We still tried other routes before surgery, but after seeing an ear specialist on Monday, it was decided that simple surgery in putting tubes in Seth's ears are the best thing to do.
I talked with Seth about it the night before while putting him to bed, and he wasn't too worried. Sweet! I thought. Maybe this will be like going to the dentist. He loves going there!
Unfortunately, his groove was thrown off from the beginning because we had to wake him up to make it to the hospital by 7:00 in the morning (no easy task as I'm still adjusting to three kiddies four and under!).
It takes him awhile to wake up, and it's best for everyone if he does it on his own and is given plenty of space. Well, his groove was further thrown off because he didn't get his morning glass of milk and cereal since he needed to fast for at least seven hours prior to surgery. How do you explain that to a toddler?
He wasn't worried about the surgery; he wanted his milk and cereal and let everyone know how uncool it was to deny him, but as soon as we got there the kid-friendly nursing staff was awesome.
Disney Channel was turned on and a warm blanket with jets on it was placed around him. He had his bunny with him as well, but they also gave him a few more stuffed toys to keep him company.
Liam also kept Seth company while he watched cartoons. Life was starting to be good again!
Surrounded by stuffed toys and a supportive little brother always makes things better.I'm also a firm believer in the power of bribery, so we enticed him with chocolate milk and froot loop cereal after his surgery.
He perked right up and the grumpy, frowning face quickly turned upside down into a smile as he contentedly watched cartoons while the procedure was explained to me and I filled out some consent forms.
Well, a few minutes after he was taken into surgery, it was done, he came back, and with the exception of a bit of pain in one of his ears (the severely infected one), he was ready for that chocolate milk and cereal.
Life was awesome once again as he got to watch cartoons again and he felt pretty important having his food tray placed in front of him. They even got me some breakfast as well, so everyone was happy.
After about an hour of observation, it was time to leave day surgery. Seth couldn't understand why we couldn't bring the sweet jet blanket home as well as the stuffed toys, so he collapsed over top of it for a minute to see if that would work. It didn't, but WAS slightly amusing.
I'm going to have to find a similar pattern to make a blanket for him now!
So how do you think the first member of the family handled surgery?! When I asked him, he stated, "Good. Wanna see my strong muscles?!"
You know it, Dude.
