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[Movie]

Yeah man at 7 months you might still have a bit of limping but recovery starts really speeding up right after that up until 1 year mark or so. then you'll most likely face what I call the 1 year-post op hell.

[Ahd1978]

Hey brother

I am in second week of consolidation

The thoughts you have about your legs and pain and recovery is exactly same as I feel

Some days my left leg the nerves go crazy. Doc says to push and walk and climb stairs when I do that I get shivers next day and takes me 2 days to recover.

Some times nails in hands and feet get blue and doc says it’s vascular system adjusting to new height

Bone pain still persists and some days is very hard

Like you mentioned I wouldn’t recommend this surgery yet and I am unable to fully utilise new height.

Yes looking in mirror is awesome and when people say u r taller but over all when other symptoms exist it’s not best feeling internally

I truly think this is a one year recoevry process. I’m glad you don’t have any blood flow issues

I hve been asked to continue taking aspirin and heparin injections of I travel. I have lost half of my hair due to this as side effect

I am hoping all this normalises in a years time

So let’s hang in there and see how we perform as human body

[TheAlchemist]

Recovery
Overall, I still have a long road ahead of me. My shins are still very numb; sometimes I feel like there’s some improvement but other days it’s just as bad as before. My gait still wobbles at the hip, and I have way less stamina than I did before surgery. I can walk maybe a mile or two before my legs are fatigued, and at that point my gait is absolutely terrible to the point I'm embarrassed to be walking in public. Walking for a while not only makes my legs tired, but my back hurts as well, so I probably still have some flexibility issues to address. Also, after a long walk or doing any leg exercises it takes at least a day to fully recover, during which my gait is bad the whole time.

I have had quite a few ups and downs this month in terms of my recovery. I know I’ve definitely improved a little, but I’m still struggling with walking normally. I certainly hope it will eventually get better, but if I walk like this for the rest of my life then I would have paid a ton of money to cripple myself. I have had a lot of negative thoughts about my legs lately. I think the worst part right now isn’t even my gait, but rather how my legs feel while I walk. Even when I walk toward a mirror and can see that my gait is almost normal, the process of walking doesn’t feel normal to me. I feel like I still have to put in a lot of effort to walk with a good gait so walking isn't natural to me. My legs still often feel very stiff and it actually hurts my bones sometimes when I walk, especially when I walk right after getting up from a sitting position or put a little more weight on one leg than usual. I am definitely getting stronger, but overall recovery has been very gradual for me, with no sudden transition from “bad” to “good”.

If you ask me how I feel regarding the surgery right now, I definitely have mixed thoughts. While I appreciate being taller, I can't utilize my new height in any meaningful way because I'm still a cripple. My legs also don't feel good/normal yet, so I think about my gait, my walk, and my legs all the time. If I'm outside I also think about how others might perceive me. At least when I was short, while walking around in public I was invisible. Now I feel like everyone is looking at me and judging my crippled walk. Now that summer is here, everything is opened up again, and everyone is outside enjoying life, I can definitely say that my sense of urgency and the need to return to normal is much more than before. I can't say that I recommend getting the surgery at this point as the recovery period is just too long.

All good my friend - at 7 months post op you are right around where I was - I was still deep in recovery mode but had a more optimistic outlook because I measured progress in small increments rather than a big bang overnight result.

One of the most dissapointing things from LL marketing materials is this notion that we are "fully recovered" and can return to full contact sports at 6 months post op - this is not the case for the large majority of LLers. At 6 to 9 months, at best our gait is normalized, but for a short period of time, at which point fatigue sets in. The key is that our muscle atrophy is still recovering, and our quads, hips, and glutes are still relatively weak. At this stage if you focus on working out your glutes and hips, I think you can reaccelerate recovery, and revisit how you feel about yourself and this surgery at the 9 month mark.

The journey is far from over, but there is much more upside to look forward to with work and dedication.

[L8GrowthSpurt]

Surgery +7 Months, Start of Consolidation +3 Months

Another month has passed; here is my update:

Physical Therapy
I did my last few PT sessions a few weeks ago. Although I haven’t fully recovered, it was definitely about time to stop since the benefit was getting pretty small. Surprisingly, they haven’t asked me to settle the bill yet, but I’ll make a separate post on all my LL expenditures once I know what the final amount was.

Reactions
Since my last journal entry, I have seen quite a few of my friends for the first time since surgery. I saw them at a formal event, so I was dressed up which helped hide my swinging hips a bit.

Friend 1: This is the only person I’ve mentioned LL to, and that was many years ago. He is 5’7” so when he saw me it was super obvious to him that I was taller. He actually looks kind of short to me now. The first thing he asked was whether I got surgery or if I was wearing giant lifts, to which I awkwardly responded the latter even though I was clearly not. Since then, he hasn't mention it again so I guess he must have accepted it. It looks like people don’t ever forget about LL once they know that the surgery exists. Therefore, don't tell anyone you know that you want LL or that LL even exists if you plan to get it and keep it a secret.

Friends 2 & 3: These two guys I met at the same time. They are 5’11” and 6’0”. I feel like I’m almost as tall as them now, but I don’t think they noticed that I grew, because I’m still shorter than them. It has been a good two years since I saw either of them, so they probably don’t remember exactly how tall I was. One of them said I seemed a lot skinnier though.

Friend 4: This guy is about 5’8.5”, so I went from clearly shorter than him to clearly taller than him. I hadn’t seen him for over a year and I usually wore lifts when I hung out with this circle of friends so I don’t think he noticed my height increase. He didn’t say anything about it, which was a little surprising to me. He also said that I looked a little skinnier than before.

Family: I postponed seeing my parents as long as I could, but I finally had to see them recently. My mom is definitely too short to notice; I couldn’t even tell that she was shorter relative to me than before. My dad is just the right height to notice and he mentioned that I was limping as well, but he hasn’t outright asked me if I got taller. He is almost old enough to start shrinking, so maybe I can use that excuse if he brings it up. My sister is taller than my mom, but shorter than my starting height. Surprisingly, I don’t think she noticed at all that I had gotten taller, but I definitely felt like she was relatively shorter than before.

Consolidation
I got updated X-rays at the end of the month. I can definitely tell that my bones have consolidated a bit more compared to the last X-ray, but they are still far from fully consolidated. Dr. D told me to get another X-ray in about two months, but based on my current rate of consolidation he wasn't even sure if I'd be consolidated enough to run by then. At this rate it could really be a full year before I can think about playing any sports!

Recovery
Overall, I still have a long road ahead of me. My shins are still very numb; sometimes I feel like there’s some improvement but other days it’s just as bad as before. My gait still wobbles at the hip, and I have way less stamina than I did before surgery. I can walk maybe a mile or two before my legs are fatigued, and at that point my gait is absolutely terrible to the point I'm embarrassed to be walking in public. Walking for a while not only makes my legs tired, but my back hurts as well, so I probably still have some flexibility issues to address. Also, after a long walk or doing any leg exercises it takes at least a day to fully recover, during which my gait is bad the whole time.

I have had quite a few ups and downs this month in terms of my recovery. I know I’ve definitely improved a little, but I’m still struggling with walking normally. I certainly hope it will eventually get better, but if I walk like this for the rest of my life then I would have paid a ton of money to cripple myself. I have had a lot of negative thoughts about my legs lately. I think the worst part right now isn’t even my gait, but rather how my legs feel while I walk. Even when I walk toward a mirror and can see that my gait is almost normal, the process of walking doesn’t feel normal to me. I feel like I still have to put in a lot of effort to walk with a good gait so walking isn't natural to me. My legs still often feel very stiff and it actually hurts my bones sometimes when I walk, especially when I walk right after getting up from a sitting position or put a little more weight on one leg than usual. I am definitely getting stronger, but overall recovery has been very gradual for me, with no sudden transition from “bad” to “good”.

If you ask me how I feel regarding the surgery right now, I definitely have mixed thoughts. While I appreciate being taller, I can't utilize my new height in any meaningful way because I'm still a cripple. My legs also don't feel good/normal yet, so I think about my gait, my walk, and my legs all the time. If I'm outside I also think about how others might perceive me. At least when I was short, while walking around in public I was invisible. Now I feel like everyone is looking at me and judging my crippled walk. Now that summer is here, everything is opened up again, and everyone is outside enjoying life, I can definitely say that my sense of urgency and the need to return to normal is much more than before. I can't say that I recommend getting the surgery at this point as the recovery period is just too long.

