I finally got the pictures downloaded from my phone, so I figured it was about time to get Stetson's surgery and hospital stay posted....like I always say, "Better late than never"!
This all started at the end of February when Stetson mentioned to me that he had a sore under his tongue, I didn't think much of it because I also had some mouth sores at the same time, as did Sadie. Then as I was taking the kids to school the next morning he was complaining about it again, so I asked him to let me take a look...when he opened his mouth and lifted his tongue for me to see I was shocked! I had never seen anything like this before!! (refer to picture #3) Although what I was seeing and being concerned about was not what Stetson was complaining about, the large bubble growing under his togue didn't bother him a bit, in fact he didn't even realize it was there. So I waited and watched it for a few days and finally decided we needed to have this thing checked by our Dr.
We went to our family doctor and when Stetson opened his mouth to show Dr. Sundwall he also was a little shocked....he was expecting something much smaller, like a blister. He thought it looked like a hematoma type cyst filled with blood, which is a little out of his field of expertise and referred us to an ENT Surgeon. We went to see Dr. Denys the following week and found out that what Stetson had under his togue is referred to as a 'ranula' (meaning frog--because it looks like a frog's neck when they puff it up). We were informed that it in fact was not full of blood, but saliva...it was caused by a plugged duct in his salivary gland. There was some concern that it could be a plunging ranula, where it starts growing into the muscle tissue or causing a disturbance for all the little nerves that are connected to the togue. So, it was necessary for Stetson to have a CAT scan done so the doctor could see where exactly this thing was growing.
This picture was taken on Friday, March 6th just before Stetson was taken back for his CAT scan. I was teasing him and said, "I wish we could just have a 'lion' look you over!" He got a little chuckle out of that, since it's one of our favorite lines from the Madagascar 2 movie.
This is following the CAT scan, he is trying to come back out of the anesthesia. They had to put him out because it is crucial that he holds perfectly still for the scan, and with kids, that is the best way for them to accomplish the task at hand.
Here is a picture of the ranula just before surgery on Thursday, March 12th. The ranula occupied most of the space under the left side of his togue.
During the last week prior to surgery it started expanding under the tongue to the other side.
After we got settled into a room Grammy brought the other kids in to check on Stetson, he was perfectly happy playing the Playstation, watching the movie of his choice, and drinking his chicken broth:)They made him stay through the night so they could watch for possible swelling that may have blocked his airway, or infection around the incision. But all was going great and he was released from the hospital around 11:00 on Friday. The one thing he insisted on doing was stopping at the Pink Shop for a delicious cheeseburger before leaving (he had enough of the broth, juice, and jello...he wanted some real food!), but was very sad to find that chewing that yummy cheeseburger was not something his mouth was ready to do yet:(
And here is the aftermath of the surgery...if you look closely you'll see a fuzzy white line where they stitched him up after the disection was complete. Now all is well with him and we're so lucky it ended up being a minor thing with no lasting complications.
