First of all, big thank you to the forum because without this place I don't think I ever would have gone through with this surgery.
Okay, a little bit about me before I get into the details of my experience so far here.
I'm 30 years old, give or take, and my starting height was around 164cm (lunchtime measurement). I won't get too specific but I live in one of the major English speaking countries (UK, USA, Australia, Canada etc.)
For the past 9 or 10 years I have been using different types of shoe lifts, so my height during the day has usually been around the 169-171 mark. Unfortunately wearing shoes like this is really uncomfortable and taking them off every evening is also not a great feeling so I decided to look into leg lengthening. My decision really came down to wearing 6-7cm lifts for the rest of my life or doing Leg lengthening.
Long story short, because of Co-vid 19 I ended up in Vietnam and decided it was now or never. Which brings me to now, after 4 months of lengthening, I am 6.7cm taller so 0.3 short of my username and original goal! I will be having my frames removed in a few days so I thought this would be a good time to start my diary.
Beforehand, I thought that once the lengthening was done I would be 90 percent of the way to normal. In reality, I'm still using a walker to move around slowly and I understand I have a lot of work to go. I do however feel happy with the decision I made and can't wait to experience life outside again with my extra height and a renewed appreciation for life (believe me, if you go through this process you will appreciate normal life so much more. I guarantee this.).
For now I'll just touch a little on my experience here but any questions are welcome because I'm pretty bored now. So the best way to describe this process is exhausting. Throughout the months I haven't really been in any excruciating pain but the bone aches, muscle tightness, pinsite stings, constipation (a big issue for me) have a way of all coming at the same time and wearing you out. The best part about doing the surgery here is that these types of issues are taken seriously and addressed quickly and that is one thing i have appreciated. For example, I requested to go to the hospital for a checkup after being constipated for a week and they took me that very day I asked. Light bulb changes or similar you might be waiting a little longer but it is what it is, and it's a trade off that works.
Finally, on the amount I lengthened. Before the surgery 7cm was my goal, this changed multiple times throughout the lengthening process and I really wasn't sure how I would know when to stop. One morning I woke up with a strong pain in my ankles, a type of pain I can't really describe and one I didn't feel throughout the whole process and it felt like my body was telling me this is enough so I stopped then and there. 6.7cm is 20 percent of my original tibia length and a very substantial lengthening so I will keep everyone updated on my recovery process. As for right now I have about 2.5cm of ballerina but very little knee contracture.
I think this will be it for now, I will update more about the experience later but for now enjoy a picture of my sturdy frames.