Benjamin's Dental Day Surgery

Benjamin has "inherited" the Carter side of "bad" teeth.  

 He had 10 (or more?) teeth worked on on Thursday, Dec. 22nd.  Which also happened to be my Dad's birthday!  Happy Birthday, Dad!

He was a bit apprehensive when we first arrived at the hospital & did not want to be weighed and measured.  So Rusty had to be weighed & then weighed again holding Benjamin.  Ben is 31 pounds and 31 inches tall.

 He was able to take his own blanket, pillow & stuffed animal with him.  We settled into a room to wait for anesthesia to come talk to us & wait until the dentist was almost done with the patient before us. 

 

 He was happy--for the time being.  He was able to watch a bit of "Sponge Bob" & then he was lucky enough to watch some of "Toy Story".  And in all of his excitement, he pushed the "nurse" call button on the remote--oops!

 He was so cute in the way, way too big hospital gown, pants & slipper socks.  

He also got a new teddy bear--orange to match his coat & our school colors. 

 He was such a good boy--the whole time.  Usually he doesn't take medicine very well, unless it is the chewable bubble gum Tylenol, but he surprised us all & took it like a pro!  He did say he was hungry once, so he maybe that is why he took the medicine so well.  Once he took the medicine, he was able to drink 1 teaspoon of water--he thought that was a treat! 

 He is just adorable!

 Here he is getting wheeled to the surgery holding room.  Usually they only let 1 family member in the room (there were about 6 other patients in there)

 but they said we both could go.  So we turned the "Toy Story" movie back on for a few minutes.

 The medicine he took earlier didn't have much of an effect on him!  After signing a ton of paperwork & permission papers and a handful of nurses asking us if we had any questions, the anesthesiologist came & started playing with Ben.  He told us he would just take him to the operating room before they gave he any more medicine, and if he started crying they wouldn't stop to let us comfort him.  

But as soon as the nurse & anesthesiologist started playing with his stuffed animals & talking "Toy Story", he was all smiles and headed off to surgery.

 He went into surgery just before 11 am (we arrived at the hospital at 9 & his surgery was scheduled for 10:30) & they told us he would be in for about 2 1/2 hours.  After we were settled in at the surgery waiting room, Rusty ran a couple of errands.  He picked up his banjo strings, bought the heating element for the dryer (YAY!), & found a hinge for our pantry door.  Then he bought us Subway sandwiches from the hospital cafeteria (yummy!).

One of the nurses called a little before 1pm and said that everything was going great & Dr. Baker expected to be another 1/2 hour.

 At 1:30, Dr. Baker talked to us about what he had done (3 crowns, 5 fillings, and some other work on all of his front teeth) & said that Ben would probably be sore from having his mouth opened for so long, be tired from being under so long, and that his gums would probably be sore.  We were to feed him liquids and soft food for the rest of the day, and then back to normal on Friday.

 So at 1:45 we were able to be with Ben.  He had woken up a bit in recovery, so they brought him back to his room, but he went right back to sleep.  The nurses said that is was okay, but when he woke up, we needed to try to get him to drink some.  

 He still had an IV in his hand & an oxygen monitor taped onto his big toe.  His lips were swollen & dry, and when he first woke up, he had that "glazed" look.  They said he might be nauseous.  But all he did was burp a few times, and then wanted to be held. 

 So I gathered the IV tubes & the oxygen monitor cord & held him for about an hour.  He finally decided he wanted to drink some apple juice that they brought in a cute sippy cup.  After he drank the first one & was awake for a while, the nurse came with discharge papers.

We got him dressed and gathered all of our things.

 And then he was able to ride in the wagon to the van.

 He was tired once we got in the van...

 and was asleep within 10 minutes of leaving the hospital.  He slept the whole way home.

Everyone was glad to see him when he was home, and Emmalee made a comfortable place for him on the couch.  They let him pick a movie to watch & then took care of him.

He finally got his appetite around 6:30.  He ate 3 pieces of toast with peanut butter, a little mashed potatoes & gravy, and some of a smoothie.  He drank another 2 cups of apple juice too.

Brienna, Zane & Callum went to the basketball games (both boys teams won, girls lost--against North Gem) while Rusty fixed the dryer.  I am thankful that Rusty is able to repair so many things that break down--otherwise I think we would be going without a lot of things!