Planning and Recovering From Tonsillectomy and Adenoidectomy
Let’s start with my own tonsillectomy recovery story. I wasn’t always this healthy. As a kid I ingested more penicillin than a corporate-raised chicken. I was in the doctor’s office several times each year with a sore throat. As the doctor or nurse peered into my mouth, the reaction was always the same: “Whoa, those are some big tonsils!” The diagnosis was usually tonsillitis, or strep throat. As the doctor wrote the prescription, he’d explain that years ago, tonsils like mine would have been removed, but, “these days,” we try to hang onto them. “These days,” were the 1970’s. I guess the tonsillectomy pendulum had swung back from the days when kids got their tonsils out because their brother was getting his out.
Aunt Kate’s reassurance helped, but I still wrote out some just-in-case instructions for my brother and hid them in my closet. I sheepishly told him where they were, just in case.
“This is temporary. You WILL feel better. Hang in there and stay hydrated!” -Greg Tooke
As an adult I continued to suffer from frequent bouts of tonsillitis. It seemed that I caught every bug that passed through my house or workplace. I guess those big ugly tonsils were a nice home for those nasties. It wasn’t until my 40’s that I also became aware that I suffered from something called, Obstructive Sleep Apnea -a condition in which a person stops breathing while asleep. I snored often and would awake abruptly, gulping in big breaths. I felt tired most days. After raising four babies, I had come to accept fatigue as a normal part of life! One day at a routine physical my doctor remarked about the number of episodes of strep throat and tonsillitis I’d had. We also talked about the sleep problems. While he didn’t formally diagnose obstructive sleep apnea, he suspected that I had it. He recommended a tonsillectomy, because of all the tonsil problems I’d had. As a bonus, I might find relief from the sleep apnea as well. If not, I’d undergo a sleep study. Forty four years old and father of four boys and a doctor finally said it: Those tonsils are doing you more harm than good! As much as I hated those tonsils, I was terrified at the thought of going under the knife. I started reading about tonsillectomy recovery on the internet and talking to friends. That didn’t help. “My cousin knew a guy who got a tonsillectomy and bled to death.” “At your age, tonsillectomy is dangerous.” When I met with the ear, nose and throat specialist, (an otolaryngologist), he told me that the risks are the same for an adult undergoing tonsillectomy surgery as for a child, but tonsillectomy recovery is longer and more painful. He was right about that!
Deciding to get a Tonsillectomy
I scheduled the surgery for the day after Thanksgiving. A traditional day of feasting in the United States. If it was to be my last meal, I planned to make it a good one! As it turned out, I was so nervous and scared that I could hardly eat on that day. I was recently divorced and had shared placement of my four boys. So many people counted on me that I began to question my decision. What if I died on the table? How reckless to leave behind a family, simply to avoid frequent tonsillitis? My aunt, a registered nurse reassured me about how simple the surgery was, and how far anesthesiology had come. I had nothing to worry about. Aunt Kate’s reassurance helped, but I still wrote out some just-in-case instructions for my brother and hid them in my closet. I sheepishly told him where they were, just in case
“My tonsils were like a 400 pound gorilla on my back. I don’t miss them at all. Ever.” -from the forum ________________________________________________________________________________
I took a week off from work, asked my ex wife to take care of the boys that week, and asked my uncle to drive me to and from the hospital. (a requirement with anesthesia) That was about all the tonsillectomy recovery preparation I did. I was about to learn a lot! Surgery went fine. I awoke in recovery with a serving of Jell-o in front of me. (“Jelly,” to my British friends) The nurse said that I had to finish it before I could check out. I swallowed it with great relish. It was divine! I called my uncle and we were out of there. I felt ok. I told him thanks and not to worry. I’d be fine. I believed this. Aside from a couple visits, I spent the next ten days alone in misery. The pain set in after about 24 hours. Streaming movies and television shows were my friends. Sleeping became my worst enemy. I’d wake up with my mouth dried out and my throat on fire. Oh my God. I was not prepared for this! I ran out of Popsicle’s on day three. I ran out of pain medicine on day five. The pain peaked on day seven. I broke down and cried in front of my brother on day eight- a combination of pain, drug induced depression, and sleep deprivation. Since then, I’ve read thousands of similar accounts on the tonsillectomy forum I created. It didn’t have to be so hard. If I’d known what I do now, I could have done so much to make my tonsillectomy recovery better. I hope to reach as many people as I can to help guide them through the tunnel. It has been my passion and taught me more about compassion and the amazing strength of the human spirit than any other life experience. When you shine a light for others, you also light your own path.
