I had 1/2 of my thyroid out.. the quick frozen section looked at by path while I was still in OR was negative, so the other side was left in. When I went to get my stitches out , the final path said I had follicular thryoid cancer and I had to go back in to surgery to have the rest of the thryoid removed. Not fun.
You could prob go back to work in 3 days, but anesthesia makes you very tired and it takes the body time to eliminate it from all your cells. And the tube that is in your throat during surgery can irritate the throat and make it uncomfortable to talk a lot .
I had a small tube in my in the lower neck (called a jackson pratt) to collect blood for about a week. If you have that you will prob not want to work but you could.
Wishing you well. There is a support group Thyca.org you could join for more questions/answers.