So I finally decided to look at the full length mirror while nked, and it's quite obvious that I got LL. My femurs look much much longer than before. But my tibs stayed the same. My torso is pretty long to begin with and so were my arms. So my whole body now looks like a normal person, except for my tibs. So if you were to take a picture of me and don't include my feet, I look like a tall guy 5'11" guy. My Tibs are the only part of me that look oddly short. They look like they've been cut off about 2" too short. I've noticed this before I had the surgery that my tibs looked short and stubby, but now it's even more pronounced after LL. But during surgery, I had a 0.8 tib to femur ratio, which Paley said is quite normal. Now I almost have to wear shoes lifts to make my tibs look proportional. My knees are way below where you'd think they should be when I'm nked.
I don't mind wearing 1" shoe lifts and 1" soled sneakers. I look like 5'11" when I do - which is my ideal height. Feels great to be that tall. This changed my mental state so much. I've been walking around my house lately to try to build back my leg muscles and it feels great that almost everything is now shorter. It really makes you feel tall when the sink is much lower than you remember it, and you can reach things now that you couldn't reach before.
I think my thigh muscles have been in pain because of tightness and how weak my legs are now. There's not much I can do about the tightness, because that just takes time. But I can work on my leg muscles. This is good preparation for when I can walk again. Every patient seems to have some kind of hip swaying when they first walk without aid. One patient said that he got rid of it after 2 weeks of walking. Speaking of which, I've been putting less weight on my walker/crutches to the point where it's almost none, and I'm able to walk just fine. I'm glad that I'm not crippled and can walk! That's a huge relief off my shoulders.
If you care about proportions when you're nked, don't do 8 cm on only one segment. I have to admit that it doesn't look good. It looks weird to have freakishly disproportionate legs. Good thing it's not the norm to go outside nked. I can wear shoe lifts and lower my pants/shorts a bit to fix the proportions. If I cared about my proportions when nked, I probably would have done 5-6 cm in femurs and 4-5 cm in tibs instead. That would probably make me look the most proportional and normal. It would also probably reduce the loss in athleticism and tightness in my legs. I don't care about the disproportion, though, because it gives me an excuse to wear shoe lifts. And now I look normal wearing them.
I can get my tibs lengthened to fix all this and never have to wear lifts again. But I don't think it's worth it. My height neurosis is already gone. I don't want to waste another half a year of my life on this stuff again and risk having permanent pain.
DoingItForMe's Precice 2 Internal Femurs with Dr. Paley
"Good thing it's not the norm to go outside nked"
Haha yeah. I don't think you should worry too much about the proportion of your legs.. You wear clothes 99% of your life so it's fine. Also, you sound like your recovery is slowly coming to fruition and you are happy. That's all that matters.
Quote from: DoingItForMe on December 10, 2015, 10:39:59 AMIf you care about proportions when you're nked, don't do 8 cm on only one segment. I have to admit that it doesn't look good. It looks weird to have freakishly disproportionate legs. Good thing it's not the norm to go outside nked. I can wear shoe lifts and lower my pants/shorts a bit to fix the proportions. If I cared about my proportions when nked, I probably would have done 5-6 cm in femurs and 4-5 cm in tibs instead. That would probably make me look the most proportional and normal. It would also probably reduce the loss in athleticism and tightness in my legs. I don't care about the disproportion, though, because it gives me an excuse to wear shoe lifts. And now I look normal wearing them.
Like someone said before: "don't let your height neurosis turn into proportion neurosis". Even nked, I don't think people will notice your long femurs, and, even if they do, they won't give any importance. And no one will think you did LL unless you have huge scars (which I think is not the case with internals)
I don't want to ask this but as a potential LL patient I have to... does the penis look smaller after lengthening the femurs...? 
It's interesting your observation that long femurs can be "balanced" using lifts. IMO that's another point for femurs in the "should I lengthen femurs or tibias?" question. The length of the lower section of the legs can be "increased" with tricks like heels or soles, but there is no way to lengthen the upper section except for LL.
Congrats on your almost finished LL journey! 
Going along the whole proportion discussion DIFM, I myself am more worried about leg to body proportion rather then just tibia to femurs considering I'm planning on doing 4+4 (which for many would seem like a hard pressed goal considering the fact that I'm going to have to experience a month of agony, but considering the better risk management and recovery I'm deadest on that goal).
You said you already had a longer torso to begin with, so how would you say you look when you tuck in your shirt as if you're wearing more formal attire? My all time biggest worry with LL isn't the possible complications that might arise, but that I come out looking weirder then most people. Also do you have any body measurements that could provide a reference as to your current proportions; Sitting height or True Inseam?