In the pages at follow, I’ll share tonsillectomy recovery tips with you that I learned from my tonsillectomy experience and years of coaching others through tonsillectomy and recovery.
I think that I have made a huge mistake by having so much surgery at one time. I’m on day 2. My necrotic teeth left puss pockets on my tonsils. So, my surgeon removed the tonsils, along with all of my upper teeth and half of the bottom teeth. I’m in unbelievable pain. My mouth hasn’t stopped bleeding, with my gums so swollen, I can’t shut my mouth due to swelling of gum line. My (removed) tonsils are burning, making it impossible to swallow without crying. All of the aforementioned experiences in this blog has scared me to death. I’m only on day 2, so anticipating days 4-6 have put me in panicky mode. I just sent my daughter for humidifier. Dr gave me Percocet and xanax, along with antibiotic and mouthwash. Any other suggestions? I think my retracted teeth hurt the most right now, with swelling so bad, makes it impossible to swallow without audible scream.. I would be so grateful for any advice from any of you who have experienced this. I’m especially concerned about swallowing (which I can’t without bursting into tears), and what’s this stuff about spitting up scaring from tonsil area? Seriously? I remain,
Hopeful, but completely freaked out…. and I’m on day 2.
I got my tonsils out on december 20th, so i am about to start day 11. I am 17 years old. After getting severe sore throats about once a month, i figured it was time to get my tonsils out. The first three days were almost painless with my pain meds (oxycodone every 4 hours). The pain got slightly worse on days 4-6. Once day 7 came, i ran out of my pain meds, and days 7-9 were horrible. The pain was terrible and I had a lot of bleeding. I had to go back to the doctor to get recauterized twice. Having a humidifier at night and always staying hydrated + eating helped a lot. Constipation from irregular eating habits and the pain medication was horrible, so plan on taking laxatives. The straining caused my bleeding. Now on day 11, I feel almost no pain throughout the day except when I eat and sleep. It was a rough 11 days, but I am glad I did it.
I got my tonsils out almost 9 days ago, on December 21st. I constantly wake up and go to bed with a sore throat, and have for most of my life, this is due to my extremely large tonsils so a tonsilectomy it was. I was dreading it, as I heard how horrible the recovery can be, mostly from things like this and other people. No doubt this has been some of the hardest days of my life. I havent eaten a full meal thus far and it is really starting to take its toll on me. I sleep A LOT more than usual and do not really have energy for activity. The first three-five days were not horrible, i slept a lot and was on constant pain meds every 4 hours. I actually managed to be social and hang around at our Christmas Eve Party. However instead of getting better as I expected it to, it seems to have gotten/be getting worse. I travelled up to my cottage on day 6 and the roadtrip was rough–would not recommend. With lack of food, the pain meds began to make me feel nauseous and constipated. After 9 days of constipation, I had to go to the pharmacy and get laxatives. Additionally on the 9th day I threw up due to the pain meds. Let me tell you throwing up after this surgery is HORRIBLE! avoid it at all costs. So i am stopping taking pain meds now as they seem to just be messing up my body and not helping. It seems after the laxatives set in and the pain meds worn off i have began to feel slightly better. I still have pain in my throat and thus horrible associated ear pain, which i think is at times worse than the throat pain. Overall, though I am hoping after this terrible morning that it will turn around. I know the nights will be rough still, as the lack of water really causes me a lot of pain. I hope the pain subsides soon and I can eat a meal, get some normal sleep and get off the couch, starting to go crazy over here and definitely understand why this recovery is awful.
