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Every parent knows that's highly unusual.
A tonsillectomy is very painful, limiting what you swallow for up to a week. Tonsil removal, which went from a rite of passage in the 1960s to an operation discouraged for all but the most repeatedly ill kids by the 1980s, is on the upswing again. And no longer is it done just to fight recurring throat infections. Surprisingly, the breathing disorder sleep apnea, long considered a bane of middle-aged snorers, today is sending thousands of children under the knife. With surgery again inching up, doctors hoping to speed recovery are testing everything from laser-like devices to shrinking tonsils with microwaves, so far all unproven.