Ears

Cedric has been suffering with constant ear infections since January. The oral antibiotics did not seem to help, so the doctor recommended injection antibiotics. So for three days in a row, Cedric had to get six very painful shots to try to rid the infection. However, that did not work either. So as did Lily and Jefferson, Cedric ended up needing tubes in his ears. He was scheduled for surgery on Thursday (yesterday), but on Tuesday he fell on Jeff's bed, hit the bed railing and sustained a terrible ear injury. He was screaming, and the ear just started to fill up with blood and started bleeding. By the next day it was a nice purple bruise. (The picture was taken two days after the injury, the same day he got his tubes, so it looks a lot better than when it first happened).
So Thursday we headed to the hospital at 6:30am for the surgery. Lily and Jeff slept over at other people's houses since we had to go so early. Cedric was such a good boy. He was full of smiles, was nodding "yes" to the questions the nurses would ask and waving "bye" to them as they left. He didn't like getting his oxygen checked with the monitor taped to his finger, but other than that he was very compliant. Although it's sad to see your child have to go through surgery, they just look so darn cute in the hospital gown.
When it came time to go back for the surgery he willingly went with the nurse. Tom and I waited for what seemed like not even ten minutes when the doctor came in and said all went well with the surgery. He did say that the ear drum was injured in the accident on Tuesday, but it didn't effect the surgery. When it came time for Cedric to come out of surgery I was expecting a groggy, fussy child as was the case with our other two (and seems to be the case for most kids coming out of anesthesia). But instead the nurse was caring him, he was wide awake and not a bit fussy. However, you could tell something was bugging him, but he couldn't figure out what it was. First he pulled off his sock, then wanted it back on, then tried to take off the oxygen monitor still on his finger, then he pulled at his ID tag, then pushed the blanket off, then wanted the sock on his hand, etc.
We were home from the hospital in plenty of time for me to still teach preschool, and although Cedric was supposedly a bit tipsy immediately started chasing a balloon around the house with a toy bat. He was as happy as if nothing at all happened that morning. We hope the tubes do their job and rid him of these terrible ear infections, but as far as the recovery goes, he's doing great!