I’m on day 4 and I had my tonsils and adenoids removes so do you think it’s the same process and what about my voice isn’t normal for me not to be speaking because it hurts too much so I choose not to …Do you think I can eat soft bread becAuse I can chew and it doesn’t hurt that much to swallow as it did before ,or what about something like baked chicken.
I got my tonsils & adnoids out 7 days ago and i am 15 years old. I knew it would hurt but i never thought it would hurt this bad. The first day was okay and went by in a breeze but then the second day i was in major pain. Then on day three i had a blood episode and had blood pouring out of my mouth. i gargled the ice water, as recommended, and it would stop. i was rushed to the hospital. they said i was okay to go home. then day 4-6 i had more blood episodes, i was rushed to the hospital and stayed overnight. they pumped fluids in me for 24 hours and then released me. after that i went off the hydrocodone, amoxicillin, and one other medicine because i was getting major acid reflux from them. And now that i am on day 7 i do not feel as much pain as i did, i take children’s tylenol and nausea medicine as needed. The biggest thing i learned is no matter how much pain your in you need to drink 6-8 glasses of ice water, even when you don’t eat. Also, when you are hungry there are multiple things i’ve found good. Such as the following: egg drop soup, cream of (your choice) soup, chicken or beef broth, ramen noodle soup (without then noodles), the baby yougert melts (lol), any type of corn puffs or cheese puffs, jello, gatorade, popcicles, and any other soft foods. But one thing i recommend is do not eat ice cream or mashed potatoes, it causes you to get like a thick thing in your throat and it is hard to get that to go away. Anyways if anyone has any suggestions for me i’m all ears.
I got my tonsils out 9 days ago and I am a 49 year old female. I am a big baby and can tolerate very little pain. But after having 2 episodes of abscessed tonsils, I knew that it had to be done and I wasn’t getting any younger. So I researched the LEAST painful way to do this, as most everything I read was horrifying. So I found out about a company called Microline. They make a tool that is sold to ENT doctors that changes the way the tissue is sealed up after the tonsil is removed. This is instead of cauterizing which creates all of the dreadful scabbing. Although they do cauterize any larger vessels. The tool is called ENTcepts. So I contacted the company because no one around the area where I live uses this method. They put me in contact with the sale rep closest to me and he shared the names of six doctors who use their tool. The only problem was that the closest one was 3 and 1/2 hours away from me. I read about each doctor as the locations were all approximately the same distance away from me. It was the BEST decision I have ever made. It was still painful, but very very manageable. I took only half the dose of pain meds for the first 3 days along with an antibiotic and prednisone. I then tapered down to just Tylenol by day 6. Yesterday was day 8 and I was able to eat almost everything at our Christmas Eve fish dinner (fish, lobster, crab, shrimp ect.). I even had a glass of red wine but had to water it down- it felt slightly acidic and I didn’t want to press my luck. When I first got home I was very cautious but ate quite a few things (popsicles, tiny pasta with butter and parm.cheese, crushed cold cereal in milk, peaches in light syrup (they were great), soup (room temp.), jello, even tuna and chicken salad by day 4 as I got more brave on wonder bread. The last thing I wanted to do was create any bleeding and end up in our local ER because they would cauterize and that was the whole thing that I wanted to avoid. I do have the white splotches in my throat on both sides, but I see more and more nice pink color every day now coming back around the area. I think it’s because the “thermal tissue welding” as it’s called minimizes all of heavy gross scabbing. So there’s some scabbing but I believe much less than any traditional methods. I am almost at a point where I feel pretty normal (ears have a little pressure and slight discomfort in throat). I did a lot of holiday activity on day 6,7, and 8 too (lots of shopping, cooking, cleaning ect.) It did tire me but I was able to do it. I also drank a ton of water and I mixed water with apple or grape juice sometimes (about 100 oz, a day). I also had a small humidifier by my bed and propped myself up slightly more than usual. The first 2 nights home I set my alarm and took pain meds because I was afraid not to. I read about people who fell asleep with their mouth open and then their throat got dry and created a lot of pain so the only weird quirky thing I did was use a small piece of “paper medical tape” over my mouth vertically so I wouldn’t accidentally sleep with my mouth open. I tucked my lips in and put a small piece of tape slanted across and it worked great and gave me security that I wouldn’t wake up in a crisis. Paper medical tape is gentle on the skin. Soooo the take away is that it was soooo worth the 3 and 1/2 hour ride to the doctor’s office visit for the initial set up and then another trip on surgery day. The ride home wasn’t too bad as drugs are still working pretty well from surgery. I had no complications at all (except a little constipation and by day 6 I resorted to milk of magnesium and that got resolved ). I was a little bit worried that my doctor would be so far away, but he wasn’t which made me feel good. He was very confident that this method results in very little complications and he was right. It is totally worth searching for this “thermal tissue welding” method and the trip if necessary. But it’s also not totally pain free, but much less than traditional methods. Good luck to anyone contemplating this surgery. If I can survive it and truly say that it wasn’t as bad as I expected anyone can.
