My husband had major (over 11 hours) surgery on May 4, 2010 to remove and rebuild the left side of his jaw bone and the floor of his mouth using his fibula and skin and veins from the leg.

He started 30 radiation treatments and 3 cisplatin treatments on June 15 and finished July 27. He can�t speak clearly and gets tired easily.

He is a college professor and the department reassigned his classes knowing he would not be able to teach when the semester started August 16. We asked the radiation oncologist to approve sick time for the semester. He did not. The dates he approved for sick time were only until August 10, two weeks after treatments ended and a week before the semester began! We did not learn this until yesterday when the university human resources informed us that Tim was AWOL. The doctor has agreed to extend the sick time to September 10, since otherwise, my husband could get fired having not shown up the last two weeks � for classes that were never scheduled.

The doctor has not seen my husband since July 13 � two weeks before treatment ended. We see him this Friday to get the results from the follow-up CT that was taken Monday. At this time, we can appeal his decision. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to convince the doctor that while my husband is super awesome, he is still human .