Clothing
So I originally thought I’d go from 30 to 32 inseam pants, but what I found out is that 30 inseam pants fit me perfectly after LL. I think that means my legs were just hella short before. I think in the past when I was wearing size 30 jeans I thought that they fit me, but now I realize that they must have been compressed a ton around my ankles. Now I feel like I finally know how pants are actually designed to fit, especially jeans. I will say that I look much better in clothes than before. I definitely enjoy looking at my body shape in the mirror more than before and it's a confidence booster. It's currently the only positive thing I have to say about the surgery.

Video
I was originally going to record a video for this entry, but my right knee started hurting out of nowhere about two days ago, especially when I put weight on it. It has been a few weeks since this last happened; I thought I had already gotten past this knee issue, but I guess not. I'm sure you don't want to see me walking with a limp on top of hip sway, so I will record a video when my knee feels better. I do think I have made some small improvements since last month, especially on flexibility so I can try a few new things on video. Let me know if there’s anything you guys want to see.

Hey BTM - Thanks for the update and candid assessment.  Very helpful for someone like me who is also planning on taking the plunge soon.  The process undoubtedly seems like a marathon - one full of highs and lows, which is good for me and others to recognize.  In terms of the height increase, I would bet that more persons noticed, but probably just didn’t say anything.  Your impressions are certainly better than my guess though for sure 😊.  Hang in there.  I’m sure that given all of your hard work and dedication, you will be much better soon.  Stay strong 💪 and thanks again for the unvarnished update!

[lift17]

wow you look great with your new height but really your wingsparn is 169? because with 177 height are 8 difference :/                                         
i for example i am 166 with wingsparn 170.5 and i want 176.5 with 2 surgeries

[BelowTheMean]

Fantastic progress. I think there's actually no reason to be depressed. Gaits usually persist until you take glute strength training seriously. Many of the nerves and muscles in those areas shrunk due to inactivity during lengthening. There're a ton of great glute exercises on the internet that will vanquish your gait in a month.

I think either my gait has been getting better or I'm caring less about it. I've been out socializing a lot recently and no one has commented on it lately.

Yeah man at 7 months you might still have a bit of limping but recovery starts really speeding up right after that up until 1 year mark or so. then you'll most likely face what I call the 1 year-post op hell.

Thanks, Movie. I already have pain in my femurs, especially above the knees and when I bear additional weight with the nail (standing on one leg, etc). If I have even more pain at the 1 year mark I don't know if I'll be able to walk

Hey brother

I am in second week of consolidation

The thoughts you have about your legs and pain and recovery is exactly same as I feel

Some days my left leg the nerves go crazy. Doc says to push and walk and climb stairs when I do that I get shivers next day and takes me 2 days to recover.

Some times nails in hands and feet get blue and doc says it’s vascular system adjusting to new height

Bone pain still persists and some days is very hard

Like you mentioned I wouldn’t recommend this surgery yet and I am unable to fully utilise new height.

Yes looking in mirror is awesome and when people say u r taller but over all when other symptoms exist it’s not best feeling internally

I truly think this is a one year recoevry process. I’m glad you don’t have any blood flow issues

I hve been asked to continue taking aspirin and heparin injections of I travel. I have lost half of my hair due to this as side effect

I am hoping all this normalises in a years time

So let’s hang in there and see how we perform as human body

I'm feeling a bit better now, but still struggling a lot going down stairs. My legs literally shake with unsteadiness if I don't hold the handrails, especially if they're already fatigued. It's also difficult balancing extra workouts on the legs and having functional legs normally. If I work out my legs too hard, then the following few days I won't even be able to walk normal. Fortunately, I'm still working from home so on my days of rest I don't have to walk in public with bad gait. I hope your nerve pain, vascular issues, and dependence on painkillers will all go away soon!

All good my friend - at 7 months post op you are right around where I was - I was still deep in recovery mode but had a more optimistic outlook because I measured progress in small increments rather than a big bang overnight result.

One of the most dissapointing things from LL marketing materials is this notion that we are "fully recovered" and can return to full contact sports at 6 months post op - this is not the case for the large majority of LLers. At 6 to 9 months, at best our gait is normalized, but for a short period of time, at which point fatigue sets in. The key is that our muscle atrophy is still recovering, and our quads, hips, and glutes are still relatively weak. At this stage if you focus on working out your glutes and hips, I think you can reaccelerate recovery, and revisit how you feel about yourself and this surgery at the 9 month mark.

The journey is far from over, but there is much more upside to look forward to with work and dedication.

Yeah, I think I was too optimistic going into this thinking that I'd be somewhat normal by the 6 month mark. I think a lot of peoples' videos after the 6 month mark look pretty good, but videos can't show how the legs feel internally. Even if someone looks like they have decent gait and a solid stride, they are probably still feeling some level of struggle in their legs while they walk. Some days are worse than others, but overall it does feel like I'm slowly improving over time. It still takes me days to recover after a tough leg workout, so I think that's part of why I am recovering so slowly. I'm super impatient with recovering right now, but my body can only tolerate so much. I've been doing a ton of upper body workouts as well, so it still feels like I'm making "progress" on something even if my legs aren't.

Hey BTM - Thanks for the update and candid assessment.  Very helpful for someone like me who is also planning on taking the plunge soon.  The process undoubtedly seems like a marathon - one full of highs and lows, which is good for me and others to recognize.  In terms of the height increase, I would bet that more persons noticed, but probably just didn’t say anything.  Your impressions are certainly better than my guess though for sure .  Hang in there.  I’m sure that given all of your hard work and dedication, you will be much better soon.  Stay strong  and thanks again for the unvarnished update!

I've been out a lot in the last few weeks and so far very few people have said anything directly about it. I just don't think most people's brains would 1) realize that it's possible to gain height as an adult and 2) their friend actually went through with a major surgery in the months since they last met. Therefore, most people would just think that they remembered your old height wrong. After all, memories are most certainly fallible! I think the only person who knew was the person who I told that I was planning to do it a long time ago. I had only brought it up once over seven years ago, and that was enough for him to remember. Otherwise, who would jump to such a silly conclusion

As for my recovery, I think I will eventually fully recover, I've just become very impatient about it at this point because it's summertime now and all the local lockdown restrictions have been lifted. People are socializing like it's 2019 again and I don't want to be left out because my legs don't fully work yet.

wow you look great with your new height but really your wingsparn is 169? because with 177 height are 8 difference :/                                         
i for example i am 166 with wingsparn 170.5 and i want 176.5 with 2 surgeries

I usually don't entertain proportions questions because proportions don't matter in real life, but if I didn't state in this journal that my wingspan was 169cm, would you have even noticed from my videos? Now if I told you that I measured it wrong and that it was actually 173cm would you be able to tell from looking? The point is, height is just a number, but it can be easily compared between two people. Wingspan is not something that you compare with others very frequently, and people aren't going to notice a negative ape index unless you have dwarfism or something.

See my post here on proportions: http://www.limblengtheningforum.com/index.php?topic=5498
Based on peer reviewed research, having a short wingspan relative to height is not noticeable even at 3 standard deviations below the mean. That means even if your ape index is worse than 99.7% of other people, it won't have an impact on your overall appearance. If you are obsessed with wingspan then you should not get LL, because what you need is a psychiatrist who can fix your compulsion regarding proportions and body dysmorphia issues. Also, it seems like you're new here since you only have 1 post and want to get two surgeries. Over time I'm sure you'll learn what's realistic and what actually matters.

P.S. @Everyone: I haven't been in the mood to record a video, so I'm just going to hold off until my next update. I've been practicing squats a little, so I plan to show my progress there. If you want to see anything in the video, let me know.

[StrydeNailChallenge]

See my post here on proportions: http://www.limblengtheningforum.com/index.php?topic=5498
Based on peer reviewed research, having a short wingspan relative to height is not noticeable even at 3 standard deviations below the mean. That means even if your ape index is worse than 99.7% of other people, it won't have an impact on your overall appearance. If you are obsessed with wingspan then you should not get LL, because what you need is a psychiatrist who can fix your compulsion regarding proportions and body dysmorphia issues. Also, it seems like you're new here since you only have 1 post and want to get two surgeries. Over time I'm sure you'll learn what's realistic and what actually matters.

Hi BTM,
Good to hear from you.

I had watched your videos. Your leg and wingspan proportions look very normal and you look great.

 I have not read that peer reviewed research you were referring here, but I agree its summary you put here.

[Tubert]

Awesome read! Just made an account for this - I read every word of your journal and have been rooting for you!
New to considering LL at 5'7 and it was great to get such a detailed perspective on what can happen. 

[LL2022]

We are literally the same height and have the same wingspan... I have just started reading your diary and becoming very emotionally attached. I sincerecly wish you the best of luck and a speedy recovery. I also hope soon, one day atleast before my mid 20's to be able to go through this painful and gruesome experience to finally put atleast some of my height related mental problems at ease...