I’m on day 4 and I am very scared but also hungry.So far after the surgery I haven’t vomited and i really don’t want to ,it also doesn’t hurt as much to swallow and I can chew without it being a bother. Except I had my tonsils and Adenoids removed ,So do you think I can eat something like baked chicken or any too that I can chew slowly and swallow or what about bread soft sweet bread.
Hello from Estonia,
Im 31 years old female and had my tonsils taken out on 15th December. Since then I have been keeping my eye on this site, while I was so scared (like most of the people here). It has helped me a lot. Reading, that there are more people in the world how can undestand the pain and the horror I have to go through. Thank you for sharing!
Like most of you I was also scared of the pain mainly. I thought it would be so horrific. Maybe the pain meds are stronger which the doctors prescribe here in Estonia, but it hasn’t been so bad. Only few days, when I thought I have made a big mistake by going through the tonsillectomy (days 3-4). The most horrific thing was the bleeding… I have had now three of them! Hardly anyone writes about them. Have I understood correctly, that most of you only spit up some small amout of blood? (I haven’t had chance to read all the comments)
The surgery went very well. I was waiting to huge amounts of blood and being unable to speak or swollow. When I woke up I was even able to talk to the doctor and after three hours I was ready to go home. They still asked me to stay little bit longer, but 6 hours later I walked out and went to the pharmacy to get all the meds just in case the PAIN will come. I planned when I must take the meds and maybe therefor i didn’t have to suffer much. So everyone, who are afraid of the surgery – don’t the next days are much better to be afraid of.
Then came the day number 6. It was in the middle of the night. I was dreaming something about American Horror Story (while I was watching the series to get my day past) and then I saw that I had to swollow blood while I was being killed and so I did. I did it many times and then I woke up. I felt something salty in my mouth and quite didn’t understand what was going on. I thought that someone cut my neck, but when I thouched it my hand wasnt covered with blood. When I finally spit into the tissue I was shocked. I remembered from this site, that I should put something cold in my mouth and on my neck. I send a message to my friend to take me to the ER, but he was in a deep sleep. While I was holding a cup near my mouth I had bleed about half a cup. When my friend finally woke up, I wasn’t bleeding anymore and had cleaned up everything. So I went back to bed, but I didn’t sleep anymore. The next day I actually felt much better, but still thought it would be good idea to stay in bed.
The day after that (yesterday) I felt so well, that I went to see my grandmother and spoke with friends and made plans for today. In the evening I started to put some items away and I felt how my face started to go numb and then I felt that salty taste again in my mouth, this time the blood kept coming and coming. I texted my friend and he took me to ER, where they put me into a bed and gave me some meds to thicken my blood. While I was there I started bleeding again. So now I have been bleeding three times. Most of the night I spent in ER, but now Im back at home. Hoping that it will never happen again. I keep spitting in the tissue, to see if Im bleeding, while I feel the taste all the time in my mouth.
I was taking diclofenac and paracetamol for the pain and it makes blood thinner. So now I have some other pain killers (which I take only one for the night, while the pain isn’t that bad) and some meds to thicken my blood. Hopefully non of you doesn’t have to go through the horror I had here few times. Stay positive and think: after the rain comes the sunlight!
ps. Sorry for the long post and mistakes in it.