Tonsillectomy Recovery Day by Day
Day 5
A collection of various experiences of adult tonsillectomy patients on their fifth 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. Below I share comments about tonsillectomy day 5. 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.
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Please feel free to add your own experience with tonsillectomy day 5.
-Greg Tooke My short bio
- Tonsillectomy Day 5 : Can I take the pain killers every two hours?
- Oh God. PAIN. …And why am I constipated??
- So, the pain is a little better today. I took Tylenol at 2:00am and didn’t need it again until 12:00pm – I’d consider that progress! The coughing is still present. I’m trying to avoid it, but it’s harder than you think. There isn’t much to say about today. I’m talking a little more, but don’t want to strain my voice even more, so I’m still writing a lot down. I had soup again today and canned peaches are awesome – even though I had to puree them. All in all, the throat is feeling okay; the ears – still painful.
- Day 5 and so far it has been pretty tolerable
- Day 5: so today i woke up feeling pretty good, my throat was a little tender but once i took the meds the pain was almost gone and i didn’t need to have any ice or Popsicles. i ate some noodles and pesto sauce. drank water and coca-cola and had some ice cream. I ate potato smileys for dinner. they went down pretty well although thier was a little pain but once i drank some pop it went away. The scabs fell off today as well and i didn’t feel it at all just the occasional tickle and i could feel them hanging down but then i looked in the mirror and they were just gone, so i’m assuming that i just swallowed them :s ( kinda gross)
- Day 5 and still not getting better. When does it start getting better?! Im nauseous all the time because I have no food in my stomach but i have to take my pain meds because the pain is incredible! I started out weighing apprx 108lbs and weighed myself today and I weigh 101lbs. I hope I dont lose much more. This is depressing
- Day 5 for me and definitely the worst day yet…woke up so nauseated and was so nervous about throwing up and ripping a scab off..got a hold of my doctor who ordered me some anti Nausea med’s
- Day 5. I’m very thankful that I’ve had a great recovery so far. No major pain other than a sore throat. Today I substituted a dose of the Hydrocodone for a dose of ibuprofen and am doing well. I’ve been eating since the very first day (applesauce, grits, milkshake)
- Day 5 and I had my best night sleep yet last night. Had to stop by Drs office yesterday. My tongue felt swollen and getting a lot of itching with the Roxicet. He said I was doing fine. Still taking Benadryl at night though. I find if I talk I pay for it later on so trying to talk as little as possible. Went to my office for an hour to do payroll but had to leave as I wanted to talk. Still eating good and no stomach issues at all. Hoping to get out of the house tomorrow even just to take a short walk.
- Throat is a little more tender today, and ears hurt when i swallow now. From what i have read/heard it is just the progression of the healing.
- Day 5-7–nothing exciting to tell, tried to eat a few more interesting things, but throat hurt too much since I wasn’t taking pain meds. Soft boiled eggs were my friend. Getting bored being home by myself all day so I went shopping for an hour and had to come home and take a nap!
- day 5 and so far it has been pretty tolerable. First day I had only soft food and lots of coke and water but from day 2 I ate normally. Doctor prescribed Voltaren 100mg suppositories which works like a charm for 8 hours, the 4 hours before the next dose however is excrutiating to say the least.
- Day 5- horrible morning, good during day.
- Recovery Day 5 (post-op day 6):This day was pretty much a blur. More pain and not a lot of food or water. Was in too much agony to do much of anything. Taking the liquid Tylenol and chasing it with a teaspoon of lortab each dose time.
- Tonsillectomy Day 5 : Day 5: I am still trying to just get through the day. I sleep much better at night and have noticed a major difference in how I feel; I have more energy and I feel rested after sleeping. I cried today over mashed potatoes and small curd cottage cheese. I am not a happy camper.
>> Next – Recovery Day 6 >>
At day 5 I woke up with a sore throat and the pain scale was 5/10. I expected it because same thing happened during day 4. I drunk a pain killer, covered my ears with the bed blanket and the pain gradually stopped within 10 minutes. I slept again. When I woke up I felt really good, like the pain was on a scale 2/10. I ate some soft boiled chicken and cold mashed potatoes. Not warm because it increases the chances to bleed. It really boosted my energy because I was exhausted from the lack of solid food the past days.
All was okay but when I went to bed at night I noticed that some of my scabs had started to fell so I decided to stay awake for a few hours and see if anything is going to happen. Like I had guessed it, after a few hours a felt a strange taste in my mouth and looked at the mirror to see if I was bleeding. There was a very dark brown blood clot which I suspect it was from a stitch I had. I got scared because I had heard that blood clots are a very serious thing to deal with after this surgery. I drunk lots of icy water, ate ice cubes and the weird thing is that there was zero bleeding. Just the dark brown blood there. I decided to sleep it off and see what happens the next day. Gladly, at day 6 I woke up and the whole blood was gone and there was no indication that I had bled the last night nor which was the spot the blood had come from. I think it was probably old blood that was accumulated to the stitch and when it started to dissolve, it came out.
