He's Home!

Less than 24 hrs after major surgery & he's home - unbelievable!

His surgical team was the best around according to the pre-op and surgical nurses. He had the head of the anesthesia team as his anesthesiologist and one woman monitored him via electrodes and needles and a laptop computer. She watched for any nerve impact as organs, blood vessels and nerves were moved around during the surgery. If it looked like they were someplace they didn't belong she could tell them to stop & do something different.

Dr. Guyer showed me before & after films shortly after his surgery yesterday. All went according to plan. He has a three inch horizontal incision about two inches below his belly button (they wanted to make sure he has a nice bikini line!) He ended up with the FDA approved model instead of the experimental device but he's not disappointed. Dr. Guyer said his disc was even discolored, which he doesn't often see, so it needed to come out.

He was kept in recovery over twice as long as normal as his blood pressure was too low. He was laying on his side & when they rolled him onto his back it soon came up to where it needed to be.

They were getting ready to catheritize him last evening when he finally managed to pee on his own. He was most grateful he didn't have to have a Foley.

He was up and walking within a few hours of surgery and walked out to the car today. He said he was expecting it to be a lot worse from everything he'd heard but he says he's fine. All the pain associated with the surgery and since is far less than what he was experiencing with his back on a day to day basis since his last major episode last fall.

He climbed the four steps into our house with no problem and just acts like nothing's wrong. I attribute much of it to his very high tolerance for pain. We even went shopping at WalMart, before coming home, to get his prescription and some groceries, but he did use an electric cart there.

He can't drive or lift anything heavier than 5# until his two week post surgical appoint- ment. Now he just has to heal and from all indications it won't take long.

The facility is fairly new with all the modern conveniences, including a five-star chef and Direct TV, no TIVO though :-(. There are only 18 in-patient rooms as much of what they do is on an out-patient basis. news story Their entire staff is just awesome.

Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers. I know they made a difference. We were both at peace before and during the surgery.