Since my diary on old forum seems to be gone and I got myself banned I will continue my diary here since I think there is still a lot of interest in how things are post LL. My experience with Dr. Sarin was positive with little pain and no major complications. Sweden has done an excellent job with his post-LL updating so I will try to do the same. I am still at the guest house for another month since I decided to stay longer to recover more.
Zip of my old forum dairy in HTML format
https://docs.google.com/uc?export=download&id=0Bx9uEct5EovhTDlxenBHNGQ2aUU
Here is a quick summary:
Info about me
From: USA
Age: 24
Armspan: 180 cm (5’11”)
Sitting height: 90 cm (35.5”)
Weight before LL: 73 kg (160 pounds)
Pants: 30”x30”
Height before LL: 170.8 cm (5’7.3”)
Height after LL: 178.4 cm (5’10.25”)
Lengthened amount: 6.5 cm (2.56”)
I found this a bit odd. I am guessing the additional height is due to spine decompression from being in bed for so long every day at the guest house.
Frames were put on 4/19/2013
I had two minor pin site infections.
I had numbness in a part of right leg and could not move my big toe and had difficulty moving my small toes so Dr. Sarin had me stop at 6.5 cm instead of 7 cm.
Frame removal on 7/26/2013
After frame removal I weighed 57 kg (125 pounds) and had about 5 cm (2”) of ballerina foot as well as some knee bending in my left knee.
I started standing 3 weeks after frame removal, walking using a walker with wheels at about 4 weeks, crutches at 5 weeks, hand crutches at 6 weeks, and at 7 weeks I could walk unassisted slowly and painfully with shoes on.
Right now I am 61 kg (134 pounds) and my ankles have a little bit above 90° range of motion.
Hospital video
Lengthening video
Walking upstairs is easy but going downstairs is quite difficult. I lack the ankle range of motion and thigh strength to walk smoothly.
Walking barefoot feels okay and walking with shoes is easier with the slight lift of the heel.
Guest house
The living conditions at the guest house are all still good. I am satisfied with the food, power, Internet, and having concerns addressed. Aftercare has significantly improved from a couple of months ago.
Current status
It takes a couple of minutes to get my feet flat in the morning or after not standing for a while. I can walk long distances unassisted upstairs or on a flat surface but I do not walk completely normal. Walking downstairs unassisted is still quite difficult. Right now I am focusing on exercises to build size and strength of thighs and gain further range of motion of my ankles.
X-ray from August 17th, 3 weeks after frame removal. The lengthening estimate on the gap is wrong, I did 6.5 cm
X-ray taken September 16th, 7 weeks after frame removal.
Proportions photos – I feel my torso looks a bit short but other than that I am happy with how I look. Tibia looks like it is about equal in length to femur so it is at the limit between looking normal and not normal. I am happy with how my tibia and femur look so stopping at 6.5 cm was just right.
Photos of scars – Tibia and Fibula osteotomy sites look good. My Tibia osteotomy site is 2 lines and Dr. Sarin told me if he did not do the C shaped cut because it might have splintered my whole tibia bone. The inner knee, middle pin site, and IM nail insertion scars look the worst. My IM nail insertion scar developed into a keloid so it looks extra bad – I see other patients with scars that look much better.
To the nked eye my alignment looks okay; my legs are straight as they should be.
Thoughts on a 2nd Surgery
I have mixed feelings about doing a 2nd surgery for an additional 4 cm. Some tell me to just go for the height if it means something to me and the amount I want is reasonable and is not going to be enough to matter and many others say I should not bother and I would be stretching my currently good proportions to the limit and be risking disproportion.
My gut feeling is to not do it. I think the sacrifice in proportion would not be worth the additional gain in height. Everyone says I look good as is, my tibias look good in relation to my femurs, and 5’10” is a good height. Personally I think my tibias look a bit longer than I would like but I think I still have a lot more muscle to build back before I can accurately judge. I still probably would have lengthened to 7 cm if I was able to. My tibias are longer than everyone else’s at the guest house who was near my starting height and I still think they look okay so I would recommend others to lengthen between 6 and 7 cm and not be worried. Perhaps later in my life I could top off my femurs with an additional 2.5 to 4 cm to even out my tibia and femur proportion and gain a tiny bit of height.
I am open to any questions or requests for photos or videos.
Calic - External Tibias - Dr. Sarin - 2013 - My LL Experience
@TomD
I feel Dr. Sarin should spend more time with patients. I am sure a lot of the time problems are not severe but he should spend a bit more time explaining things and make patients feel like they are cared for. He almost always answers his phone and will be here if you have a problem you really think needs to be checked out right away. All of the patients here currently are doing okay and have no major problems.
The guest house is clean and the staff are responsive. Bed sheets are changed regularly, floors are swept and cleaned, pee bottles and trash emptied, and food trays removed.
