Maybe I'm being naive or stubborn, but I honestly don’t worry much about proportions. I’ve thought about it before, but I never really paid attention to anyone’s wingspan until I learned about limb lengthening. A lot of people who are already familiar with LL claim they can “tell” when someone’s proportions are off, but they almost always say that after finding out the person had the procedure like with TikTokers who openly talk about it.
If you showed an average person someone who has no idea what LL even i —a picture of someone with shorter wingspan relative to their height, they wouldn’t notice anything. Most people don’t know LL exists, let alone think about proportion details like wingspan.
From my perspective, if someone is very short (say 5'2"–5'6") and decides to go with the maximum of inches 8.78 inches which you can get from betz, their quality of life will genuinely improve much more than just getting something "relative" to there wingspan. And even if someone also has the money for arm lengthening to match wingspan, I’m not convinced it’s necessary. Sure, every once in a while someone might comment that your arms look a bit short for your height if you end up getting 8 inches, maybe during sports or while shopping with someone new but you could just brush it off with some excuses like "I have scoliosis thats why my torso and arms are smaller". Most people wouldn’t think twice about it.
Maybe I’m wrong, and maybe it’s just because im a all or nothing type of guy, but if someone is already willing to spend that kind of money, time, pain, and dedication, I think they should choose the most inches they can get out of it. Worrying about the judgment of one or two people or random commenters online you see on someones post who got LL doesn’t seem meaningful. Most of us wouldn’t even notice wingspan differences if we weren’t purposely looking for them.
That’s just my personal outlook: if someone is already committed to the surgery, they should make the choice that makes them happiest, rather than stressing about a detail most people will never notice.
Yeah I get where you’re coming from, honestly
Most of us only started staring at people’s wingspans after we discovered LL. Before that I never paid attention to anyone’s arm length at all, and normal people definitely don’t walk around calculating ape index in their heads. Most of them don’t even know LL exists, let alone small proportion differences
I also did LL myself, got around 3 inches and ended up right around 6ft, and I’ve never once looked in the mirror and thought “wow my arms are short now”. Nobody has ever commented on it either – friends, family, coworkers, dates nothing. If I didn’t know my own numbers I wouldn’t even think about it
That said I still think proportions matter once you push things to extremes. Being 1–2 inches “off” is basically invisible in real life, but going for 7–9 inches on femurs for someone very short isn’t just a visual thing, it changes how you move – gait, hip angle, how your lower back feels, how easy it is to stay flexible and do sports. Arms you can hide in a hoodie, but a weird gait or chronic tightness is harder to ignore. When surgeons are conservative they’re usually not doing it for TikTok comments, they’re doing it because they’ve seen what happens when people go too far
So I kind of sit in the middle. I agree with you that obsessing over the perfect wingspan ratio is pointless and most people will never notice or care, and if someone wants LL they shouldn’t let imaginary internet critics control their decision. At the same time, “max cm possible” isn’t automatically the best choice either. It’s more about what still lets you live, walk and move comfortably long term
Short version from someone who actually did it: I gained 3 inches, hit 6ft, feel totally normal about my arms, and nobody has ever said a word. Proportions are worth respecting so you don’t wreck your biomechanics, but they’re really not worth losing your mind over.
Thanks for the response Charizard seriously. It helps hearing from someone who’s actually done LL and isn’t just theorizing. And you’re right most people don’t notice wingspan, and obsessing over ratios usually becomes a thing only once you start reading forums or social media comments. Before that, nobody thinks about these things.
I also agree with you that surgeons push for moderation for real reasons, not just aesthetics.
That said, the part where I still feel differently is the perspective gap between someone who starts out closer to average and someone who’s much shorter. Going from 5'10 to 6'1, or 5'9 to 6'0, is a huge psychological upgrade with only 2–3 inches. But for someone who’s 5'4, getting to 5'7 still leaves them in a height range where the difference is that are in the percentile that will get tormented by heightism and probably will still be insecure and still wishing they were taller. I mean I know many people who are tall who wish they were taller so the argument still can stand for all heights but its just so more brutal getting LL and being below 5'10 in my eyes.
I’m not completely saying “max inch's/cm no matter what,” but I am saying that if someone on the shorter end could safely gain a most cm possible without biomechanical issues, and the only real trade off is that their wingspan will look off, then I don’t think wingspan alone should be the thing that holds them back. Most people don’t notice it anyway, and as you said, arms are the last thing people comment on.
If its possible for a 5'4 man to get 8 inches and the only thing is his wingspan will be inches off I say still do it, everyone has different wingspan who cares if someone makes a T-rex joke once every couple years, but highly I doubt anybody will ever comment on your wingspan.
what are you on about - who ever increases by 8 inches??
Many people? there's people who have even gotten LL twice on both upper and lower leg, your able to get 12.3cm on upper leg and 10 cm on lower leg from betz which equals to 8 inches brother.
it might help if you could spell 🥵
thick as pig-
pajeet are you referring to the fact that I am spelling the word retard as "reetard" to accentuate the melodic nature of the term? i understand over there in india you guys are unable to appreciate the fine nuances of giving an emotional charge to written word so im gonna let you have this one
you win, time to go drop a stinky load on the nearest street corner to celebrate your intellectual supremacy
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