Back at my desk at week 3 and I am finished by lunchtime. Did anyone else underestimate the tiredness rather than the pain?

Three weeks and two days after a full tummy tuck with repair, back at a desk job from home, and I am wrecked. Not sore, wrecked. The pain honestly stopped being the story around day ten, but by 1pm I am staring at a spreadsheet with no idea what I was doing and by 4pm I am back on the sofa.

I had planned this so carefully. Two weeks off, third week easing back, everything signed off, and I genuinely thought the hard part would be sitting comfortably. Sitting is fine with a cushion. It is my BRAIN that has clocked off. I keep having to reread emails three times.

Is this normal for week three or have I done something daft by going back too early? I am self-employed so there was not really a version where I took six weeks, which I know is the answer everyone is about to give me.

Completely normal in my experience and it lasted longer than the pain by miles. I went back at three and a half weeks to office work and I was doing half days in practice even though I was on the clock for full ones. Around week six something switched back on. I remember the exact week because I noticed I had stopped needing a nap.

Not daft, just under-warned. Everyone measures recovery in pain because that is the thing you can describe, and then the tiredness turns out to be the bit that actually runs your calendar. I found afternoons noticeably worse than mornings and I think some of that was the swelling building up rather than pure fatigue, they seemed to arrive together.

paulalifts said:

It is my BRAIN that has clocked off

Yes, and the words for it are terrible so people just say tired. Mine felt like the first week of a new job, that specific fried feeling, except I was doing my own job of eleven years. Blocked my hard thinking into the morning and put admin in the afternoon, which was the only scheduling decision that helped.

Week three was exactly where this hit me too, and I had made the same planning mistake: I budgeted for pain and driving and forgot that a general anaesthetic, major surgery, broken sleep in a recliner and a body rebuilding tissue all cost something, and they get paid for out of your energy. In my diary the phrase I used at week three was "the tiredness has taken over from the pain", which turned out to be the honest summary of that fortnight.

Two things that made a real difference to me, for whatever they are worth. Getting up and walking a few minutes every hour rather than sitting for three straight hours, because I felt better and less swollen on the days I did it. And accepting mornings as the productive part rather than fighting for the afternoon. Mine lifted somewhere in weeks five and six, gradually enough that I only noticed afterwards.

The realistic version of this stretch is in tummy tuck recovery weeks 3 to 6, and the honest picture on how long people actually need is in time off work after a tummy tuck. Being self-employed does not make you daft, it makes you the same as a good half of this section. What it does mean is being firm about the lifting and core restrictions even while you push on the desk hours, because those two are not the same thing at all.

Week six and a bit update, since threads that trail off are annoying. The afternoons came back. I did not do anything clever, I just stopped scheduling anything that needed a brain after 2pm for a month and it sorted itself out. Still swollen by evening but the fog has gone.