Thanks again for providing us with such a detailed diary.

[BelowTheMean]

Hey everyone! Update and video coming soon. Not happening today since I'm way too tired, but this weekend for sure.

Hi BTM,
Good to hear from you.

I had watched your videos. Your leg and wingspan proportions look very normal and you look great.

 I have not read that peer reviewed research you were referring here, but I agree its summary you put here.

Hey SNC, always nice to see you post! I should just stop replying to anything regarding proportions because it really doesn't matter and other people don't notice. For most short men, it's far better to be taller than to have perfect proportions.

Awesome read! Just made an account for this - I read every word of your journal and have been rooting for you!
New to considering LL at 5'7 and it was great to get such a detailed perspective on what can happen. 

Thanks for the encouragement and I'm glad my journal has been informative for you.

We are literally the same height and have the same wingspan... I have just started reading your diary and becoming very emotionally attached. I sincerecly wish you the best of luck and a speedy recovery. I also hope soon, one day atleast before my mid 20's to be able to go through this painful and gruesome experience to finally put atleast some of my height related mental problems at ease...

Thanks again for providing us with such a detailed diary.

If you're very young then try not to think about it too much. Enjoy life the best that you can and make the most of yourself (career-wise). You can always come back and do this later if you still feel unsatisfied.

[BelowTheMean]

My legs are too sore today so I'm waiting for tomorrow to record a video and update the journal. This entry is not an update, but rather the list of LL costs that I had promised. It should give you a good idea of what you might need to spend in total to get this done in the US. I'm also including a list of some of the items that I bought just for LL and found helpful or not helpful to have during the process.

Major Medical Costs (No Insurance)

Item	Cost
Virtual Consultation	$200
In Person Consultation	$400
Deposit	$15K
Remainder to Doctor	$54K
Hospital Deposit	$9K
Hospital Radiology+Lab Bills	$100

Ancillary Medical Costs (Billed to Insurance)

Item	Count	Out of Pocket Cost
Pre-op Blood Work (Lab)	1 visit	$40
Physical Therapy	60 visits	$3850*
Pharmacy	4 mo supply	$1850^
X-Rays	4 visits	$850

My insurance paid about $10K for these claims. YMMV depending on your plan benefits.
*PT: First 6 visits were within 2 weeks of my surgical date and covered by Dr. D. For my PT sessions at home, I negotiated a discount on my out of pocket costs otherwise I would have paid about $900 more.
^Drugs: Painkillers paid with cash and everything else billed to insurance. The anticoagulant was most expensive drug by far. I only got one refill on my painkillers.

Other Items

Item	Cost
Vegas Airbnb (1 month)	$1500
Home Health Aide*	$450
Bone Supplements	$40/month
Waterproof Bath Pillow^	$40
Rubber Ring Cushion^	$20
Massage Gun	$80
Walking Cane	$20
Grabber Tool	$10
10 ft Cell Phone Cable	$10

*Aide came 5 times for 3 hours each time.
^For taking baths. It's very uncomfortable to sit in the bathtub with a flat butt

Items that I didn't find useful:
Cloth bath pillow - grew moldy, way too hard to clean for an LL patient
Biofreeze gel - didn't really do anything for my pain
Bath wipes - didn't really need them

Other costs not included here:
Transportation - airfare, rideshares, and hotel for initial stay or follow-up visits
Food - delivery of groceries and takeout
Additional X-rays - I will have to get more of these to track my consolidation, but they are <$100 a visit for me for the rest of the year
Nail removal surgery - no comment for now
Scar removal surgery - I might need this

[Worzezterlire]

So far looks nearly identical to my expense list with Dr D, except a 5000 discount for precise 2.2 and my insurance covers PT.  To anyone looking for Dr D, this is exactly what you’ll spend.

[BelowTheMean]

So far looks nearly identical to my expense list with Dr D, except a 5000 discount for precise 2.2 and my insurance covers PT.  To anyone looking for Dr D, this is exactly what you’ll spend.

One important thing I forgot to mention - doing your surgery when I did it is the worst possible time of the year in terms of insurance. My deductible reset immediately after I met it the first time, which is why my out of pocket costs are so high. Also, some of the bills come in the mail months after surgery.

[BelowTheMean]

Surgery Month +8, Consolidation Month +4

A lot has changed in this last month. Here is my update:

Reactions

-Event 1-
This was an event with a social club so there were a lot of old acquaintances who should be familiar with my height. I wasn’t feeling terribly confident about my gait going in, but I think I actually ended up walking pretty well. I had to go up and down two flights of stairs multiple times throughout the evening and spent a few hours standing. I don’t think anyone noticed any issues with my walking or even saw that my legs were wobbling while I was walking downstairs.

Friend 1: This guy is 5’8” so he was slightly taller than me before and I thought he would be likely to notice. I had sometimes worn lifts in the past though which made me taller than him. He actually didn’t seem to notice at all that I was taller than him now and didn’t comment on my height even though he should be familiar with my old height. I guess most “normal” people just don’t care that much about height, especially keeping track of other people’s heights.

Friend 2: This guy is a true 6-footer and I used to think he was even taller but after getting LL he only seems a little taller than me. He definitely didn't notice any change in my height since he’s taller than me. While we were catching up, a few girls approached us to strike up a conversation. One of them actually asked us how tall we were and I said 5’11” and he said 6’1”. She said “wow, you guys are so tall, I’m only 5’4” in heels”. This was the first time in my life that anyone had ever called me tall (and I probably benefited from being grouped together with the other guy here). I certainly don’t feel tall though, just taller than before.

Friend 3: This guy is about 5’10” and the first thing he said when he saw me was “Wow! You got bigger.” Based on the level of amazement in his voice I’m almost certain that he realized I had become taller. He couldn’t say that though, because it’s clearly impossible for me to have grown I immediately played off his “bigger” comment and said that I had been working out during the pandemic and jokingly made a flexing pose. He went along with it and said “Man, I remember you were a lot smaller before. You must have lifted a lot during the pandemic.” He didn’t say anything else about my height for the rest of the evening, so I assume he accepted my new height.

There were quite a few other acquaintances that I met that night whom I hadn’t seen during the pandemic or for even longer than that. Strangely, even those who are 5’7” to 5’9” who I have now surpassed in height did not seem to notice that I grew taller. I have worn lifts around this group of people in the past, so I think that really helped with obscuring my actual height. Also, I don’t think most people care all that much about other peoples' height.

I also talked to a few female acquaintances at the event. None of them were taller than my starting height, but some were close. I don’t think any of them noticed that I was taller, but a few of them said that I looked good. I'm sure my new physique had something to do with it. Based on my observations so far, I think it’s very difficult for someone who was already shorter than your starting height to notice that you got taller.

-Event 2-
This was a smaller gathering, but a few of my close friends were there. There were also some old acquaintances as well. I did not wear lifts in the past with this group of people so I went in again feeling like I might be exposed. My biggest fear is someone mentioning my change in height in a group conversation and then everyone else having their thoughts confirmed and becoming emboldened and correspondingly inquisitive about it as well.

Friend 4:
The host of the party is a very good friend of mine and about 5’7”. I hadn’t seen him for almost two years, but he definitely knows that he was the same height as me because we have actually compared heights before. We also hung out a ton the year before the pandemic because I was dating his wife’s friend at the time. With that said, when I saw him he did a double take and looked at me a bit weird, but didn’t say anything at all about my height the whole evening even though the change was clear. His wife is far too short to notice any change in my height relative to herself, though she might have noticed that I was taller than her husband now. I'm surprised he didn't say anything, but I guess it's impossible for me to have grown taller, right?

Friend 5:
This is one of my closest friends from before surgery and someone I even hung out with during the pandemic. I had to come up with lots of excuses to avoid hanging out while I was recovering from surgery. I didn’t tell him about the surgery (as I have told no one) and I have been delaying hanging out as long as possible because I'm sure he'll say something about my gait. With this party hosted by our mutual friend I figured it would be more suspicious to skip out. Before surgery, I thought that he was 5’10”, but now I can say for sure that he’s a solid 5’9” because I think I’m actually a tiny bit taller than him now. Since I was clearly much shorter than him before surgery, I thought it would be very obvious to him that I grew taller, but he didn't seem to notice my new height at all. Everything was just business as usual and he was just happy to finally catch up in person. This reaction was very surprising to me, but again I suppose most “normal” people have a lot more to worry about in their lives than how tall other people are.

