Quote from: OldieButGoldie on May 09, 2016, 09:42:44 PMUpdate:
It´s been 3 years since my op. I am doing fine.
Athletic recovery is around 99%, but I only lengthened very little (something around 5,7 to 5,9cm, i don´t know exactly) so i don´t know if athletic recovery is possible -in terms of 99%- if you lengthen 8cm.
It all depends on many different factors. Age, dedication, genes, body type, etc etc etc.
One guy -here or in the old forum- made some kind of LL compendium , trying to establish some kind of statistics about good and bad outcome of LL patients. He put me in the "bad outcome" department. This is ridiculous. My outcome is good, if you look at it from a medical standpoint. I was lucky. My complications were minor, compared to what happened to others and compared to what can happen in general.
My pre-LL-problems were mostly in my head, and LL cannot solve this (in most cases). So, maybe this guy who did the statistics chose to put too much emphasis on negative posts of mine that don´t have anything to do with the medical/physical outcome.
I generally advise against LL.
If you think this is your very last option and you are about to kill yourself, ok, do it.
But don´t expect to be happy after LL. This is rarely likely if you have been unhappy pre-LL (exceptions always exist, of course).
If you are an unhappy person, you are an unhappy person, a few centimeters more won´t fix that.
I am glad that I did the op, but I am still an unhappy person. This is my nature and the circumstances of my life.
But maybe my case is different. I did LL at 45 and I was pretty ok until then. Well: I must correct, I was pretty ok until 41 or 42. It was then when I realized that you cannot easily start all over again at that age, e.g. realizing you should have been an artist and ended up as a lawyer. Or the other way round.
So maybe, if you are young and do LL and you are unhappy, maybe LL can actually help you to become a happy person. I don´t know. Each person is unique , each case is different, each one has his/her own complications.
But, LL should be the very last remedy. Before, try everything else. You have got to realize that -doing LL- you finally and unchangeably decide to not accept the body that was given to you. This can be a huge burden for the rest of your life.
It all comes down to a very simple logic:
1. If you are happy, don´t do LL. You risk many things and you lose important things. What for? You are already happy, so stay happy and make the best out of your life.
2. If you are unhappy, chances are that you will stay unhappy after LL, just being a few centimeters taller. But maybe you are an exception and LL will actually affect your happiness. Nobody knows...
To all those who think they will have better chances with women: Your personality weighs way more than just a few centimeters. So, if you do it, do it for yourself and not for women.
Peace
OBG
I have been thinking about what OBG said in this post for a few months now. Overall, I don't regret doing LL. It did get rid of my height neurosis. But at the cost of less-than-perfect (although overall fine - even seeing me nked, no one's ever commented) proportions, recurring pain (although I still need to have the hardware removed), and the fear of running into/hanging out with certain people (7cm is a VERY noticeable increase, believe me). I get angry sometimes wishing I was 5'7" naturally. I honestly feel that, at a height of at least 5'7", while that's still "short," it's the height where a man starts looking normal/having normal proportions (at least, in my opinion). I was about 5'5.5", so beneath that and at a height where I was undeniably short. But now that my height neurosis is gone and my "eyes are open," I do see a lot of men who are below 5'7" who are living great lives. Maybe they're not married to Heidi Klum or Kate Upton, but they do have attractive and kind wives, children, etc. They might get occasional jabs for their height, and while I can't comment on how that makes them feel or if they experience it in the workplace (where it would annoy me more), among friends, it's really not malicious. I think I was just hurting internally and those innocuous jabs hurt me more than they should have as a result.
I somewhat regret changing myself. It's a weird catch 22. I'm such a damn perfectionist (something I'm working on) and I KNOW I'm more attractive at 5'8" than I was at 5'5" and some change. And I also think that, if I had never done LL, I'd always be wondering what being taller would be like, and would regret missing the chance to do it when I was relatively young. So, knowing me, either way, I'd have some regrets.
I guess I just want others to know that life is really largely the same after LL (assuming you don't have any serious complications). You're just taller. That's about the only thing that's changed for me. LL will NOT magically fix all of your life problems or make you happy. You might be happier, or at least, content with your height - but that's it. Be cognizant of this.
. Thank you for that and your honestly. 
Or maybe people thought I just grew naturally.