Tonsillectomy Recovery: Day 8

Weight: 217
Change from yesterday: -1
Change overall: -8

I hate to get ahead of myself, because tomorrow could always end up being worse, but I felt like I started to turn a corner today! First, I got about 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep, which was a huge stretch. I haven't had anything close to that since the surgery! Unfortunately, the long sleep led to a temporarily unpleasant morning, as all pain meds had worn off and my throat had gotten a little dry overnight. Once I drank some water, slurped down some applesauce, and took some percocet, I was good to go!

Most of the day was pretty decent. I'm still weak, and woozy from the drugs. Naturally, eating still hurts, but maybe a little bit less than it did yesterday? I definitely had less jaw and ear pain, and I was able to talk a lot more! But then, more talking leads to more soreness in the throat for a little while afterwards, so I'd have to take breaks. I also was able to open my mouth all the way for the first time, and I did so quite a bit to try to stretch out the muscles in my jaw.

The biggest triumph of my day was eating macaroni and cheese for lunch and dinner! That's the most-solid food I've had to eat so far, and actually involved a little bit of chewing. I was absolutely thrilled that I was able to eat it with just a reasonable amount of pain. My stomach is happy!!

I'm still too squeamish to look at my throat, but my dutiful husband was willing to take one for the team, and he reported that the left side has no scabs (so weird...I still have felt almost nothing on that side! But he confirmed that the tonsil is in fact gone!), and the right side is still scabbed over but looks pretty good. Also he confirmed that my uvula is still swollen, which I was starting to suspect because I can frequently feel something back there when I swallow. I figured it was either a swollen uvula, or some dangly scab. Very relieved to learn it's the uvula. :)

So, I don't have a ton of percocet left, and I think it might be time to start weaning off them anyway. I'm only going to take one pill tonight before I go to sleep, and I'll figure out my first dose tomorrow based on how I feel in the morning. Getting off the drugs will make my head clearer, so I can maybe start mentally re-engaging with my life. I am SO ready for that. So here's hoping tomorrow continues today's positive trend and is not a step backwards!!!