In fact, no one else at this party noticed that I grew taller at all. Lots of the guys who were at the party are 5’9” to 5’10” and have met me before at my original height, but somehow nobody seemed to notice that I’m now the same height as them. I was amazed that no one noticed that I had changed at all even though to me it was a very obvious change since I clearly remember being shorter than them. Given that I want to keep everything a secret, I’m just pleasantly surprised about all this. I know some LLers want external acknowledgment that they grew taller, so if your experiences are like mine you might be disappointed.

-Event 3-
This was another big party with a lot of people I didn’t know and a few people I knew from before. I’m definitely getting more used to socializing and less worried about others noticing my new height so I’m finally able to enjoy going out and being taller instead of being stuck at home worrying about being outed as a “crazy LLer”. Note that I did wear 2cm lifts for this party because of a specific reason I won’t go into. I’m not planning to wear lifts normally.

Friend 6:
I’m not too close with this guy, but we’ve been acquainted for several years. I thought he was a bit taller than me before, and this could have been magnified by his heavyset build. When I saw him at this party he looked to be about 5’8” and I was close to 5’11” since I was wearing lifts. After seeing me he immediately went “HOLY SH*T HOW DID YOU GET SO TALL?!” and then made some comments about playing basketball to grow taller. I realized that he might not know exactly how old I am and could have just thought that I had a late growth spurt in the last two years since we had met. Fortunately, no one else I knew from before was standing nearby so I just replied “yeah, I played a lot of basketball during the pandemic” and we laughed it off. He did not make any more comments about my height after that. Also, what’s really crazy to me is that this guy feels small to my brain now even though he’s got a good 70+ pounds on me. I can see why tall guys are so confident now lol.

Friend 7:
This guy I’ve known for a while and he’s about 5’8”. He didn’t say anything directly about my new height but I could tell that he noticed. While we were chatting up some taller girls one of them asked him how tall he was and he said that he and I were about the same height (we are clearly not) and then he deflected the question to me and asked me how tall I was. I noticed he was standing on his tiptoes at this point to match my height, so I said “six foot” and then stood on my tiptoes as well and added a “one” sarcastically. Since the girl was watching me when I did that she just laughed and then changed the subject.

Afterwards I think this guy accepted my new height because he didn’t mention height or try to stand on his tiptoes near me anymore. I never thought I’d see the day where I could make a joke about my own height and not feel terrible about it. I was also reminded of the old days where I tried to sneakily appear taller at parties due to my feelings of being too short. It must have been obvious to others and they probably just didn’t point it out because it would have been awkward.

Friend 8:
This girl is an old acquaintance. She’s about 5’6” and was wearing really high heels so she was maybe 5’9” in heels. I’ve seen her in heels before my surgery and she was definitely taller than me. I would say back then I would have been a bit intimidated by her height but now she just feels like a “normal girl” to me. Fortunately she did not remember my height at all, and just commented that I looked “fresh”. I think the taller a girl is the less she cares about a guy’s height than shorter girls do. For some reason, short girls want a guy that towers over them, but tall girls are okay as long as the guy isn’t shorter. Of course, some girls don’t care about a guy’s height at all, even if he’s shorter than her, but this forum is not the place where we talk about those girls

-Others-
I also hung out with some other friends during this period.

Friend 9:
This guy is my college friend who always claimed that he is 5’10”. We have pictures together where I’m a few inches shorter than him and he definitely knows that I didn’t have a growth spurt after college since we’ve been living in the same city and have hung out sometimes. When I saw him I realized he was basically the exact same height as me now, so not quite 5’10” but close. Somehow he did not notice in any way that I had gotten taller. We hadn’t met for a year and a half so we just caught up as usual. I’m quite surprised that he didn’t notice but I don’t mind. I guess some people’s brains just don’t register the possibility that an adult grew taller, because it’s impossible

Friend 10:
I was actually roommates with this guy for a few months in college. We’re not really close though, but both he and I are good friends with friend 9, who invited both of us to a party of his. I remember that this guy was shorter than my starting height, but don't remember by how much. When I saw him though, I immediately noticed that I was way taller than him. He commented that I looked like I must have been lifting a lot because I was way “bigger” than he remembered. (I’m telling you guys, the Captain America plan really works!) Anyway, I don’t think he remembered my exact height because it really was a long time since I last saw him. Friend 9 was also there when Friend 10 made that comment and he said “[BTM] has always been built.” I seriously think this guy's brain retroactively changed his memories of my past height and he forgot that he was taller than me lmao.

Other Comments on Reactions
That’s about it on reactions. I’m sure I will meet some old friends and acquaintances in the future who might notice that I grew taller, but after this last month I really don’t think of it as a big deal anymore. Most people so far have either not noticed, been silent about it, or quickly accepted it, so there’s not really anything that interesting to write about. I think the only people I’m a little concerned about calling me out on it are my extended family, especially cousins and uncles who I have surpassed in height, but none of them live in the area so it’s not a big concern at the moment.

Also, the only people who seem to notice that I grew taller are men at or just above my starting height. Even then, all the guys who noticed and made a comment about it internalized the information quickly and just accepted my new height. After all, height is not something that can be changed in most people’s brains so if I’m a different height than before, then they must have just remembered my old height wrong lol. I really don’t think any women have noticed yet. Almost all of the women I know are 5’6” or shorter. Some of the ones I’ve met have commented that I look “better” without any explanation, which is amusing to me because I know the real reason why. No one has made any rude or negative comments about my new height so I don’t really see any issues with just showing up taller and pretending that nothing happened because it seems to work. I also had the pandemic as a backdrop to my surgery, so that made things a lot easier since there were many people that I hadn’t seen in well over a year. My company has announced a return-to-office date but based on the reactions so far I'm not afraid of seeing my coworkers again at all.

I can’t imagine telling everyone (or even a few close friends) that I did the surgery though. Even if some or most people accept the truth, I think as long as there are some bad apples that might find out, they can definitely use the information against you. Even your friends might accidentally (without any malicious intent) reveal the information to someone who you don’t want to know about your surgery. I also really don’t want it to be the main topic of conversation every time I meet my friends because knowing that you did the surgery isn’t something that anyone will easily forget and everyone will definitely be curious about it. I’m definitely not the type of person who wants to be the center of attention all the time.

Height Dysphoria
I don’t have any height dysphoria, neurosis, etc. anymore. While I have written a lot in this entry on peoples’ exact heights, I’m only doing it to provide context for the journal. Personally, I don’t care at all how tall anyone is anymore. Well.. at least I don’t care any more about height than a “normal” man would (because let’s be honest, all guys notice height to some extent). However, it’s not the first thing I think about when I meet new people and most importantly, my own height doesn’t make me feel bad anymore. I think at this point I can say that this surgery definitely cured any height neurosis I had previously. In fact, I think the surgery made me realize that height really isn't that important. When I go out to parties, there are still guys that tower over me, but I just don’t care because they tower over everyone else too. However, my relative standing amongst my peer group seems to be slightly above average now, so I’m really quite satisfied with how things feel when I’m hanging out with others now.

When you reach an acceptable height, I think everything regarding height just becomes “normalized” and I feel like this has definitely happened to me. I will absolutely not consider getting my tibias done. To me the marginal advantage of another two inches is not worth the immense drawbacks. Getting femurs done has already been much more difficult than I thought. I will be very happy just fully recovering from my femurs surgery and living my life fully at this height. Doing LL has made me realize that my life has always been pretty good and that I really took everything for granted. I’m ready to go back out there and fully appreciate what I already have. I think having done something about my short stature is one of the main reasons that I don’t care anymore. If I never got LL, I would always go through life thinking “what if?” but instead I got it done and now I know for sure what it’s like being slightly taller (hint: it doesn’t really make that much of a difference).

Dating
I just checked a percentile calculator and assuming it’s not out of date, I'm taller than 98% of women in the US and 88% of women in 3 inch heels, so I really can’t complain about my height in terms of dating anymore. If a girl must have a guy who towers over her, that’s really not my problem. The way I look at it, when people tell a short man who is complaining about heightism in dating that he should just find a girl who doesn’t care about his height, that advice isn’t very helpful if only 20% of women are okay with his height. However, if 80% of women would be content with his height, then that advice is golden. Going forward I’m just going to happily avoid or ignore any girl who thinks I’m short, because finally I can do that without excluding most girls from my dating pool.

