Yellowspike - Dr. Guichet, Internal Femurs, Late 2014

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Quote from: Uppland on February 23, 2015, 07:34:59 PMLooking forward to your diary, I am also interested in hiring DR. Guichet.

Make no mistake...Dr. Guichet is an amazing surgeon, and I believe a great person in general. My latest few posts have NOTHING to do with him or his craft. I'm just frustrated and VERY antsy. Patience has never been one of my virtues. LL has taught me that I need to work on that.

But Dr. G is awesome 

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I'm not sure where you at but keep in mind... Month 1 post op I could barely lift a leg with help when lying on my side, 3 months   just sitting flying home hurt badly, 4 months workouts began and continued to now where I am doing almost full leg workouts and (poorly) jogging after 8 CM. You go from a total shell of yourself to normal pretty fast.

Everyone I lengthened with seems to have recovered even better than me too, when I saw them at their worst, and despairing with my own eyes. Unless something has gone wrong and you are an outlier, I think it is normal to go from feeling broken(since you are) to normal quite soon. You should be very comfortable a couple weeks after stopping, with legs feeling almost normal after 2-3 months. And that is estimations using 8 CM, for you I would imagine better.

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Quote from: programdude on February 23, 2015, 11:40:34 PMI'm not sure where you at but keep in mind... Month 1 post op I could barely lift a leg with help when lying on my side, 3 months   just sitting flying home hurt badly, 4 months workouts began and continued to now where I am doing almost full leg workouts and (poorly) jogging after 8 CM. You go from a total shell of yourself to normal pretty fast.

Everyone I lengthened with seems to have recovered even better than me too, when I saw them at their worst, and despairing with my own eyes. Unless something has gone wrong and you are an outlier, I think it is normal to go from feeling broken(since you are) to normal quite soon. You should be very comfortable a couple weeks after stopping, with legs feeling almost normal after 2-3 months. And that is estimations using 8 CM, for you I would imagine better.

Thanks for the support pal. I appreciate it. I've followed your story as well, and given how athletic I know you are, I'm surprised recovery has taken you so long, even for 8cm (just over 1cm than what I lengthened). But you seem to be doing great, and you're back to your player ways with all your girls hehe (though, you never really stopped - I give you props). I have a lot I want to accomplish, and while I'm young, I'm not getting any younger. I want to get a better job (I'm paid pretty well, but underpaid for my qualifications), be dating/hooking up with girls again, back to the gym to get my ass back...lol. Today I did the bike for 30 minutes and walked a lot outside today. And I didn't feel winded at all. I also took my first full-standing shower (without sitting at all) since the surgery. So I guess I'm getting there. I'm trying to weight-bear as much as possible to help myself heal as soon as possible.

At this point, I'm just dying to walk unaided again, even if funnily. My next x-rays are on Saturday, just over a week since I finished clicking to 6.75+cm (not counting hospital clicks and extra clicks I threw in and didn't keep track of). I'm going to ask the radiologist if they can measure my gain, but Dr. Guichet insists his file is the most accurate. I think I gained closer to 7cm than I may realize, because I remember, even when subtracting the 1cm that he said the radiologist was overestimating, I was a few days ahead of the click file.

I just hope my bone ossification is better than the last x-rays, because while there was a definite bone bridge, it wasn't that great overall. But I was still clicking at a faster rate at my last x-rays (now almost a month ago next week).

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You are past the worst part, and once you start walking unaided and improve from there I think it will become a memory pretty quickly.

Are you noticing a serious change in your height with what you lengthened?

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Quote from: programdude on February 24, 2015, 01:23:49 AMYou are past the worst part, and once you start walking unaided and improve from there I think it will become a memory pretty quickly.

Are you noticing a serious change in your height with what you lengthened?

Thanks man, I sure hope so.

I am definitely noticing a serious change in my height, absolutely. My dad, boss, and another friend of mine are all my former height. I've seen them all since my surgery, and while it may not look it to someone on the outside looking at us, I feel like I tower over them. Like, I can almost see entirely over their heads. It's nuts. When I "walk" down the street (still with fairly significant duckass), I find that I'm as tall or just a little shorter than most men that I come across. I definitely didn't feel that way before the surgery. I never planned on going past 7cm, so 25mm (maybe even less) is undetectable I would say.

Overall, I'm happy with my gain. I still have a lot of pain right now, so I think stopping was the right idea, especially given how after 6cm recovery time really starts to climb.

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Im surprised you have so much pain, that should pretty much be gone a few weeks after, and only really present during extenuating circumstances.

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Quote from: programdude on February 24, 2015, 02:04:52 AMIm surprised you have so much pain, that should pretty much be gone a few weeks after, and only really present during extenuating circumstances.

Well, it's only mostly when I do certain movements. And I just stopped clicking officially less than a week ago. I didn't expect the pain to begin to subside until a bit after clicking. I have hip pain (due to one of the screws) on my right hip, which is probably the worst at this point, and both of my hamstrings/ITBs hurt a bit when I do certain movements.