The caretakers live here and have cell phones you can call to request anything you need done - being moved up and down stairs, laundry, retrieve items from the fridge, clean up messes, buy stuff from the market, or whatever.
@Carter
I would definitely do internals if I choose to do femurs. I am pretty worried about proportions so I will need to wait until I get my muscle back and do some mockups before I feel comfortable doing 5 cm more.
My level my pain was low throughout the whole process, I almost never took any painkillers. Physio, pin site infections, and moving around after 1st surgery did cause me substantial temporary pain though.
I no longer use crutches.
@Sweden
I am sure I will get used to them soon. I often wonder how much I could have lengthened and still been okay. My tibias are longer than everyone else's at the guest house so that had me scared to not lengthen too much.
@TomD
I felt Dr. Sarin genuinely cared for me, he would always answer my calls or text messages right away or within a day. He never ignored any of my concerns but I never had any major concerns come up during my lengthening.
Dr. Sarin did not try to up-sell me anything and he stayed true to the package price including everything you need while staying here including fixing complications. Pain killers and meds are always available free to anyone who needs them. I do not think he refused x-rays to me or anyone and everyone goes for x-rays every 3 or 4 weeks anyway. Perhaps if you wanted more frequent x-rays you would need to convince him of a reason why.
Dr. Sarin fixed complications for patients for free without any haggling, I have seen many patients go to the hospital again for frame or pin adjustments or other issues with no trouble.
I did meet Sysop for about 5 minutes when he came to my room but I did not know at the time he was Apotheosis.
Thanks, I still think the scars don't look so good right now though. I have not been given any cream or anything for the scars and I have not done anything personally to try to improve them. With enough time they will fade and with the hair on my legs they probably will not be noticeable and I will not care. I might have the keloid scars cosmetically fixed up after I get my IM rods removed.
I am still at the guest house and will be here until the end of the month.
@Goodnews
Thanks. I have been told it is just weak muscles and it should fix itself eventually. I definitely did not have this issue before LL and my roommate who is at my stage of walking also has the same issue. My ankles do not hurt when I walk so it is not as painful as it looks.
@short_and_depressed
Yes, I can make them straight. I do agree it looks like I am bending them but that is the normal relaxed state for me, not sure if it is normal or not?
My knees, especially the right knee, do point inwards slightly. I was told it was just lack of muscle size and strength that causes this so it should correct itself with time.
@Leonardo2013
I do not consider myself to have any ballerina. Within a few minutes of standing in the morning I can get my heels flat on the floor no problem and for the rest of the day I am okay. I have more than 90° range of motion but I am still far from normal.
There is no pain when I am sitting and crossing my legs. I am unable to squat much at all, I simply lack enough range of motion of my ankles and leg strength to do it.
Quote from: Sweden on October 09, 2013, 04:19:41 PMYour callus looks like it was more than a year since first surgery. Are you Superman?
Haha, thanks. Actually DEM is having a faster recovery than I had. He lengthened 7.5 cm and is getting is ballerina down and walking with crutches quicker than I was. He even did a little bit of walking without crutches several days ago. I will get after him to do an update in his diary.
@Leonardo2013
Yes, anything between 6 and 7.5 cm is ideal. I think most people can lengthen 7 cm on their tibias and they will still look normal to anybody who is not aware you had leg lengthening.
I do not think you lose any mm after frame removal. The rod is locked in place with screws before the frame is removed so I do not think this should happen.
Quote from: Leonardo2013 on October 11, 2013, 03:44:23 PMHey, Calic -- what do you know of Captain? I knew he lengthened the same amount as you did, but do you know how his recovery is? Thanks!
I am not sure but I heard from others that he is not walking yet since he is so heavy he needs a lot of callus before he can safely do it. I am not sure what the status is on his foot.
Quote from: kneehowguys on October 13, 2013, 03:35:57 PMCalic what are your thoughts on
1. Sarin horror stories
2. Dr jamal / jamal nail?
3. censorship from old forum
4. censorship from Sarin?
I do not know of any horror stories. There are patients who have had problems but since they have left I am unaware of their current status.
I have not looked up much information on Dr. Jamal or the nail but he seems like he might be a cost effective alternative to the HLN for internal femurs. I might consider going to him in 2014 if I choose to do my femurs.
I think it is cool Sysop wants to push LL forward but the way he is going about it is wrong. Promoting a fake diary for an inexperienced doctor and removing all traces of Dr. Sarin without any legitimate reason is not right.
Quote from: Adriano on October 16, 2013, 02:42:27 AMHas that "deep bone nnfection" been confirmed or mentioned by anyone else other than Syop/Apotheosis?
Maybe i missed a few posts that did.
I was roommates with the HLN patient for most of my lengthening and I am still in contact with him by email. He had the infection pretty much the entirety of his lengthening and after going back home he had to have the infected rod and screws removed and he also had an infection around the site the hydraulic hose went in.
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