Lastly, and I'm sure I asked you this before, but are you willing to provide pictures of your current proportions? Obviously covering your face and everything cause privacy is still 100% important.
well if you want an honest answer you can send me a pic. underwear of course and i'll give a brutally honest answer.
Quote from: Iamready on December 10, 2015, 08:48:14 PMwell if you want an honest answer you can send me a pic. underwear of course and i'll give a brutally honest answer.
Are you referring to me or DIFM? Either way I'd be willing to post mock ups one day but for now I feel like I rather focus on getting much fitter and working on my weight before I tackle my height (not obese just a bit fat around the sides is all lol).
Also funny enough that you posted here because I was also going to ask you about what you think in regards to proportions since you're aiming, in a relatively safe way, pretty high in terms of gain. Any insight into this subjective discussion would be appreciated.
Quote from: DoingItForMe on December 02, 2015, 09:38:22 PMIt's a drug that they inject into you. It's meant for treating osteoporosis and reducing the risk of hip fractures in certain patients. But Dr. Paley said that it'd be useful for me as well. The way it works is that it prevents the body from reabsorbing the bone back into the blood stream. The way people's bones work is that bones are constantly being absorbed into the blood and then rebuilt again. This slows down consolidation, because you lose bone as you're growing bone. By stopping the body from absorbing the bone back into the blood, then you only grow bone without losing any. Therefore, the consolidation is sped up. I put off the drug not because of the $1,000+ price tag, but because I'm worried about putting more drugs into me that could potentially have serious side effects. The risk of serious side effects of Zometa are very low, though. Most likely I'll just end up with flu-like symptoms for a day or two. The only serious side effect is permanent jaw pain. But those cases usually only happen to cancer patients who take the drug long term, and also to people who have dental surgery after taking the drug.
So how long would you have to take it for before you start seeing the benefits? Do you know how much it speeds up the process. I would totally budget for it.
I ended up not taking Zometa, because the doctor refused to see me because I was 10 minutes late to the appointment for reasons that wasn't my fault. His next available appointment was in February. By that time, I'd be able to walk without crutches anyway. I could see another doctor with an earlier appointment date, but by the time I get the drug, I'd probably be able to walk anyway. I know this because I've been able to walk without aid already.
I don't have final approval by Dr. Paley for walking without aid, but he did say that I was almost fully healed on my left leg. I don't want to risk further muscle atrophy, which I think is detrimental to my well-being and health, so I'm going to risk breaking the nails to try to get some walking in my exercises. The Precice 2.1 nail is very well made, and it seems to be able to hold my weight on one leg even though it's only rated to hold 75 lbs. The thing is, I try to keep the weight as straight as possible. The rods are strongest when you put the weight lengthwise. It's weakest when you try to bend them. So I'm not going to try to put my weight on the rods at an angle. And the way to do that is to take shorter steps. The more your separate the legs, the more the weight is angled. The recommended consolidation posed by Precice's instruction manual is that the bone needs to be solid on at least 3 sides out of 4 sides of the rod, but I'm only solid on 2 out of 4 sides.
Anyway, I started walking without aid because I got really tired of sitting to shower. It's been 5 months since I was able to stand to shower, and a few days ago, I finally decided to just walk into my shower without aid because I didn't want to get my walker or crutches wet and slippery. At first I was very cautious and held onto any fixed object. But eventually I managed to just baby step my way into the shower. Now that I'm standing more, I can feel my legs feeling a bit more normal again. There's still pain in my legs but I'm hoping they'll go away as I get more and more exercise on my legs. I enjoy my standing showers now. The one thing they don't tell you about LL is that it gives you a greater appreciation of the things you normally would take for granted.
No pictures, sorry. As much as I want to, I value my privacy greatly. So here's a picture of someone else's mock up pic whose legs look similar to mine: http://i.imgur.com/Wj07rGx.jpg He's wearing underwear, so it's a bit less obvious. But if you picture the underwear in a V shape like a Speedo instead of boxer briefs, you can sort of see how the thighs look really long when you're fully nked. That's how I look like when I'm nked. My thighs seem to go on forever, but my tibs look short.
My inseam used to be 28" - no adult-sized jeans fit me well. It is now 31". I checked online, and it seems like 5'5" - 5'6" should have a 30" inseam, and 5'9" guys should have a 32.5" inseam. This is why my leg to torso ratio is just perfect now. It's just weird to see my knees lower than where I expect them to be or my tibs looking short and stubby still. With pants on, it look normal.
is it ok to swin while lengthening? so that weight will not increase?
to prevent muscle loss too
You can swim while lengthening. That's what I used to do for exercise when I was still lengthening. During consolidation, I swam for the first month, but then didn't swim much lately, because it's cold outside.
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