A Parents Nightmare

Yesterday, Joey our 13 year old had oral surgery.  His wisdom tooth was preventing his 12 year molar to come through.  His orthodontist has been keeping an eye on it, hoping for the best but finally it was determined that it needed to come out.  Granted his wisdom teeth were no where close to being an issue, as most do not come out until you are in your late teens early twenties, but this one tooth needed attention.  So the wisdom tooth would need to come out and the 12 year molar would need to be surgically up righted and moved into position.

Last week we had a consultation with an oral surgeon and was told that although the wisdom teeth are far up and low down, it would be fine to go ahead an extract all four of his wisdom teeth and the recovery would not be too much harder on him.  The surgeon said it would be better to do it all at one time than to have him have to come back years later to do the other three.  So we agreed to move forward with the extraction of all four wisdom teeth.  This would be done under IV sedation.

Yesterday was his surgery.  Joey was very nervous and was not looking forward to it one bit.  We assured him that it would be a piece of cake and he would sleep right through it and then spend the next couple of days eating pudding and ice cream!  A 40 minute procedure tuned into a 1 hour and 45 minute surgery.  I was getting a little nervous to say the least.  When the nurse came to finally get us, I told her I was freaking out because it took so long.  She said that it was a rough surgery, but did not offer any explanation and I was just wanting to back there to Joey, so I figured the doctor would explain the “rough” part to us.  When I walked into the room Joey was crying uncontrollably and shaking.  When I got to his side he told me that I lied and he was awake for the surgery.  I looked at my husband and we locked eyes asking each other without words, did our son just go through this awake? 

The nurse told us that when a child is very nervous before a surgery that sometime they can wake up like this and be very upset.  She walked out and Jeremy and me did everything to console him,  Nothing we did was helping him and he continually kept saying the same thing, “it hurt so bad and I was awake”.   Finally the doctor came in and I asked, was he awake?  He said that there were complications with the anesthesia and that the further that he went under the more combated that he became so that they had to pull him out.  He assured us that Joey would not remember anything and in fact that he would not remember this conversation.  Trust me I was livid, and not processing any of this at this point.  I think the main goal of me and my husband was to get our child out of there because all Joey kept saying to us was” get me out of here” and we were going to do just that.

As soon as we were in the truck, I looked at Jeremy and said, “please don’t tell me that out child just went through all that awake?”.  Of course this was not the time to discuss anything.  Joey was very sick.  We had to pull off the road for him to throw up.  Then again in the grocery store parking lot he was sick, so at this point our efforts are completely on him and not the fear that were forefront on our minds.  We were finally able to get some anti-nausea medication in him and he finally went to sleep.  So our 30 minute drive home was full of questions.  I think at that point we were hoping that he really was having some kind of reaction to the sedation and was in fact under but not as deep as they would of liked and that he would not remember any of this.

After he were home and hours later he was awake, we asked him how was the surgery.  He told us it was terrible and that he remembered everything, even the conversation that we had with the doctor saying that he would not remember.  He said that he told them he was awake and they kept telling him it would be over soon.  He said that he shook and cried the entire time. 

I am so upset.  I am not sure where to turn.  Last night I was desperate to talk to this surgeon, to find out what happened.  He never called.  When our 18 year old had his wisdom teeth out the oral surgeon called later that night to check on him.  Joey’s oral surgeon did not.  I thought about calling him, but then thought that I needed some composure before I talked to anyone.  I laid awake last night fretting over what our son had to endure.  Not only were all four of his wisdom teeth cut from his gums, but another tooth was erected into place.  If you could see his xrays you would know that all five teeth were no where close to the surface.

The only positive thing about this entire situation is how remarkably Joey is doing.  Beside the swelling, he is up and doing so well.  He said the pain is not that bad and was not much worse than getting his braces tightened.   Praise the Lord! 

I am not sure where to go from here.  Monday morning Joey has an appointment with his orthodontist so he can check on the 12 year molar.  We adore his orthodontist so I think I will start with him on what should be done.

This oral surgeons office was more worried about getting our money yesterday and me signing and re-signing paper work and having me void one check to write another one, which by the way was not a small amount.  I wished that they would of been that concerned over the well being of our son than amount of money that they were making from his surgery.

I think the worse part, is knowing that I told my child not to worry about the surgery.  He would go to sleep and wake up and everything would be fine.  I can not believe that they made him endure this,  and why they did not stop this procedure.  I would of stopped this and tried another route before making Joey go through this.  They could of kept their stupid money for all I care. 

Needless to say, we are upset, confused and very angry.  Pray for us as we try to process all of this and for the next steps of handling this.  Also pray for me, I am having such guilt and anguish over putting my child through this, I am so mad at myself for allowing this to happen.  Again, the biggest blessing is how well Joey is doing.  Just now, I peeked over at him sitting at the counter with his laptop hearing him click away at the keyboard and laughing!  I guess someone said something funny on facebook!