Recovery, babies, Thanksgiving in California,..........

WELL............
Marks recovery has been rather slow. He refused to get up and walk until 6 days after the surgery. The surgeon had told him to get up and walk the day of surgery, and to be up showering, moving around on the second post op day. Mark refused because it hurt. He preferred to lay in bed for 5 days until we had a major fight, me telling him,..enough,..get up, and take a shower, now. On day 6 he decided to start walking a little, but would lay down whenever he is uncomfortable. So now,...he is expected to return to work on Tues, (in two days), and is too sore to be up more than a few hours at a time. The frustration for me is that it didn't have to be like this. The surgery was laproscopic, no large incision, he had no complications,..just too stubborn to do anything that was uncomfortable. The pathology came back negative for having any metastasis. The tumor was malignant but appears to be contained. The chance of recurrence is less than 10% for the next 5 yrs. Could not have gone better.
Our friends have been incredible caring and supportive and I appreciate their prayers in all of this.
Donna brought Baby Jessi down for a visit to see her Dad after his surgery. Between work and Kassi's meeting at school, I didn't see much of them. Kassi has started volunteering at the Crisis Pregnancy Center in Woodland one afternoon a week, and has bought quite a collection of anti abortion "stuff". It would appear Mark decided to pose the baby with one of the bumperstickers.

Mark thinks Jessi really favors her Dad, I think she looks like Donna,..whatever,..she is 5 1/2 months and really cute. Not crawling yet,..but trying. She will let anyone (me) put her to sleep if she is tired enough, and really likes to watch me cook. Easily entertained!


So the plan is that Kassi, Denver, and I will be going to California for the Thanksgiving weekend. Mark has to work on the day after Thanksgiving and part of the weekend to make up for his time off. Just as well, most of the people I visit in Ca were my friends before I met Mark, so we are often talking about things he knows nothing about. The kids are excited, we'll go to Tulare, Tehachapi, Bakersfield, and Calif City , trying to see as many people as we can in 4 days. They have people to see and so do I, so we will try to cover all the bases. It will be a nice get away. We (the kids and I) haven't had a vacation together since the disaster that was Costa Rica. Not that it is a bad place, just the fact that we were sick as dogs has forever colored our view of that country! Happy Thanksgiving to everyone that is home for the holiday.