Got home late last night and sorry to have to leave my daughter and those wonderful grandchildren. But Katy's husband is there and basically works from home, so he'll be there while she recuperates.
It was an involved surgery (several hours) for her herniated disk which was the L1 just above the sacrum, and involved the sacrum, the L1 vertebrate and several nerves. This was a more involved surgery, as to get to the site, they had to go through the abdomen to get to the spine. They call it an Anterior Lumbar Interbody Fusion (ALIF), where they removed the herniated disk by entering the pelvis from the front, moving everything aside to get to the spine, then removing the disk, placing a spacer with a bone graft inside. The idea is for the body to fuse to this bone graft which takes 6-12 months. She came through the surgery very well, and when she went walking on day 1 the back pain she had been suffering with was gone. So, now it's just the pain from the surgery.
She won't be allowed to resume her surgical practice for at least 3 months, as they want her back to fuse, so no "forward tipping" like leaning over a patient undergoing surgery. She has quite a bit of vacation time so she is taking 2 months off before going back, which will give her some excellent time with her kids which she is very excited about.
This will be especially nice as they will be deploying her back to the war in July. So, this will give her the time with her kids that she will lose during the summer.
I'm glad to be back, as I so MISSED THIS GROUP OF FRIENDS, but my days were busy with her recuperation and the grandkids going to school and back, etc.
NOW TO TRY AND CATCH UP!!!!!