What's up everyone, I remember obsessing over these forums like a year ago reading all these journeys and stuff so I thought I might as well make some contribution for anyone in my similar situation.
Some background I'm a 18/19 yr old male in America. I was very healthy/ in shape but also very inflexible going in. Before my surgery I did a couple months of PT to improve my flexibility but I'm not actually sure how much that helped. I had pretty unfavorable proportions going in as well, with like 0.78 starting proportions. I'll give a breakdown of my experience and then tell you what I think about the effects of the surgery.
On the day of the surgery (august) I woke up very early and got prepared at the hospital it was pretty scary, after I was put to sleep it was over before I even knew it. I woke up in a half conscious state feeling like there was 100 ton weights on my legs. The first few days were miserable the pain was ridiculous and I complained like a baby to get painkillers from the nurses lol. Hospital food was awful, but eating was difficult. Sometimes I was nauseous , sometimes lightheaded was just an all around bad time. According to the nurse I did pretty well walking for the first time on the walker. I had 100 pound weight bearing but I weighed like 140. the fear of bending my rods was very real.
Going to the hotel was very difficult, but I made it. The first week at the hotel was fking miserable, took me a bit to realize I was not taking my opioids often enough and every time it wore off I was going through withdrawals, which in my opinion is on the same level if not worse than the leg pains. If you do the surgery, be diligent with pain meds and then eventually you can taper off.
My legs were also getting thin as fk and it was really freaking me out imagining myself with freakish femurs. I'll put a little spoiler and say that when going through this you just need to deal with looking freakish for a bit and worrying about it. Today (6 months later) I'm perfectly happy with even my ending proportions. Regardless I had several "panic attacks" about my proportions.
Everything was difficult from moving to using the restroom etc. This surgery I would say is basically impossible by yourself. I was kind of going crazy except I started making friends with people at the hotel and my girlfriend/friends visited me. I'm kind of writing this in a hurry so it might be all over the place. Anyways I saw some people there having an awful experience and some people having an easier time than me. My hamstrings were crazy tight the entire time.
I was super worried for my first followup but everything was going smoothly. In fact I had some pretty crazy bone growth especially on my left leg. Another thing was that I had been trying to not take any painkillers before PT and when I did it made PT much easier because around a month in PT became so painful that I would sob every time. Jessica, Jason, Mike, and Kaylee are amazing physical therapist. They push you very hard so you can achieve your goal.
About a month in my rods started bending as well, it was very scary. However another spoiler after my muscles loosened up my rods today are straight again for the most part and so are my bones.
Anyways I got to 7 cm before the doctors stopped me. I'm tired of typing so you can just ask me any questions you have. I consolidated and started walking normally about 4.5 months post OP and right now around 6.5 months post OP I am starting to jog and jump a bit. LMK if you got any questions or wanna see something thanks
Author
Topic: My Bilateral femur lengthening Dr. Paley Precise 2.2 Journey 7 CM lengthened (Read 921 times)