This has been one of the worst days so far. The first couple days weren’t too bad and I got cocky and thought that maybe I was one of the lucky ones who wasn’t going to suffer that much but I must have jinxed myself because OMFG THIS IS BAD! At the beginning I found that I didn’t have much trouble speaking but today I found it was extremely too painful to say a word. I’m actually having to spit out my salvia because I’m finding it too painful to swallow.
Today, whenever I move or eat, I find that I have this awful burning sensation in my ear drums and I find it hard not to cry but then crying just makes it even more painful.
Also, is anyone having issues with their tongues? Half of my tongue has been numb and sore since the surgery, even sticking my tongue out to lick my ice lolly is incredibly painful and the taste in my mouth honestly makes me want to gag.
Another thing. Constipation. I have never been constipated in my life but I have spend over 30 painful minutes on the toilet most days to get 1 little nugget out. I don’t know what to do! My bowels just aren’t working!
I wish I could go back and tell myself how painful this recovery was going to be. I have had lots of awful tonsillitis, but none of those can equal this constant pain that not even painkillers can touch. I need something stronger but the doctor refuses to give me anything because I can’t go and see him there at the doctors by myself at the moment.
Hello everyone! I figured I would post some words of encouragement for others!
I am 21 years old and currently on day 8 of my recovery (this is including my surgery day, I was out of the hospital by 12 in the afternoon).
I was a little nervous going into the hospital, because this was my first surgery other than my wisdom teeth, and those don’t really count. Everyone at the hospital was WONDERFUL, so if you’re reading this before your surgery try not to worry because it is not as bad as your mind convinces you it will be! I barely remember my time in the hospital. All I remember is being checked in and getting my IV, sitting and chatting with my mother and my fiancé before they took me in. My doctor and anesthesiologist came in and talked to me. They finally wheeled me back into the OR, gave me some drugs to “relax” me and that is basically all I remember.
I woke up in a decent amount of pain, nothing terrible because I was so messed up from the drugs they gave me. I just remember feeling terribly nauseous. The other thing I remember, VERY CLEARLY, is my newfound inability to swallow. It was the most disturbing thing of waking up, honestly. I didn’t so much care at that point, because like I said, I was on some heavy drugs. I remember wondering if this is how my throat was going to feel forever. It felt like I had something just caught in there. It was also almost impossible to talk and very very uncomfortable to do so. My nurse brought me a popsicle and ended up giving me some medicine for my nausea and then sprung me! They wheeled me out to the car and I took a nap on my fiancé while my mother drove us home.
Fast forward to being home, I get into bed and ended up throwing up due to the heavy medication I was on. After that I felt LOADS better. I drank some water and put an ice pack on my neck and drifted off. That’s all I remember from day 1, that and my wonderful fiancé bringing me lots of gifts to cheer me up.
Day 2, holy pain. I was definitely starting to feel it. Luckily, the medicine they gave me worked wonders and I wasn’t in too much pain unless I swallowed. I watched a TON of Full House on Hulu and actually finished all of the seasons during the first few days of my recovery.
Day 3, the pain was reaaaaally starting to set in. I at some jello and that felt wonderful. I tried to eat ice cream which ended up being a terrible mistake due to all of the nasty mucus in my throat. DO NOT EAT ICE CREAM OR PUDDING, it just adds to all of the mucus you already have and makes it impossible to swallow or sleep. The mucus at this point was probably the worst thing for me. It was so uncomfortable.
Day 4 was pretty similar to day 3, lots of Netflix and Hulu and more jello. I started to add different foods to my diet (kraft easy Mac, chicken ramen noodle broth, scrambled eggs.) I found those things the easiest to get down even though they hurt like hell. Everything I ate or drank hurt like hell, actually. Medicine was still a life saver!
Day 5 and 6 were basically the same, my pain was probably the worst these two days. It’s hard to tell when the pain was the worst because, for me, all of the days blurred together.
Day 7 and day 8 I felt a tad bit better. I’m not debhilitated by the pain anymore, but it’s definitely still there. The worst part about the pain these days were that it was more of a stinging pain than an ache. I also had pretty severe ear pain these days which SUCKED. Every time I swallowed it felt like I was swallowing shards of glass. It was hard to even drink water. This was due to my scabs starting to come off. I figured out that hot things felt loads better on my throat than cold things did!
The most important things when you are going through this are:
1. To drink, and drink WATER.
2.Take your medicine exactly when you are supposed to because that’s the only thing that kept me sane. The medicine probably will make you constipated, as it did with me, but I plan I taking a laxative tonight to try to help my poor stomach out a bit.
3. Eat. Even if it hurts. EAT. It will help you heal faster.
4. Don’t talk! As much as you want to, don’t do it. It is a terrible idea. I am just starting to talk again on day 8 and it still hurts like a bitch and I still sound absolutely ridiculous.
