Collin has surgery

I apologize if you are "squeamish."  If you are, you might not want to read on.  This is to follow up from this post. 

Collin had surgery today for the following:

A Pediatric Neurosurgeon removed a quarter-sized lump on his scalp (lipoma = fatty benign tumor).  These are not uncommon, but his was unusually large (they are usually smaller than a nickel), and in an unusual location (usually found on the torso).  The surgeon said it looked normal when he removed it, but they will send to lab for biopsy just in case.  Collin has a small patch of shaved skin on the top of his head, and we will probably give him a short buzz cut to balance it out until it grows in.  There shouldn't be any complications (the lump was all outside the skull) and he just has some internal stitches that will dissolve, and it's "super-glued" closed on the outside.  That was the easy part. 

Now the harder part.  The ENT performed a tympanoplasty to repair a perforation on Collin's right ear drum using a small piece of tissue from behind his ear (externally), meaning he has another incision on his head, behind his right ear, and lots going on inside.  The biggest issue is that his equilibrium is way off, causing a lot of nausea (and some vomiting), but that should settle down, and the medication for it helps (but it knocks him out).  He had a rough time coming out of the anesthesia and it took him a really long time to be discharged (about 3 hours, rather than the 1-2 that is usual) and they almost decided to keep him overnight because he didn't seem to be holding up very well.  But then he perked up a little (after vomiting) and got to come home.... where he immediately zonked out again.  :)   He has some stitches where they took the graft from, and has to wear a giant plastic shield over that ear that makes him look a bit like a wrestler with lop-sided headgear.  :)  He will be taking it easy for a couple of weeks, and he won't be doing any swimming the rest of the summer, but that's OK. 

All in all, everything went well and according to plan, and Collin was a trooper, though he had a bit of anxiety when they had trouble getting an IV going, and after "blowing" a couple of his veins decided to wait until he was "under."  (He takes after me that way.  I'm a really hard "stick.")