Surgery Is Scheduled

So on March 4, J will have his shoulder surgery.  It's confirmed:  2 torn tendons and a rotator cuff tear.  The doctor promised he'd try to get J back to pre-work-injury health but that if he'd come when he first hurt his shoulder (and I quote:  "15 or 20 years ago"), he could have gotten the shoulder back the way it was in J's 20s!!!  J said he doesn't remember hurting that shoulder, but the doctor said there was quite a bit of atrophied muscle so it's obvious he did, and then powered through it, ignoring the injury and the pain.  That was the first time we met the doctor and he pegged J but good!!!

I was so afraid that since it was a workman's comp event we'd be sent to the doctors from hell, that we'd be sucked into the black hole of red tape and paperwork that would never be resolved because we all know government workers just take home a paycheck and don't care about their work...  (FYI:  That was a JOKE, people!  Although I admit to fear that working with the comp people would be problematic at best.  We've all had insurance fiascos, I'm sure...)

But, OMG, the people we had to work with at the comp office, along with the doctor's office staff, were absolutely phenomenal!  They responded to voice messages, they got things done, the comp people even had to get the doctor's surgical center approved as a venue so they could pay for the surgery, and they did it all!  We're dealing with CompServices, Inc.  They handle workman's comp claims in NJ and in PA.  I guess the government has farmed the work out to third party handlers and they have been wonderful.

The doctor told J that if we didn't like him now, because of his recommendation for surgery, we'd probably really hate him post-surgery.  The pain he's going through now is apparently nothing compared to the suffering after the operation.  He said if J is in the 40% of his patients who don't feel immediate relief, and there's a chance of that since there's so much damage in the joint, we'd be calling him demanding another MRI "because there's no way that [he] fixed the shoulder because [J] is in worse shape than before the surgery..."  He told us up front he's going to refuse another MRI, IF of course the surgery goes the way he feels it will, because it might take two months to see/feel any improvement.  Ouch.

Then the bad news.  And yes, SURGERY was NOT the bad news.  The BAD news was that J could be out of work, according to the surgeon, 9-12 weeks.  Completely unacceptable to my husband.  The doctor agreed that if his recovery and PT went well, that he'd consider 6-9 weeks, with a return to light duty.  You know, where you TEACH the kids to do a jumping jack, but you don't do it yourself.  Yeah, like that will ever happen...  But he made a point of telling J that doing the PT was good, that doing a little more at home, as advised by the therapist AND the doctor, was okay, too, but that OVERdoing it was NOT.  We had to explain that to my thick-headed husband a couple of times...  (Just kidding, J - love you!)

I'm going to take the day of surgery off, and the day after as well, and I'm planning to work from home the rest of that week.  J thinks that's overkill and I should go back to work the day after the operation.  (Don't know why he didn't tell me to go in after the surgery...)  I'm leaving it all up in the air for now, but have told my manager my plans and he's okay with them.

We've been warned by many that laying down will be impossible for him so we're borrowing recliners from our niece.  We were going to get them tomorrow, but we're waiting until next week now, because she's sick (and her husband is, too) and we can't take a chance that he picks up something.  It's bad enough he spends 7-1/2 hours a day with KIDS and their germs...

Keep your fingers crossed for the surgery and for my his recovery.  Thanks!!!