Another thing that I've considered with my gain...I was moderately bowlegged before LL. With my feet together, my knees were pretty wide apart, though not enough impact my life in any way. My legs are like perfectly straight now. I think this may have given me a half cm/few mm as bonus, because I explicitly remember "manually correcting" my bowlegs in front of the mirror before the surgery, and it seemed to slightly increase my visual height. So there's that too.

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I'm feeling extremely ambivalent about continuing to click for a bit more or not. Right now, I'm at 6.75cm+ (I'm pretty sure I'm over that, because it doesn't count for practice clicks the first 2 days in the hospital, plus some extra clicks I threw in early on before the pain set in around 5cm) according to the click file, which I'm lead to believe is gospel (per Dr. Guichet). 7cm (37 clicks away) seems really far, and my main issue now is time. I'm working from home, but need to get back to the office hopefully by March 16th, and I had really wanted to be walking unaided by then. If I have to click for close to another week (I won't be able to handle more than 7 clicks or .5mm per day given my current pain), this may not be possible. Maybe I settle for in between and go to 6.85cm? I realize that we are talking about millimeters now, and I probably sound like an idiot. The difference between 6.75 and 7cm is 1/10th of an inch (undetectable). I had never planned on going over 7cm, and I still don't. 7cm was always the absolute limit I wanted to lengthen.

I guess all this talk about femur angles taking away some of what you lengthen has upset me (I didn't discover this until a few days ago, and really wish I hadn't, as much as this forum has been an asset to me). I really want to be 5'8"...that is all. And I have fairly significant duckass still, so my standing height still can't be properly measured. I just don't want to have any regrets...but now I feel like I'm falling victim to the numbers game. And the fact of the matter is, I'm running out of time with my work and also have fairly significant pain/issues (knee pain, ITB pain, hip pain - nothing excruciating, but bad sometimes).

Height neurosis is the absolute worst...I just want to fully put this behind me after I recover with no regrets. I've worked too hard not to have closure, as stupid and petty as all of this may sound.

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In my opinion,this is a psychological issue. Which either needs psychological and/or psychiatric solutions OR the physical attainment of your target. Even if you physically reach your target, or exceed it, there is a chance that it is a "moving target", ie you might revise your target upwards to 5'10, etc. So a psychological/psychiatric solution is (probably, but its your life) more acceptable. Ie, accept your height as-is, whatever the outcome is, because you have done your best and within your constrains.

On top of all this, all this has the bearing of withdrawal symptoms from pharmaceuticals, very familiar. Note the sudden (which coincides with cold turkey date) mood changes and depressed feelings (almost manic-depressive). The solution is to restart the pharmaceuticals at maintenance doses and taper off.

I've been reading your posts for some time and it might be advantageous to see a doctor or counsellor if you feel morbid impairment of your life at this point of time.

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Quote from: ItsMyLife on February 24, 2015, 10:18:40 PMIn my opinion,this is a psychological issue. Which either needs psychological and/or psychiatric solutions OR the physical attainment of your target. Even if you physically reach your target, or exceed it, there is a chance that it is a "moving target", ie you might revise your target upwards to 5'10, etc. So a psychological/psychiatric solution is (probably, but its your life) more acceptable. Ie, accept your height as-is, whatever the outcome is, because you have done your best and within your constrains.

On top of all this, all this has the bearing of withdrawal symptoms from pharmaceuticals, very familiar. Note the sudden (which coincides with cold turkey date) mood changes and depressed feelings (almost manic-depressive). The solution is to restart the pharmaceuticals at maintenance doses and taper off.

I've been reading your posts for some time and it might be advantageous to see a doctor or counsellor if you feel morbid impairment of your life at this point of time.


Nah, it's not really like that, although I can see how my recent mood swings may say otherwise. I have anticipated doing LL for a very long time, and finally did it, and just want zero regrets. I have worked too hard, gone through too much pain, and spent too much money not to have complete closure. I'm realistic...as a guy that started in the 5'5" range (and was still successful in my career and with women), 5'8" was all I ever wanted. Anything above that, and my proportions would slowly start to look weird. So 5'8" remains my hard goal. Even if I did 7cm and I was still a pinch under 5'8", that's fine because I would never go beyond 7cm for recovery reasons. 7cm would be the point I reached where I could say "I really did all that I could," if that makes sense.

My mood swings recently have been a combination of antsy-ness (wanting to get back to my life and start dating again, get a new job, etc) and now ambivalence regarding continuing to click or not (which I blame learning about the femur angle thing on). Because according to the click file, per Dr. Guichet (and another doctor who both measured me in the evening), I am now 5'8". But this femur angle thing has just got me second-guessing myself.

If someone could confirm (which I know isn't possible) that I'm 5'8", I'd be 100% comfortable with stopping clicking.