I’ve gone on a few dates now, even one with a 5’9” girl. I don’t think she cared that I wasn’t much taller than her; it's probably fine that I just wasn’t shorter than her. I also went out with a doctor, though she wasn’t doing anything related to orthopedics. She did not make any comments about me that would suggest to me that she was suspicious about my height. So far, I feel like my confidence has gone up a little due to my increased height and I haven’t experienced any heightism in dating that I’m aware of. However, I’m still not 100% confident about my gait, I have absolutely no lower body athleticism, and I’m worried about all the scars on my legs. I have been holding back a bit with dating because of these things. Also, the dating pool here isn’t that big for the type of girl I like and being taller can’t really help with that. I’m pretty sure COVID is still somewhat interfering with dating in general, especially offline dating as many social groups disappeared during the pandemic and have not come back. Since I started dating again I actually haven’t met any girls that I’m super into yet, but I guess in a way that kind of works out since I also haven’t fully recovered yet.

I think from a dating perspective, being 5’10” man really is a world of difference from being 5’7”. A lot of girls who only felt slightly shorter than me in the past now feel much more petite to me. I definitely notice that I feel less pressure regarding height around these girls than I did before. It's almost like magic! I don’t really notice any difference with girls who already felt very short before, but I think from their perspective I probably look better now since I stack up better against other men. Overall, height is definitely a confidence booster for dating and I'm looking forward to enjoying my new height even more.

I’ve also hooked up with a girl for the first time since surgery. *Skip the rest of this section if you don’t want to read about sex* First, I think she definitely noticed my scars but for some reason she didn’t comment about them. I also awkwardly pretended that they weren't there. My stamina/cardio level isn’t anywhere near as good as it was before surgery, but it’s definitely enough for a quick romp. My glutes are still terribly small and weak, so I need assistance from my leg muscles to thrust. Missionary is quite difficult because I can’t split my legs very far apart (improving slowly) to get myself low enough to put it in. I can still do missionary in what is basically a plank position, but that's tiring and the thrusting is not very effective since my glutes are so weak. Doggy style is much better for me than before, because long femurs = better angle to go in at. Also, it was funny because when she wanted to go on top I was like “hell naw!” Even though she was quite skinny I’m super paranoid about her inadvertently sitting down on my femurs and bending or breaking the nails. Anyway, this has definitely gotten me motivated to do more glute exercises to recover my previous thrusting power haha.

Scars
As I’ve posted in some other threads on here, I’m a bit concerned about my scars. I have pretty light skin on my legs, and the scars are not fading as much as I’d like. At eight months after surgery, they range from reddish-brown to light-reddish-brown. I think the light ones will have faded by year two, but I’m not so sure about the darker ones. I’ve been periodically applying a topical scar reducing ointment, but I don’t think it really helps all that much. I think the scars closest to my knees might have been exposed to more sunlight because they are the darker ones. Unfortunately those are also the scars that others are most likely to see. I have at least one tropical vacation planned for this winter and I’d love to be able to wear swim trunks without exposing my scars.

Of course, many of the scars will be reopened after nail removal, so even if they fade, I will have to go through the whole process again. If it takes years for everything to fade away each time, then it’s going to be quite a while before my skin looks normal visually. Of course, with the darker scars I’m not even 100% sure they will fade. I plan to book a consultation with a dermatologist/scar specialist who might be able to tell me more about how long it will take for my scars to fade and if there are any treatment options for me. If not, then I’m going to have to come up with a pretty good backstory, because eventually there will be a girl who asks about them.

Recovery
Recovery this month is a tale of two halves. The first half of the month was basically just like the prior month. All the symptoms of fatigue and weakness and difficulty in working out were still there. I felt like my legs were healing far too slowly and that it took forever to recover from any type of leg workout. However, I decided to push myself to my limit and did a 2.5 mile walk and then a 3 mile walk a few days later, and after that my recovery suddenly sped up. By the end of this period I did two 4 mile walks on back-to-back days (though that was definitely pushing my limit) and one day I even had a total distance of ~7 miles.

In the second half of the month, it felt like I only needed one day to recover after a leg workout, and during that day my legs didn’t feel too bad. However, it still takes some time for my legs to warm up and start walking well. If I sit down for a while, I usually have to stretch my legs out and take a few steps before my gait is normalized. Walking is certainly getting a bit more normal, though my legs still feel some level of stiffness and resistance when I walk. I probably just need to continue stretching, but I definitely think things are improving. This month has been solid for my recovery and I feel much better about everything than I did last month. In fact, I feel that my leg muscles are already strong enough to jog if my bones were consolidated and I'm looking forward to that because it should speed up my recovery.

This month I have also frequently been in the gym working out my upper body and my diet has still been very clean, so I think in general I should be healthy and recovering at the maximum rate that my body is capable of. If not, at least my upper body is continuing to get more muscular which helps obscure my height change (or at least distracts from it). I certainly “feel” healthier than I did a month or two ago. I’m back up to sets of 185 lbs on the bench press and 115 lbs on the shoulder press. I can also do 20 unweighted dips and 5 unweighted pull ups now. These are all huge gains in strength from a month ago. I also do a large range of arm and back/core exercises and I think my upper body is quickly returning to its former glory. I find that with some creative adjustments, I can work out any muscle that's not directly a leg muscle without putting extra strain on my nails. Being in the gym more consistently along with a good diet and better sleep habits has greatly improved my mood from last month. While I still feel a bit disabled when I move around, being able to lift more has compensated for that by making me feel like my body is still strong.

I still have a long way to go on recovery, but this month has been a huge improvement in my recovery. I can’t squat or deadlift with any extra weight at all yet. I’ve been practicing unweighted squats and lunges a bit, but it still hurts my femurs to do most leg exercises, so I don’t train very consistently. I think this might be a chicken-and-egg problem though; if I don’t do any leg exercises I won’t speed up my consolidation, but if I don’t consolidate I won’t feel like doing leg exercises due to the pain. Walking a lot has probably helped with this though. The pain feels like it’s mainly inside my femurs, right above the knee. It comes and goes on both legs but if I’m well rested it doesn't limit me in walking even if I feel it. The level of numbness in my shins is still the same, and I sporadically have irritating nerve pain in my lower legs, though it’s only a small fraction of how bad it was while I was lengthening. I usually just ignore the nerve pain, though it’s definitely annoying to me.

Finally, like I said I still feel somewhat disabled. This is because any time I move my legs while putting weight on them my brain feels like there’s something slightly off about them. Even though externally my gait looks normal now, my brain still senses something wrong with my legs and until that feeling goes away completely, I don’t think I will be able to feel “normal”. Also, if I walk fast or take long strides, I can still feel the limitations on my legs in terms of strength, flexibility, and tightness. I’m surely improving over time and this month has been great in terms of recovery, but I’m still not quite “normal” yet, even though I’ve been consolidating for as long as I had been lengthening. I hope to reach that point soon though, and it may coincide with when my femurs finish consolidating.

Consolidation
I’m not scheduled for any X-rays this month so I have no idea how my consolidation is coming along. I will be getting X-rays next month though, so I hope that I’ll be a lot closer to being consolidated given how much I’ve been working out my legs this month. Everything is taking way longer than I anticipated so I must keep my expectations in check, but it would be amazing if I’m consolidated by my next X-ray though, because I’m really looking forward to running and doing leg workouts to round out my body. My upper body is getting pretty bulked up now, so it’s starting to look like I’ve been skipping leg day lol. I’m also going to be traveling a bit at the end of summer and I’d be able to do a lot more things if I was already consolidated.

Regarding nail removal at some point in the future, I was thinking about how we’re not supposed to do leg workouts for three months after the nails are out. That’s almost as long as I have been consolidating so far and I know that’s going to feel like a really long time! I can’t imagine that it will be very fun going from fully functional legs back to the early stages of consolidation all over again. I’m definitely not looking forward to that, but I guess it’ll be the last step in putting all of this behind me. I haven’t considered exactly what I’m going to do for nail removal yet, but I’m keeping my options open for now.

Video
I finally managed to find the time to make a video. I wore a disguise so I wouldn’t have to spend as much time editing the video. Fortunately none of my neighbors came out into the hallway while I was filming



I have started doing squats this month, so I can finally somewhat show my progress in the video. However, I can’t do it with my butt to the ground or I’ll fall over backwards. I guess that’s due to the change in biomechanics and additional leg strength won’t help me there. I still feel quite weak when squatting though, so my glutes need a lot more work. I think the squatting actually helped with my gait though, because I finally feel good about my gait. It still takes some concentration to walk properly and I lose some of my ability to walk well when my legs get very tired, but at least when I’m fresh I should appear to walk normally.

My flexibility is only a little bit better than before since I haven’t stretched as much as I should be stretching. My sit and reach hasn't really improved and I can't quite touch my heel to my butt yet. Most of my increase in flexibility should come from all the walking and general leg workouts. I think my muscles are all quite a bit stronger than last month though (hips, legs, etc.) If my recovery progress continues at the rate that it has this month, then I think I will be back to feeling “normal” fairly soon, which is an important milestone for me. Also, the clicking sound in my right knee was there before surgery so it’s not caused by LL.