5. Don’t worry about the scabs. If you’re like me, you worry about literally EVERYTHING. I was so scared about my scabs, about bleeding, etc. and honestly it’s not that bad. You will have a terrible taste in your mouth and smell in your nose, it’s just the scabs! And if you start to feel something caught down your throat on the later days, it’s your scabs starting to fall off so do not worry! I bled a tiny bit on the 5th day, because I yawned, but it went away after taking a sip of cold water.
6. After your 4th day, get out of bed and start moving! Take a walk around your house or the block. Get some fresh air, go for a drive! This will help you out a ton.
7. If you start getting depressed, try not to worry. I have been dealing with depression since day 5/6. I have read that this is completely normal and it WILL go away. Just try to hang in there!
8. DO NOT TAKE NSAIDS, such as ibuprofen. From what I have read from other people, it causes bleeding in a lot of them. My doctor told me absolutely no NSAIDS for 10 days after my surgery. Just take the pain meds you were prescribed!
9. SLEEP SLEEP SLEEP. If you have to, set an alarm to wake up every hour to take a sip of water otherwise your throat will dry out and it will hurt a ton, or it could even cause you to bleed. The key is to keep your throat wet at all times. I found that sleeping was the only time I felt any relief. It’s completely fine to sleep your recovery away for the first 5 days, but make sure you sleep sitting up! Even though your back kills you, you don’t feel like you’re choking on your own throat/ mucus.
10. Find a good surgeon! My doctor was WONDERFUL. He was so personable, had a great sense of humor, and just made me feel entirely comforable/confident in his abilities as a surgeon. I’ve had a pretty basic recovery (still extremely painful, but haven’t had an serious issues yet, knock on wood) I 10/10 believe it’s because of my wonderful surgeon!
Overall, this was probably the worst experience of my entire life so far. I spent a week thinking my life was over, that I was never going to get better and I regretted the surgery 100%. Now that I’m almost in the clear, I will tell you it is probably worth it and I don’t regret it as much. I had terrible tonsil stones, chronic throat pain, and enlarged lymph nodes due to my tonsils and I am so happy to never have to deal with that again once I recover! I had no idea it was going to be this painful, even though my surgeon told me it was going to be hell. I thought, “Hey, it can’t be that bad!” WELL, it was! So go into your surgery knowing that this will be the worst 2 weeks- 1 month of your life and there will be no surprises! Good luck to all of you, and remember even when you feel at your worst, it WILL get better. Trust me!
PS, I am sorry that is so long!! This group just helped me out a ton when I was going through the worst stages of my recovery and I wanted to try to help others as much as possible!
Sorry??? It’s GREAT! Thank you for sharing Emily!
Thank you, Greg!! I just hope my story helps out our fellow tonsillectomy survivors! 🙂
Day 5: I have not eating since the day before my surgery . everytime ill try to eat it will hurt badly and I’ll have a bad ear ache . The meds was working fine until last night . I took them and my throat started to burn and ears ache bad . I don’t know what else to do!!
Day 5!! THIS GROUP SAVED MY LIFE! 37 year old female! I am no stranger to surgery or pain. I’ve had 15 surgeries in my life and I bounced back immediately! This is not something I would ever ever ever do again! At 4am I was in so much pain I seriously didn’t think I would survive till sun up. I just wanted out. Lost
over 5 pounds from not eating in 4 days because hot, cold, blended, didn’t matter it was pure hell in my mouth, couldn’t even swallow the unending mouth slime. Medicine with water was like razorblades. Ear pain was so bad. Sleep even with sleep aid did not happen for 4 days!! I’m telling you I was desperate when I found this site!!!! I read several folks had had steroid shots. I figured it couldnt get any worse so at 8am when my doctor opened I was banging on the glass demanding in my horrible mute person voice to shoot me in the ass with the strongest steroid the had on site.. I’m from a small town and doctor knows me from around the community an knew that something was crazy wrong.. She gave me a steroid shot and an antibiotic shot an sent me home with liquid antibiotics. Said if I feel like I need another to come back in… I can’t even tell you how amazing one steroid shot has been.. No I can’t say I’m healed.. It still irritating to swallow, my ear pain is a dull ring, but I drank an entire glass of water, ate some soft mashed eggs with no problems and even cold ice cream!!! Pain level went from I’m seriously not going to survive another week of this id rather die to my throat is just irritated in a matter of hours. This was my day 5 an I’ve been told 5_7 is the worst.. thanks to those of you who actually filled this out an didn’t just read and move on you seriously saved my life!! I wish I could thank you personally!! An for those of you who are here because your as desperate as I was when I read it go an get a steroid shot it will bring you back to a level of sanity…
I know how u feel.. i am 31 and u ended up un the hospital a wk after having mine out.. i told the dr that admitted i would have rather had my tubes untied have another kid and retie my tubes then to go throught that again… the only thing that soothed my pain the 1st wk was showers like 50 a day and its the only way i could sleep.. after that didnt work and i end in the hospital for two days hooked to an iv fluid and antibotics..plus a steroid shot i was able to heal … kudos to you i couldnt tolerate the liquid medicine which is one reason i ended up in the hospital..