Pain Rating: 
Around 3am the day after surgery, I woke up in some discomfort. While I had the painkillers and water available next to my bed, I had neglected to bring up any snacks (it is recommended to take the painkillers with food), so I decided to work through the pain. In hindsight this was probably a mistake as the pain intensified. Finally around 5am I asked my wife is she could grab some crackers from the kitchen and bring them upstairs. Having taken the painkiller with food, I was finally able to get some more sleep around 30 minutes later. From now on, I'll leave some crackers by the side of my bed.
There is definitely more discomfort in my back today than yesterday - I have a feeling this is due to the morphine finally wearing off. Given that I'm 6'3" and weigh around 195lbs, I've decided to take two painkillers every 6 hours, instead of one. I've also started the rather large antibiotic pills and I'm taking the muscle relaxants too.
The hospital called around 9am to confirm that everything was okay and wanted to know if I had any questions. Since I haven't had a bowel movement yet, I wanted to know if this was an issue. I was told I should expect this to happen in the next day or so. As a precautionary measure I have some muscinex ready to "accelerate the process".
Most of today has been spent writing this blog and watching TV. My plan is to walk around during the commercial breaks on TV, to keep my back active.
Since I'm taking a myriad of pills at various times of the day, my wife put together an Excel spreadsheet to keep on top of things i.e.
The nurses at the hospital had mentioned the importance of loose stools, so I also started drinking plenty of prune juice as well.
In the afternoon, I decided to go for a short walk outside - thankfully I took the walkie talkie with me as the surgeon called a few minutes into my walk, and my wife notified me via the walkie talkie. Dr V (Villavicencio) wanted to know how I was feeling and if I had any questions. Since I wasn't completely sure about the length of surgery, he told me it took only 45 minutes. He also re-iterated the importance of not bending from the hips and not lifting anything that weighs more than a gallon of milk
After this conversation, I went for a 10 minute walk outside -- it felt good to get some fresh air.
Around 9pm, I did start getting some chills and I put this down to my body fighting the pain, as it didn't last long. In the evening, my wife removed the dressing from my back and I took my regular dosage of pills before going to bed.