Final Comments
Sadly I think this is going to be my last journal entry for a while and there is a chance that I never come back to the forum. I completely understand why most vets simply disappear; some without even a trace. I just don’t feel like keeping a LL journal anymore because my life is becoming more and more normal and LL just isn’t a major focus in my mind any longer. As I think less and less about LL each day I just don’t have all that much to write about related to height. Even when I record a video for the journal, instead of thinking “oh this is exciting, I can see my progress” instead I just want to get it over with.

Comparing the time when I first started considering LL many years ago to now having done it and finally starting to recover, I realize how much doing LL has changed my perspective on a lot of things. I actually find it quite difficult to relate with someone who hasn’t done the surgery because the way we think about height, the surgery itself, and the rest of the process is completely different. I no longer believe that my original height actually limited me as much as I had thought (maybe retroactively fixed by LL) and my current height is definitely not limiting my life in any way (though the recovery from LL still is). I realize now how good it is to be a normal able-bodied human, even if short statured, and I can really appreciate that now.

The forum has been less active now that Stryde is off the market and I’ve already been visiting less and less, but I don’t plan to visit anymore because I think it will help me move on from this mentally. As I’m starting to get over LL, I’ve also spent more time thinking about the other major goals in my life and realized that I’ve wasted a lot of time making no progress toward them while undergoing LL. As such, I’m now ready to direct my attention to the future rather than the present. I might come back with an update when I get my nails removed next year. However, if this is my last post here, don't be surprised. Unfortunately, at this point I can't say for sure if the surgery was worth it for me or not. I think I need more time to recover and experience life at my new height to reach a solid conclusion. If I ever come back here I will have a better idea of whether or not it was worth it for me, but if not I'll just have to leave it up in the air. As of now though, I will say I have no regrets from doing the surgery.

While I may disappear like many others before me, at least I said my farewells first. To all the vets that I’ve gotten advice from, thank you. This forum is quite helpful for those undergoing lengthening and consolidation and I’m glad this community was there when I needed it. To those currently undergoing the process, I wish you all a speedy recovery and return to normalcy. To all the prospective lengthers, I hope you are all content with your height someday, one way or another. If you get the surgery, be smart about it. Goodbye everyone, and best of luck with everything!

[HeightGain]

Brilliant post. Good luck with life after LL

[AimHigh]

Great Update - Thx

[Worzezterlire]

Walk looks 95% normal, proportions look completely fine.  This has been a great journal and I congratulate you on your recovery.  I understand that you’re disappearing; I myself only stick around to try and give people a version of your journal but with Precise 2.2.  After I’m healed I will leave too, this forum draws some very strange and disturbed personalities and yet is a great resource for those who are at wits end with their neurosis and need guidance.  Half the people here really are wonderful, but it’s easy to get neurotic around neurotic people.  I understand entirely.  If I stay after I hit 183-184 I will probably then get neurotic and try for 188 and that would be just dumb.  But this forum can sometimes do that to you.

Again, you’ve been extremely helpful to me and others, and I’m extremely happy that you of all people look so good and walk so well after full recovery.  Best of luck!

[L8GrowthSpurt]

Thanks, BTM  - I’ll join in HobbitMan’s statements because I can’t say it any better.  Thanks for sharing your journey and I wish you a long and happy tall(er) life! 😁

[Movie]

Proportions don't look off, keep at it with the squats and stretching! doing great for 8 months

[las vegas baby]

good stuff

the walk is lil' bit off honestly, I feel like your one hand swings more than the other

squats are good. funny I always thought first you walk perfectly and then sqaut, but its all random irl 

but yeah good stuff, happy for you!

[FSchez]

Hello BTM!
Glad to see your progress.
I am sure that very soon a day will come when you will have improved your walking so much that you will no longer think about surgery.
Your walk in this last video looks much better than in the previous ones, almost 100% normal.
I agree that the 6 months that many doctors promise to go back to playing sports and feeling like before is very, very optimistic and causes despair when you don't get it ...
I am in 6 and a half months and I still do not walk normally, I suppose it will take me another 2 or 3 months to be able to walk as before the surgery ...
I know that it is very likely that you will not visit the forum again for a long time but I give you all my support so that you continue to make an effort to recover completely because thanks to your diary and some others have helped me to focus on my recovery.
Thank you!!
I wish you good luck and I hope you continue to enjoy your new height, and every day you feel better and more convinced that you have achieved something very difficult.
Doctors help us by giving us the tools to grow, but the greatest effort and sacrifice is ours💪.
I'm sure that when you fully recover you will feel much stronger physically and mentally😉

[Dreamer57]

Such a brilliant post ... And such a crazy update! Looks like in no time you will get back to normal!

Btw please dont abandon us! I dont know if anyone will say this....bt I really look up to you and you are an inspiration.... Would really be happy to hear from you now and then...!

Wishing you all the best for your further recovery!

[BelowTheMean]

Surgery Month +15, Consolidation Month +11

Hey everyone, I’ve been back on the forum for a little while and noticed it’s a lot less active here than it was back when Stryde was in its heyday so I thought I’d make a post. For some reason some of the forum functions don’t work for me anymore (links, videos, etc.) and some of the long posts are trimmed at the end so I’ll keep this post to text. As usual, I’ll cover what is most relevant to me at this stage in my recovery and I’ll answer any questions you might have. I feel like I have actually made quite a bit of progress lately, and just a few weeks ago I would have had a more pessimistic outlook on my recovery, but I'm feeling pretty good right now.

Walking: I would say that I’m pretty close to 100%. Sometimes if I’m not paying attention to my legs, my walk can deteriorate a bit, but I correct that as soon as I notice it. I definitely haven’t seen anything lately that would indicate that others were thinking that I had a weird walk. I can walk for pretty much any distance comfortably (though I haven’t tried more than 8km) and I’ve gone on quite a few hikes including some steep and muddy trails.

Running: Since I was cleared to run, I have had a ton of struggles trying to run due to pain in my femurs when my feet hit the ground. Recently I randomly tried running again and surprisingly didn’t have any pain. There was nothing that I did differently; I guess I must have suddenly just reached another level of recovery. I tested out my abilities and was able to “sprint” at 8.5mph on the treadmill briefly without any pain, so I plan to practice more going forward. I need to record a video of myself running though, because it feels weird when I run and I’m not very stable, so I need to see how bad my running gait is before I go run in public lol.

Weight Lifting: I’m actually in great shape right now even though I go to the gym infrequently due to a very clean diet. I've been working out my upper body completely normally for months and my strength is close to my past peak. Unfortunately, my lower body is still lacking a lot. Even though running doesn’t cause me pain anymore, squats still hurt. I can go through the motions pretty well, even with about 100 pounds on my shoulders, but my legs hurt so I’ve been taking it very lightly. I also haven’t been doing deadlifts because they hurt my legs as well and I end up using my back to compensate, which is dangerous. I don’t know how good my recovery is going to be here, but I will continue to take it slow. My knees weren't great even before surgery, so that doesn't help either.

Cardio: I’m not sure if it’s because I caught COVID last year or if it’s from LL recovery, but my cardio level is absolutely horrible. I can only run at a jogger's pace for a minute or two before my heart rate gets very high. I can’t even jog for a mile (1600m) right now, so that 9:00 mile goal I set over a year ago is nowhere near achievement. I think the closest I’ve gotten is a timed attempt on 800m and that took well over 6 minutes, and I had to slow down to a walking pace multiple times. (I could run a mile in under 5:30 before surgery). I still think I will eventually improve here, especially once my nails are out, but I really don’t know how long it will take at this point.

Sports: Surprisingly, I’ve been able to play sports that don’t require running quite well. For example, I can still shred down a black diamond in the Rockies. I haven’t tried skiing yet, but I imagine my level would still be just as good as before. I’ve also surfed a couple of times on the Pacific coast and it wasn't bad at all. I can swim both at the surface and with fins underwater no problem. For some reason my cardio issues aren’t as bad outside of running, so I can last for a while with other activities and I just need to rest a little bit more than before. Once I get more practice running and my running gait is normal, I’m definitely looking forward to playing other sports where I might need to run around and use agility.

Nerve Issues: For those who followed my journal, I had multiple bouts of nerve pain during lengthening and at the end of lengthening both my shins were completely numb. I would say that they have recovered slowly over time (with my shin nerves tingling and hurting a bit as they grew less numb), but out of nowhere a few weeks ago they suddenly jumped to about an 85% recovery. I’m pulling that number out of nowhere, but I have almost full sensation back in my shins. The biggest change was that I could finally feel the inside of my pants brushing against my shins normally like they used to. Now the only weird thing about my shins is that if I push hard on them I’ll notice that my skin is still a bit less sensitive to pain than before LL. I anticipate a 100% recovery here.

