Quote from: Tiger5 on February 09, 2016, 01:10:58 AMHey DIFM, this is the first time I posted, but have been reading your diaries, I am curious of your progress sine the last time you made an entry, I am sure others are as well. Hope to hear from you soon
Thanks
T
I'd had hope that my pain would be reduced as I rebuilt my strength, and some of it did. I'm at the gym almost every day now for at least an hour. I'm starting to use the exercise bike to regain stamina and strength. My stamina is starting to return to me, and I can walk maybe a mile before getting tired - when before it took only walking down the street to get tired. My heart rate drop down to 140-155 bpm when exercising. Before it was 170 bpm from just walking, which was exhausting. So I'm optimistic about my fitness, because it's starting to return to me, and it seems to be returning pretty quickly.
But aches and pain in my legs are still there. Some days I think that it's because I need to rest my legs. I get sore after working out the rest of my body, and usually the pain goes away after resting 3-4 days. So I tried that with my legs and let it rest - i.e. don't use them. After doing that, it actually made things worse, because leg muscles were tighter and less loose. And I guess they were weaker as well, so it hurt more when I used them. So no more rest days for my legs. That was a bad idea. I think that I just have to keep working out my legs until they're so strong that it no longer hurts to use them. That's my plan right now.
I still walk like a penguin, but less than before. I've also gained weight and am now 165 lbs - when before I was always 150 or under. This is the heaviest I've ever been in my life. I'm not exactly sure how this happened, because I've been exercising quite often. Most likely it's because I've been eating a lot. I'm going to cut carbs out of my diet to try to lose weight again - it worked back in October when I was only 142 lbs without even exercising. I've been eating whatever I wanted the past month, because I was afraid of depriving myself of nutrients for bone healing. But I think this weight is unhealthy.
Quote from: chineseguy on February 09, 2016, 12:21:51 PMhi. how much cm do you recommend for lengthening?
This depends on how much your body can handle the adjustment. But in general, from the diaries I've read and the stories I've heard, 7-8 cm is really the limit, and most likely where you'll cause problems long-term. I would recommend 6 cm or less on the femurs if you want to reduce the risk significantly. But it should really depend on the individual patient. For example, I noticed during my lengthening that I had to take more pain killers than every other patient (except for one other patient who was older than me). So I think age plays a huge factor in this as well.
Hope