[ImpOssibleOne]

Hey,

I finally bit the bullet. Had an ALIF on Tuesday at Stanford and all went well.
Took about 90 minutes and the surgery itself was a breeze (for me.) They wheeled me into the OR; one minute I'm chit-chatting being introduced to everyone and the next Dr. Carragee was smiling and saying "You're done!"
The pain was manageable, courtesy of a morphine pump and the nurses couldn't have been nicer. My husband stayed all day with me and that was a godsend emotionally. He simply set up camp; computer/phone/newspapers and stayed till I went to sleep at night. Not that I slept well, the Dr's and vampires from the lab were disturbing me all night long but it was all fine.
By Wednesday afternoon I was only using the pump recreationally so they yanked it and switched me to Vicodin. It works but it's definitely not as much fun.
On Thursday the doctors stormed into my room at 6:20 and said, "You're doing great. Your chart doesn't even look like a surgical patient's. No fever, no blood loss, no nothing. So after a forced march around the nursing station, I was given the boot. It was actually my choice; I really wanted to go home as there was nothing the hospital was doing for me at that point.

I'm still in pain, obviously, but it's not unbearable and I can putz around the house with relative ease. In fact, I made my husband his morning toast today. :-) I'm still a little gassy, eating gingerly, but I don't think that's a reason to remain hospitalized. I'm sure it'll be fine soon.

My surgeon happens to be of the get-up-and-do-it persuasion so I've no brace and few restrictions but when my body begs to differ it has no problem letting me know. All well so far.

Adrienne