Batman's Surgery and the Bulldog Surgeon

Last Friday my 3 year old had his adenoids removed. It was outpatient surgery. My son wore his batman jammies complete with an attached black cape to the surgical center. He was a hit with the doctors and nurses and got a lot of extra attention, things like, "I've never operated on Batman before!" Needless to say my toddler did not want to change into the medical issued Bugs Bunny hospital gown, but no worries the nurse was quick to let us know that was fine and the hospital gown was not mandatory. Big Duke, my son's beloved large stuffed bulldog was allowed to go back with him to surgery.

He was in surgery for about 45 minutes, which included the time to get him under anesthesia, and when I got to go to him in recovery Big Duke looked like this:
Someone had fun putting a surgeon's mask on the stuffed bulldog!

My 3 year old did great! The recovery room nurse said he wished his adult patients were as good. I said, "Well, that's one perk of being a 3rd child, you're pretty tough!"

Anyway, we got to go home quickly and the real challenge was keeping my toddler from crazy physical activity. He did not want to rest on the couch, he wanted to play and he was still coming out of the anesthesia. He took off running at one point and nearly collided with the wall; I saved him just in time! And I suddenly had to be vigilant about the stairs again after not worrying much about him climbing up or down for the last couple years!

The next day he ran a little fever, but I was told to expect that due to inflammation from the surgery and that I didn't need to worry unless it got over 102 degrees. His throat was hurting him the next day, too. It was really sad, but a little funny, too, when my 3 year old began fussing, "When they gonna put my adenoids back in!"

Anyway, he's on the mend now. The fever lasted about 3 days, and it took about 5 days for his appetite to seem like it was getting back to normal. Now he's still a little more cranky than usual, I think the antibiotic he's taking to prevent infection post-surgery is upsetting his tummy a little. It's still too early to tell if removing his adenoids will decrease his drooling because there is inflammation at the site where the adenoids were removed, hopefully in the next week or two we'll notice a difference.