Physique:
My quadriceps are completely back and as just as thick as they used to be. From the front I look and feel like a beast in the mirror so I’m very happy with my body. However, on the other side my butt is still lacking a lot. It’s bigger than it was right after I finished lengthening, but nowhere near its former glory. I’ve started focusing on butt exercises in the gym. I think it will improve my stability in running and sports as well. Given how little I’ve focused on my butt in the gym, I think I can still get it back at some point if I work it out harder.

Dating: I’m dating a heightist and I don’t know how I feel about it. She is not even that tall, maybe a bit over 160cm. Due to this height stuff I’ve subtly prodded her to see how she feels about short guys and oh man it’s bad. One time she explicitly said that I wasn’t tall, but an “acceptable” height. I guess that's reasonable, but then because she didn’t think I would be offended if she insulted short guys, she went on a detailed tirade about how much she abhorred short guys, which was very offensive to me, but I didn’t want her to suspect anything so I had to keep a blank face. I can tell 100% that she would not be dating me at my original height. If she wasn’t hot as hell I would have dumped her already. I might break up with her soon anyway; I actually didn’t have a ton of chances to date after recovering from LL since I found her pretty quickly and I still want to play the field a bit with my new height. At my current height it’s noticeably easier to date both online and offline.

Social Aspects: A few people that I knew before surgery that I’ve seen a bunch of times have started questioning if I grew. I just continue to gaslight them and deny it and they don’t press much further. Otherwise, the pandemic was the perfect cover for me, and for most people (coworkers, distant friends, etc.) I didn’t see them for over two years so they didn’t have much to say when they saw me for the first time. Otherwise, my new height has no impact on my daily life. I don’t feel like I’m taller anymore and I feel like this is the height I have always been. Also, at some point I even realized that I stopped mentally comparing my height to other people out in public, like I used to right after I finished lengthening. I guess even subconsciously I don’t have anything to prove anymore.

Nail Removal: I’m currently researching nail removal options. Mentally I’m not in a huge rush to take them out since I don't think they're hindering me, but my X-rays look very solid and I don’t want to run into any Stryde lysis issues. I may have a chance to take a long break from work later this year, so I’m planning ahead to get them taken out around then. I will try to put together an update after I recover from nail removal.

Scars: Unfortunately my scars still haven’t faded. The scars near my knees are very dark and obvious and the rest are light, but still noticeable. Once I get the nails removed, I plan to get all the scars removed by laser as soon as I can. For now, the scars are a PITA because I can’t easily wear shorts around people that I don’t want to know about my scars, which is pretty much everyone I knew before surgery. I guess I shouldn't have just trusted everyone who said the scars would fade on their own.

Final Thoughts: Now that nail removal is in my sights, a big part of me is very excited to finally be done with this whole thing. It was an interesting experience for sure, and I don't regret it one bit. It gave me some serious introspection into my own brain, and in a way it feels like I took an epic adventure into what's possible with the human body. I can still happily report that I have absolutely no intention of doing my tibias. I think my current height is great, and even though many would not consider me "tall" I no longer feel that my height is limiting me in any way. I don't care about the numbers anymore and I don't care what others say about my height. Although I still have some physical limitations in my recovery, I've been able to do most of the activities that I love and go to the places that I enjoy. Overall, I have a pretty positive outlook on life right now, and it feels like LL both helped me unlock my potential and better helped me appreciate all the things that I already had.

[ilovescience]

Surgery Month +15, Consolidation Month +11

Hey everyone, I’ve been back on the forum for a little while and noticed it’s a lot less active here than it was back when Stryde was in its heyday so I thought I’d make a post. For some reason some of the forum functions don’t work for me anymore (links, videos, etc.) and some of the long posts are trimmed at the end so I’ll keep this post to text. As usual, I’ll cover what is most relevant to me at this stage in my recovery and I’ll answer any questions you might have. I feel like I have actually made quite a bit of progress lately, and just a few weeks ago I would have had a more pessimistic outlook on my recovery, but I'm feeling pretty good right now.

Walking: I would say that I’m pretty close to 100%. Sometimes if I’m not paying attention to my legs, my walk can deteriorate a bit, but I correct that as soon as I notice it. I definitely haven’t seen anything lately that would indicate that others were thinking that I had a weird walk. I can walk for pretty much any distance comfortably (though I haven’t tried more than 8km) and I’ve gone on quite a few hikes including some steep and muddy trails.

Running: Since I was cleared to run, I have had a ton of struggles trying to run due to pain in my femurs when my feet hit the ground. Recently I randomly tried running again and surprisingly didn’t have any pain. There was nothing that I did differently; I guess I must have suddenly just reached another level of recovery. I tested out my abilities and was able to “sprint” at 8.5mph on the treadmill briefly without any pain, so I plan to practice more going forward. I need to record a video of myself running though, because it feels weird when I run and I’m not very stable, so I need to see how bad my running gait is before I go run in public lol.

Weight Lifting: I’m actually in great shape right now even though I go to the gym infrequently due to a very clean diet. I've been working out my upper body completely normally for months and my strength is close to my past peak. Unfortunately, my lower body is still lacking a lot. Even though running doesn’t cause me pain anymore, squats still hurt. I can go through the motions pretty well, even with about 100 pounds on my shoulders, but my legs hurt so I’ve been taking it very lightly. I also haven’t been doing deadlifts because they hurt my legs as well and I end up using my back to compensate, which is dangerous. I don’t know how good my recovery is going to be here, but I will continue to take it slow. My knees weren't great even before surgery, so that doesn't help either.

Cardio: I’m not sure if it’s because I caught COVID last year or if it’s from LL recovery, but my cardio level is absolutely horrible. I can only run at a jogger's pace for a minute or two before my heart rate gets very high. I can’t even jog for a mile (1600m) right now, so that 9:00 mile goal I set over a year ago is nowhere near achievement. I think the closest I’ve gotten is a timed attempt on 800m and that took well over 6 minutes, and I had to slow down to a walking pace multiple times. (I could run a mile in under 5:30 before surgery). I still think I will eventually improve here, especially once my nails are out, but I really don’t know how long it will take at this point.

Sports: Surprisingly, I’ve been able to play sports that don’t require running quite well. For example, I can still shred down a black diamond in the Rockies. I haven’t tried skiing yet, but I imagine my level would still be just as good as before. I’ve also surfed a couple of times on the Pacific coast and it wasn't bad at all. I can swim both at the surface and with fins underwater no problem. For some reason my cardio issues aren’t as bad outside of running, so I can last for a while with other activities and I just need to rest a little bit more than before. Once I get more practice running and my running gait is normal, I’m definitely looking forward to playing other sports where I might need to run around and use agility.

Nerve Issues: For those who followed my journal, I had multiple bouts of nerve pain during lengthening and at the end of lengthening both my shins were completely numb. I would say that they have recovered slowly over time (with my shin nerves tingling and hurting a bit as they grew less numb), but out of nowhere a few weeks ago they suddenly jumped to about an 85% recovery. I’m pulling that number out of nowhere, but I have almost full sensation back in my shins. The biggest change was that I could finally feel the inside of my pants brushing against my shins normally like they used to. Now the only weird thing about my shins is that if I push hard on them I’ll notice that my skin is still a bit less sensitive to pain than before LL. I anticipate a 100% recovery here.

Physique:
My quadriceps are completely back and as just as thick as they used to be. From the front I look and feel like a beast in the mirror so I’m very happy with my body. However, on the other side my butt is still lacking a lot. It’s bigger than it was right after I finished lengthening, but nowhere near its former glory. I’ve started focusing on butt exercises in the gym. I think it will improve my stability in running and sports as well. Given how little I’ve focused on my butt in the gym, I think I can still get it back at some point if I work it out harder.

Dating: I’m dating a heightist and I don’t know how I feel about it. She is not even that tall, maybe a bit over 160cm. Due to this height stuff I’ve subtly prodded her to see how she feels about short guys and oh man it’s bad. One time she explicitly said that I wasn’t tall, but an “acceptable” height. I guess that's reasonable, but then because she didn’t think I would be offended if she insulted short guys, she went on a detailed tirade about how much she abhorred short guys, which was very offensive to me, but I didn’t want her to suspect anything so I had to keep a blank face. I can tell 100% that she would not be dating me at my original height. If she wasn’t hot as hell I would have dumped her already. I might break up with her soon anyway; I actually didn’t have a ton of chances to date after recovering from LL since I found her pretty quickly and I still want to play the field a bit with my new height. At my current height it’s noticeably easier to date both online and offline.

