Good News and Bad

Good news - Richard has been accepted into TBI's (Texas Back Institute) study for the Kiniflex disk replacement. Bad news - it will mean surgery. He doesn't want surgery but has exhausted all his other options. He has to have a bone density test first to see if he qualifies, otherwise it will mean the disk fusion method.

This is a new disk product that is being studied in comparison with the Charite (which itself is so new insurance companies don't pay for the surgery). This surgery is paid for by the company that makes the disk. He won't know until after the surgery which product was used but they are both good so he doesn't really care which he gets.

He'll be contacted for the bone density test and then scheduled for the surgery, whichever it turns out to be. Recuperation time is a lot less with the disk replacement; he should be out of work for less than a month. They go in through the abdomen making the incision a little longer than one for an appendectomy. He will go home from the hospital in just 24 hrs. So, if all goes well he'll have the surgery sometime mid to late March. He's not anxious for the surgery but is anxious to stop hurting.

We're going to have to get my parents some help as Mom has fainted twice in the past two weeks due to very low blood pressure (60 over something standing up yesterday) which is due to her not eating and drinking properly. The doctors told Julie that Mom and Dad need to get some help so she's making calls today to see about LTC, Meals on Wheels and transportation. We've put the burden on Greg to tell Daddy he can't drive any longer. This is always an extremely tough time in parents' and children's lives when the roles become reversed.

Deidra has to have her tonsils out which she's not looking forward to at all. Dayna will be gone the week of spring break so it will probably be the first of summer vacation.

Dayna is having a really tough time at work right now. After her last audit in Alabama she came home to have LP (Loss Prevention) inform her the clerk at the store has accused her of stealing $1800! A more honest person you'd be hard to find and her supervisors here all know that. She was even fingerprinted last week as the envelopes the money was supposedly in have been found. She feels like a criminal and is having a hard time handling the stress of the accusation and investigation.

Sally doesn't usually put cameras into their stores due to the cost but there just happens to be two in this particular store as they are having other LP issues. The LP supervisor in the area didn't want to pull the tape for another couple of weeks due to his current investigation but the head of LP here told him to go ahead and do it as he wants to clear Dayna's name. We would all love to be a fly on the wall when the tapes are pulled as no one, including the store manager, know the cameras are there!

She's been told that if it were just between two employees at the store Sally wouldn't be getting involved but because she's corporate they have to investigate. Hopefully she'll hear something today.