1 : Well i just got home from surgery. I had my tonsils removed, deviated septum fixed, uvula removed and turbinates (nasal wall tissue) reduced. I have no recall of surgery, only remember maybe a minute of being in the operating room, then waking up in the recovery center.
Pain is not what i expected it to be. I think i have worse pain from strep throatTonsillectomy Day 1 : Post op eight hours……everything feels fine but I’m scared for the horrible days ahead. Sandra you developed ear pain at 3rd day? That makes me nervous
Tonsillectomy Day 1 : (Day of surgery) I actually felt pretty darn good, was able to eat a little, but I wish someone would have told me that I needed to re-learn how to swallow. VERY SMALL sips is the key.
Tonsillectomy Day 1 : Slept only about 2 hours due to still being very restless and fidgety from the effects of the anesthesia. Stayed on a steady dose every 4 hours of pain med’s which seemed to edge my pain. Still in a great deal of pain all day. I ate more Popsicle and jello and applesauce and was able to eat some luke warm soup which tasted great and drank 2 ensure shakes and a yogurt shake. The anesthesia effects seemed to finally wear off sometime in the early evening making me a bit more comfortable. Still in a good deal of pain. My entire mouth now hurts along with the throat and I am having jaw pain and slight ear pain and tongue pain from the clamps they used during the surgery.
Had my tonsils and uvula removed at noon 12/30/13 was awake from surgery by 1:10pm. Throat was very dry and scratchy, post op I was given fentanyl at the hospital and discharged at 3:30. I took a Percocet when I got home I was asleep like a baby for a few hours, slept with a cool air humifier and when I woke up my throat wasn’t that dry. Day one not bad Jello and Popsicles and Ice Water, my advice take pain meds on a schedule I waited on my 2nd Percocet and it took an hour to kick in while I was in pain. Just cut it off before it starts. I got pill pain pills instead of liquid to prevent nausea. I will post daily so anyone can follow me, I read so many responded before surgery I can’t believe how helpful this forum was and want to repay by documenting my case.
I had my tonsils taken out on Friday, December 20, 2013. My surgery was scheduled for 8:30 am and ended up just a little behind schedule. I hadn’t actually met my surgeon until just before the procedure…I had a consultation with his NP and booked the surgery right away. This is something I have been wanting to do for years and thanks to having my gallbladder taken out this summer I was close to my out-of-pocket maximum so insurance would cover almost all of it now.
After reading through a lot of the info on this site, I made sure to ask the surgeon about pain meds. I really did not want to end up running out on Christmas and not being able to get in touch with him or trying to find an open pharmacy for a refill. He prescribed me plenty of Hyrdocodone/Acetaminophen to last me through about 10 days. I also asked for a script for Zofran just in case after reading about so many people struggling with nausea, but I haven’t felt the least bit nauseated so I haven’t picked it up.
When I talked to the anesthesiologist before surgery, I told him I was really scared about waking up in pain. When I had my gallbladder removed over the summer, they pulled back the pain meds then woke me up “so they could assess my pain level.” Waking up in excruciating pain was not fun! This anesthesiologist swore he would not let me wake up in pain, and I will forever be grateful that he was right!
My husband took me home and I started on a 4 hour regimen of eating a little something (I had spent the prior 2 days filling my fridge with homemade applesauce, smoothies, popsicles, soup, chicken and beef stock, sorbet, etc.) and taking the hydrocodone and benadryl. My tonsillitis always flared up when allergies hit and the last few days had been bad. I figured if I stayed on top of taking Benadryl, not only would it help me sleep but it couldn’t hurt to dry up the post-nasal drip that always caused so many problems.
I am sleeping on a wedge shaped pillow that keeps me mostly upright. I hate sleeping on my back but I can actually sleep on my side with this thing. If I lay on my back, I start snoring because of my huge uvula and wake myself up 🙁
I’m 15 years old and I had my tonsillectomy on December 16th, 2013 at 7:30 am. When I woke up in the recovery room at the hospital, the pain wasn’t bad, I was just pretty uncomfortable. I drank about five 8oz cups of water before I went home- I was very thirsty! It took some effort to swallow the water, but it wasn’t too bad. I had several popsicles in the hospital as well, and they all went down relatively easily.
When I got home, I sat up in bed and had some more popsicles and water, took my meds at the correct times (very important!!), and went to bed. I woke up 2 hours later, drank some water, and went back to bed. My mom got me up to take my meds, and after another nap, I stayed up, watched a couple movies, and had some soft noodles (not the easiest to get down, I only had a little before I stopped and went back to popsicles/liquids).
I iced my neck a bit, but it was a hassle to sleep comfortably with them, so I set them aside and went to bed. But if you need the ice, definitely do it.
I had a pretty good night’s rest, which I’m very thankful for.
Good luck everyone 🙂
I’m 32 and had a intracapsular or partial tonsillectomy yesterday afternoon. So far the pain isn’t too bad at all and I’ve been drinking a lot of water and taking my meds. The recovery is supposed to be a bit better with a partial. Anyone been through it hat can tell me what to expect the next week?
33 year old here. Had my tonsils out 11/27/13, the day before Thanksgiving. After nearly 10 years of recurrent tonsillitis, it was time, although I did put off surgery for over a year after reading some of the stories on this forum and elsewhere. My first 24 hours post-surgery were not too bad. I woke up in recovery in pain (5 on 10-scale), but a quick dose of morphine knocked that down pretty quickly. After waking up, I drank some Gatorade and was sent home. Doctor prescribed liquid hydrocodone and liquid amoxicillan, which I am taking religiously, as instructed. My first night was a little rough–very little sleep. My meds wore off about an hour before I could take them again, and that was quite uncomfortable. Finally slept about an hour and a half and woke up hurting pretty bad. Another dose of the hydro took care of that. Checked out my throat in the mirror…just not the type to not be curious. It was as expected thanks to the photos I have seen here. I’m tolerating water and Gatorade quite well, so I have been drinking lots on advice of the nurses and posters here. I feel prepared for what lies ahead based on what I have read here, but it does concern me that it will get (possibly much) worse before getting better. One day at a time…