Stryde LL surgery in Istanbul, Turkey (May 2019)

Hello everyone,

I never had any problems with my height in society, with people, with work, with friends. I have had pretty good girlfriends and friends that are bigger and taller. That wasn’t the reason I did it, I did it for myself because I wanted to better than I could be, and wanted to be physically, mentally and whatever it may be, the best I could have ever been.

My career was of an athlete, always have been an athlete in my life,. I would never have done this surgery unless it was only 3 months of lengthening and that’s it, you are done, and you can still walk and do everything. Just thought it would be better to have a little bit more height to myself, not because I was trying to portray an image in anybody else’s eyes but just to make me feel better.

I had limb lengthening surgery on May 7, 2019 with Stryde method in Turkey, by Dr. Ozgur from a team called "Wanna Be Taller" (www.wannabetaller.com), who are specialized in limb lengthening and other orthopedic surgeries.

As I go through my LL journey I plan to update you guys every day. There will be photos, x-rays and videos soon.

edited: on OP request

Hey Simon, congrats and best of luck on your journey, it won't be easy.

I'm also from Canada, and did my surgery in Azerbaijan, which almost neighbors Turkey, and in fact all the people here speak Turkish. Are you going to spend your recovery time in Turkey, or head back to Canada? 3 months lengthening ONLY means lengthening, it doesn't talk about the recovery time, which means the most actually. Heck, my lengthening stopped after 3 months, and 5 months later I'm still not 100%,

Did you do externals or LON/LATN?

A LITTLE INFO ABOUT PRE-SURGERY:

(readers please note that I am making diaries in the form of voice recordings then convert them to text when I have time. So don't mind the weird structures of sentences, i just don't have the patience to edit it properly)

I arrived in Turkey in the evening, the driver from Wannabetaller team was already there waiting for me. He took me to my hotel and I got some rest. The next day he took me on a good tour, showed me around, I had a good translator and a good driver. He took me to the hospital where I did all my x-rays and everything to get ready.

I was starting to feel nervous and actually thinking maybe not to go ahead with it. I hadn’t told anybody I was doing it, and I almost cancelled. I set my thoughts and then we had an appointment arranged to see the surgeon. So I went in, saw the surgeon, had a good chat with him. He was very good, very professional, and I decided it was what I wanted to do, and I was gonna go through the surgery. The doctor explained everything about the surgery, and how it was going to be the first Stryde being done in Turkey. And then I told the guys that for the service package I had selected, I wanted to go with a different hotel.

So I decided I was gonna do it but I wasn’t really sure where I was going to stay, and so I spoke to the Wannabetaller team and their head boss decided he will come with me, and we went all around the city, we looked at different hotels, I told him what I was looking for, he went through all of them and asked the special rates and got really good deals from all of them actually. So I was happy with what I have found and I picked Hyatt Regency. I had also requested for a PlayStation to play, and they bought and gave me when I arrived here. They got me a blender for my protein shakes. Anything I asked them for, they wanted to sort it out.

At the end of the day, I was nervous about what was going to happen, and they knew that and so they really looked after me and made me so comfortable and told me that after the surgery they would help me through the whole recovery for the whole time I will be in Turkey.

are you lengthening femurs o tibias?

I had surgery on femur and aiming for 8 cm. I think physiotherapy is very important to do every day and I chose the better package (they have two service packages for two types of budgets and I chose the more expensive one, and asked for even more physio sessions which added to the costs)

I also recommend staying in Turkey for 90 days, for the whole lengthening phase, to those who want to get it done, to prevent any complications. Because you need to be around people who know whats going on, in case of complications etc, this is the most serious surgery I have ever done.

You wouldn’t be able to do what you usually do, so they provided an aid in the hospital, which is great, and covered in the package. You wanna make sure you get a hotel. Sports and mobility is important that’s why I recommend getting physio sessions 7 days a week for the whole period of lengthening.

 I had surgery on femur

how tall are you simon? How much did you pay for it?

can you remove your company name and website? diary would become more genuine then.

THE SURGERY DAY
When in the hospital, I saw the surgeon, he went through what was gonna happen and then anesthesia was applied and I don’t remember anything, I just woke up there, not much pain, I was just very sleepy from the medication, and cannot really remember much of that day, this is how I spent my day 1 in the hospital.

Day 2
I didn’t sleep very well that night, I woke up, and then fell asleep, but I didn’t have much pain. I woke up the next day, I was still kind of trying to come to terms with what I have actually done. The boss of Wannabetaller came to visit me, they changed the translator to a better one, who spoke really good English. She was with me as my caretaker for the rest of the time I was in the hospital. The boss was really good, he is the guy who organizes everything. He bought me a chess deck, some additional PlayStation games. The hospital staff was bad, not organized, not kind, and after that, they (guys from Wannabetaller) are not going to use this hospital again.

Day 3
Was starting to feel a bit lost about what I have done, this is crazy, ‘should I have really done this?’. My gf came today as well, and that made me fell a lot better. I don’t remember so much, with a lot of painkillers, but I was ok. The hospital staff was bad but the Wannabetaller team came and set everything up for me, it was great, they were there for everything I needed the whole time and have never let me down ever since. They were more than enough of help.

Day 4
Feeling a bit better, and I haven’t mentioned earlier but the physiotherapist came on the previous days and I had walked a little bit every single day, not very much, and I have done physio and exercises.

Day 5
Here is a brief video of how I was walking on the day 5:


I will soon update more recent videos of my walking and hope that gives you an insight of how physio everyday improves walking ability.

Take care!

Hi simon

Congrats on starting your new journey to the CLL!!  Yeah, it is a crazy process.  Most of people, perhaps all, have some moments to think "what the hell am I doing?"  But it is done and no turning back, which may be a good thing to think.  Just focus and make a small progress everyday!  So far, you look pretty good as a patient 5 days after surgery.  You may feel quite some pain for a while up to 3 weeks and then pain will go down to a extent.  So just keep on working everyday!
By the way, I am just curious about why you chose to go to this place in Turkey.  Are they cheaper than those in US?