Everly Sellner
Everly Sellner didn’t want to miss out.
Everly needed her tonsils out. She had been sleeping poorly, overly tired during the day, and getting cavities – a surprising clue to tonsil trouble.
Her surgery was scheduled for the last week of school. Everly would miss the chance to tattoo her teacher at a fun school fundraiser. The six year old was disappointed.
So Everly’s mom Kelly suggested bringing some temporary tattoos to the Surgery Center. Maybe a nurse would like one, she said.
Ten did.
While prepping for her tonsillectomy, Everly drew a crowd. She met some of the nurses from PACU who would care for her after surgery. She even tattooed her ENT surgeon, Dr. Gerard O’Halloran, with a strawberry on his bicep. (He kept his hands scrupulously clean for surgery.)
“Everyone was so kind to her, and she felt very at ease,” Kelly says.
Then there was the wiggly tooth. Everly’s front tooth was loose. Dr. O’Halloran told her they might need to take it out while she was asleep for surgery. (They did.) When Everly woke up in recovery, there was her tooth in a specimen cup . . . with $9 from tooth fairy, plus tips for all her tattoos. “She’s the only kid I know who made money during surgery,” Kelly laughs.
Everly was referred to Dr. O’Halloran by her pediatrician Amy Kraushaar, DO, FAAP. Everly wasn’t having strep throat or other illnesses connected to tonsil trouble. But her tonsils were large, and her mouth breathing and incontinence at night were worrisome.
Dr. O’Halloran diagnosed obstructive sleep apnea. Tonsillectomy is a common treatment for it. But Everly’s apnea presented “weirdly,” Kelly says. “She wasn’t snoring, but was having trouble staying dry overnight, and was mouth-breathing a lot at night. She also cranks her neck and throws her head back during the night; Dr. O’Halloran told us, ‘She’s basically giving herself CPR’ by opening her throat as wide as possible.”
And Everly was overly tired during the day, “more than a typical kid should be,” Kelly recalls. “Dr. O’Halloran thought it would cause trouble down the road if we didn’t take her tonsils out now.”
It worked. Now Everly has energy during the day, sleeps comfortably, and stays dry at night.
“I wish I thought about surgery sooner, especially with such bad cavities at age 3 and 4,” Kelly says. Why cavities? Mouth breathing dries out the mouth and prevents saliva from washing over the teeth and keeping them clean.
Dr. O’Halloran was an easy choice to care for Everly. “He did Everly’s ear tubes and my son’s, so we trust him a lot,” Kelly says. “And I love that he gives out his cell phone number to patients. We didn’t need it, but I was grateful and relieved to have it.
“It’s super nice to go where you know people, and get that familiar care from one procedure to the next.”
Kelly’s advice for other parents: “Trust your gut. If you notice problems, reach out to your pediatrician. At NH+C they’re good at getting you the right referral and treatment. They also laid out our options if it turned out to be something other than her tonsils.”
Everly wasn’t “a typical snoring kid with strep throat, so I wouldn’t have thought about tonsils until we talked with her pediatrician about it. I’m glad we did.”
The tattoo artist is glad, too.