Very interesting thread.  I personally didn't really need any recovery time.  I would say within 3 days I was pretty much back to my normal routine.  My surgery was on a Monday and certainly by Friday I was back to normal.  I wasn't doing pull-ups and push-ups but I certainly wasn't restricted from leaving the house and doing most of the things I would normally do.  I went to a family gathering on the Friday following my surgery.  I wasn't able to set up the canopy's but I was able to move tables and set up chairs etc.  I did try to refrain from reaching over my head that day but at my follow-up visit with the surgeon the following week he encouraged me to go ahead and not restrict my reaching with my arms either.

I read everyone's posts before surgery and I too was worried about recovery.  But it turned out that all of that worrying was not necessary at all.  I am disabled and do not work, but I do not think my top surgery would have prevented me from working. 

Enjoy this exciting time and don't stress - its really not nearly as big of an ordeal as most think it will be.  Now with all of that said, we all know that everyone is different and everyone has different pain thresholds.  I have had seven major spine surgeries in the last 10 years, so my top surgery seemed very minor to me. 

Good luck to you & congratulations on your surgery date!! 

video games and christmas movies... lots and lots of christmas movies (surgery was dec 17th) after that it was tv and video games and books... at first books were kind of a non option with the pain meds situation... dizzying to read a bit.

I had a very quick recovery. I was up an walking right after surgery. Day two I slept most of the day and didn't take any pain pills and that night went out to eat. Third day I went to stay at my job for a few hours. My co-worker ended up sick and vomiting and I need up working for 3 hours. Day four I went to a farm and basically hung out. Day 5 and 6 I chilled at work. I even drove myself to my post op appointment to get the drains out. This is not a typical recovery. I wasn't in pain and was a very happy camper. Things to do depends on your hobbies. Reading, computer games, online time, movies, having visitors come by, school work. Make sure to get plenty of rest and eat well. And if sleeping is considered a hobby then do that. Lol

Sent from my SD4930UR using Tapatalk

Personally I spent the first week sleeping almost the entire time, I had all these plans for different things to keep me busy but the healing process and pain killers knocked me right out!
Now that I'm feeling mostly okay but still sore I spend most of my down time on Minecraft, it's very soothing


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Since I bled like an idiot I couldn't do much the first week. I was just super fatigued and my back hurt whenever I tried to do some regular activity, too, even though I wasn't in much pain otherwise. Just going to the store and do some shopping made me so tired I began to suffer from pain in my back and shoulders just from wearing my coat. I also couldn't walk up straight until about very recently, which is closer to 2 weeks post-op.

I'm almost fully mobile now though, outside of being a bit stiff, and it's been about 2 weeks. Still very swollen, however. When I couldn't do much, I spent most of my time in my bed watching TV series and I slept quite a fair bit the first week, too.

Slept for the first couple days because of the pain meds and then moved on to video games. I actually bought two new games before the surgery just so I would have something to do while recovering. |D

If you have a ds, fantasy life. I played a lot of video games. I also write and I've written 3 complete novels. I actually finished one of my books start to finish when I was recovering.

I didn't sleep much, but I was down on the couch for most of my recovery time. I just asked my spouse and he said I spent most of it doing things like writing,  playing my ds and watching him play games. I spent my first week in a hotel and I binge watched American horror story and walking dead. Of course, my recovery was interrupted by an international flight from Florida to osaka, Japan so I was put back a week on my schedule that my surgeon gave me. 

Sent from my SM-G920I using Tapatalk