Long John Silver in the Orient - Dr Xia

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You're not a wimp for being in pain or crying. It's all part of the grueling process. There were many sleepless nights for me due to constant aching and the inability to find one comfortable position to sleep in. Some nights I was even cursing myself for voluntarily getting my legs broken and pulled apart. Once distraction is over that pain will go away. Just think of it like you're in a long battle and that you're not going to let the obstacle of pain prevent you from your mission.

Are the doctors there not willing or unable to give you a prescription for more pain medication?

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Yep, that's how it is in China.  They're very stingy with the pain medicine because of their society's troubled history with opium.  I'm not sure if this will fly anymore, but back in 2007 if you kept bothering the nurses you could get more.  I got 4 pills in one day with this method, then Wu Jie told me I'd had enough for that day.

LL hurts everyone.  Don't think you're special in that regard.   Have they given you wood lock?  You could try asking for it.  We had to buy it back in my day, but it provides some relief and they'll let you have as much as you want.

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Quote from: KiloKAHN on October 07, 2014, 03:35:28 PMYou're not a wimp for being in pain or crying. It's all part of the grueling process. There were many sleepless nights for me due to constant aching and the inability to find one comfortable position to sleep in. Some nights I was even cursing myself for voluntarily getting my legs broken and pulled apart. Once distraction is over that pain will go away. Just think of it like you're in a long battle and that you're not going to let the obstacle of pain prevent you from your mission.

Are the doctors there not willing or unable to give you a prescription for more pain medication?

Thanks Kilo, if the pain and aches don't get worse then I can manage and sustain this , I just wasn't sure as I expected the pain to go down when the number of turns we're reduced.

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Quote from: Medium Drink Of Water on October 07, 2014, 09:10:05 PMYep, that's how it is in China.  They're very stingy with the pain medicine because of their society's troubled history with opium.  I'm not sure if this will fly anymore, but back in 2007 if you kept bothering the nurses you could get more.  I got 4 pills in one day with this method, then Wu Jie told me I'd had enough for that day.

LL hurts everyone.  Don't think you're special in that regard.   Have they given you wood lock?  You could try asking for it.  We had to buy it back in my day, but it provides some relief and they'll let you have as much as you want.

Yes MDOW the mindset here is that if you take more than say 3 painkiller tablets in a day that you'll lose your sanity !

Better to be mad in pain than blissfully mad

I was given a wood lock rub and it was nice but did nothing to relieve my 'growing pains'. I think it will be useful when I'm consolidating and latter to rub down when the nails are in maybe.

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Quote from: Thegosis on September 28, 2014, 05:22:14 AMAre you in erqu dong or yiqu dong (#2 wing or #1 wing) at the Guangji Hospital in Fengtai District or do they have you in the new hospital somewhere else in Beijing?

My bed was #20 in yiqu dong and my maid was Yangjie from Gansu Province. Send her my regards and tell her that David from Australia (who left there on June 22 this year after first arriving at the end of November last year) has returned to work and is walking OK.

About ten days after the operation they will allow you to stand with the frames attached to your legs and permit you to commence turning the fixator dials which stretch the leg (bone, muscle and tendon) gradually longer over the course of months. I lengthened at 4 turns a day, with two hours between each turn (6am, 8, 10, noon). They changed that to 3 hours after I went past 4cm (6am, 9am, noon, 3pm). There are four dials on each frame and each dial has six numbered positions.

About 3pm each day the maid should offer you 'baojia' ie. foot massage with soaked hot towels, hot as you can bear.

Make sure to get about and practice words from your Chinese phrasebook with patients, visitors, nurses, etc in the other rooms and other wings. The wheelchair will be faster but the walking frame will be better for rehabilitation.

Hawthorn defeated Sydney by a big margin in the AFL Grand Final yesterday.

Hey David,  you did well being able to turn 4 times a day every 2 hours without painkiller right up to 4 centre meters.   Right now I am waiting 3 hours between turns and struggling to get the 4th turn due to the stretching aches and pains.

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LOL yeah.  My roommate Cloud took a lot of tramadol towards the end of his LL.  He was actually paying one of the maids to steal it for him from the stockroom.  Although she did it, she would say to him "Ni fungza. Ni fei chang fungza."  That's how I learned all those words.

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It is now three weeks since my operation and the X-ray results look good. I am just over a centimeter 'taller' now (1.26616 on my spreadsheet) and my body is coping much better with the 4 turns per day with gaps of 2.5 hours. Wheelchair is easy to get around and I'm taking longer walks each day with the frame. 

Two Chinese patients here have 'gone home' to consolidate. The Chinese girl, jennifer I met after consultation with Xia and her consultation decided to postpone her operation so I won't see her here. I met a 17 year old Chinese girl yesterday when I was out on my wheelchair and she is getting her legs fixed after a car accident. This is a full facility hospital with causality so ll patients are an exception and I noticed that x-ray staff are not experienced in treating ll patients.

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Interesting.  Guang Ji was primarily an LL place when I was there, and we had the grunting Neanderthal x-ray tech who lived in a room next to the machine.

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I have now lengthened just over 1 and a half centimeters.  Unfortunately though over the last week my left knee in particular has become very painful to bend and I'm becoming incapacitated. Although I could just keep turning, I fear something is wrong. I was doing 4 turns every day with a lot of pain in the evenings and nighttime. Today I will do no turns at all and hope the rest will do my body some good abd hopefully see a start to recovery in knee movement.

Have any of you chosen to stop for a few days and if so were then difficulties in getting back to the routine later?

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Sorry to hear you're having difficulties.  I had the same issue with my knees being stiff during lengthening and wondering if something was wrong.  It was okay, just the body's natural reaction to the trauma of LL.  I decided to keep going because the knee isn't where the lengthening is taking place, so there couldn't be a problem.

I took several breaks from turning, the longest being over a week if I remember correctly.  Taking breaks really helps if you're having pain when lengthening.  Nothing helped the knee stiffness, however, except cortisone injections.