Social Aspects: A few people that I knew before surgery that I’ve seen a bunch of times have started questioning if I grew. I just continue to gaslight them and deny it and they don’t press much further. Otherwise, the pandemic was the perfect cover for me, and for most people (coworkers, distant friends, etc.) I didn’t see them for over two years so they didn’t have much to say when they saw me for the first time. Otherwise, my new height has no impact on my daily life. I don’t feel like I’m taller anymore and I feel like this is the height I have always been. Also, at some point I even realized that I stopped mentally comparing my height to other people out in public, like I used to right after I finished lengthening. I guess even subconsciously I don’t have anything to prove anymore.

Nail Removal: I’m currently researching nail removal options. Mentally I’m not in a huge rush to take them out since I don't think they're hindering me, but my X-rays look very solid and I don’t want to run into any Stryde lysis issues. I may have a chance to take a long break from work later this year, so I’m planning ahead to get them taken out around then. I will try to put together an update after I recover from nail removal.

Scars: Unfortunately my scars still haven’t faded. The scars near my knees are very dark and obvious and the rest are light, but still noticeable. Once I get the nails removed, I plan to get all the scars removed by laser as soon as I can. For now, the scars are a PITA because I can’t easily wear shorts around people that I don’t want to know about my scars, which is pretty much everyone I knew before surgery. I guess I shouldn't have just trusted everyone who said the scars would fade on their own.

Final Thoughts: Now that nail removal is in my sights, a big part of me is very excited to finally be done with this whole thing. It was an interesting experience for sure, and I don't regret it one bit. It gave me some serious introspection into my own brain, and in a way it feels like I took an epic adventure into what's possible with the human body. I can still happily report that I have absolutely no intention of doing my tibias. I think my current height is great, and even though many would not consider me "tall" I no longer feel that my height is limiting me in any way. I don't care about the numbers anymore and I don't care what others say about my height. Although I still have some physical limitations in my recovery, I've been able to do most of the activities that I love and go to the places that I enjoy. Overall, I have a pretty positive outlook on life right now, and it feels like LL both helped me unlock my potential and better helped me appreciate all the things that I already had.

Thank you for sharing it. Doing LL is a big challenge in life, probably the most challenging task right?

[thankscience]

Cheers for the update. Glad to hear things are going well generally. What do you think of your proportions now? Also, how hard has it been to squat with your new biomechanics? This is one of my biggest concerns.

[Masteryourlife]

Surgery Month +15, Consolidation Month +11

Hey everyone, I’ve been back on the forum for a little while and noticed it’s a lot less active here than it was back when Stryde was in its heyday so I thought I’d make a post. For some reason some of the forum functions don’t work for me anymore (links, videos, etc.) and some of the long posts are trimmed at the end so I’ll keep this post to text. As usual, I’ll cover what is most relevant to me at this stage in my recovery and I’ll answer any questions you might have. I feel like I have actually made quite a bit of progress lately, and just a few weeks ago I would have had a more pessimistic outlook on my recovery, but I'm feeling pretty good right now.

Walking: I would say that I’m pretty close to 100%. Sometimes if I’m not paying attention to my legs, my walk can deteriorate a bit, but I correct that as soon as I notice it. I definitely haven’t seen anything lately that would indicate that others were thinking that I had a weird walk. I can walk for pretty much any distance comfortably (though I haven’t tried more than 8km) and I’ve gone on quite a few hikes including some steep and muddy trails.

Running: Since I was cleared to run, I have had a ton of struggles trying to run due to pain in my femurs when my feet hit the ground. Recently I randomly tried running again and surprisingly didn’t have any pain. There was nothing that I did differently; I guess I must have suddenly just reached another level of recovery. I tested out my abilities and was able to “sprint” at 8.5mph on the treadmill briefly without any pain, so I plan to practice more going forward. I need to record a video of myself running though, because it feels weird when I run and I’m not very stable, so I need to see how bad my running gait is before I go run in public lol.

Weight Lifting: I’m actually in great shape right now even though I go to the gym infrequently due to a very clean diet. I've been working out my upper body completely normally for months and my strength is close to my past peak. Unfortunately, my lower body is still lacking a lot. Even though running doesn’t cause me pain anymore, squats still hurt. I can go through the motions pretty well, even with about 100 pounds on my shoulders, but my legs hurt so I’ve been taking it very lightly. I also haven’t been doing deadlifts because they hurt my legs as well and I end up using my back to compensate, which is dangerous. I don’t know how good my recovery is going to be here, but I will continue to take it slow. My knees weren't great even before surgery, so that doesn't help either.

Cardio: I’m not sure if it’s because I caught COVID last year or if it’s from LL recovery, but my cardio level is absolutely horrible. I can only run at a jogger's pace for a minute or two before my heart rate gets very high. I can’t even jog for a mile (1600m) right now, so that 9:00 mile goal I set over a year ago is nowhere near achievement. I think the closest I’ve gotten is a timed attempt on 800m and that took well over 6 minutes, and I had to slow down to a walking pace multiple times. (I could run a mile in under 5:30 before surgery). I still think I will eventually improve here, especially once my nails are out, but I really don’t know how long it will take at this point.

Sports: Surprisingly, I’ve been able to play sports that don’t require running quite well. For example, I can still shred down a black diamond in the Rockies. I haven’t tried skiing yet, but I imagine my level would still be just as good as before. I’ve also surfed a couple of times on the Pacific coast and it wasn't bad at all. I can swim both at the surface and with fins underwater no problem. For some reason my cardio issues aren’t as bad outside of running, so I can last for a while with other activities and I just need to rest a little bit more than before. Once I get more practice running and my running gait is normal, I’m definitely looking forward to playing other sports where I might need to run around and use agility.

Nerve Issues: For those who followed my journal, I had multiple bouts of nerve pain during lengthening and at the end of lengthening both my shins were completely numb. I would say that they have recovered slowly over time (with my shin nerves tingling and hurting a bit as they grew less numb), but out of nowhere a few weeks ago they suddenly jumped to about an 85% recovery. I’m pulling that number out of nowhere, but I have almost full sensation back in my shins. The biggest change was that I could finally feel the inside of my pants brushing against my shins normally like they used to. Now the only weird thing about my shins is that if I push hard on them I’ll notice that my skin is still a bit less sensitive to pain than before LL. I anticipate a 100% recovery here.

Physique:
My quadriceps are completely back and as just as thick as they used to be. From the front I look and feel like a beast in the mirror so I’m very happy with my body. However, on the other side my butt is still lacking a lot. It’s bigger than it was right after I finished lengthening, but nowhere near its former glory. I’ve started focusing on butt exercises in the gym. I think it will improve my stability in running and sports as well. Given how little I’ve focused on my butt in the gym, I think I can still get it back at some point if I work it out harder.

Dating: I’m dating a heightist and I don’t know how I feel about it. She is not even that tall, maybe a bit over 160cm. Due to this height stuff I’ve subtly prodded her to see how she feels about short guys and oh man it’s bad. One time she explicitly said that I wasn’t tall, but an “acceptable” height. I guess that's reasonable, but then because she didn’t think I would be offended if she insulted short guys, she went on a detailed tirade about how much she abhorred short guys, which was very offensive to me, but I didn’t want her to suspect anything so I had to keep a blank face. I can tell 100% that she would not be dating me at my original height. If she wasn’t hot as hell I would have dumped her already. I might break up with her soon anyway; I actually didn’t have a ton of chances to date after recovering from LL since I found her pretty quickly and I still want to play the field a bit with my new height. At my current height it’s noticeably easier to date both online and offline.

Social Aspects: A few people that I knew before surgery that I’ve seen a bunch of times have started questioning if I grew. I just continue to gaslight them and deny it and they don’t press much further. Otherwise, the pandemic was the perfect cover for me, and for most people (coworkers, distant friends, etc.) I didn’t see them for over two years so they didn’t have much to say when they saw me for the first time. Otherwise, my new height has no impact on my daily life. I don’t feel like I’m taller anymore and I feel like this is the height I have always been. Also, at some point I even realized that I stopped mentally comparing my height to other people out in public, like I used to right after I finished lengthening. I guess even subconsciously I don’t have anything to prove anymore.

Nail Removal: I’m currently researching nail removal options. Mentally I’m not in a huge rush to take them out since I don't think they're hindering me, but my X-rays look very solid and I don’t want to run into any Stryde lysis issues. I may have a chance to take a long break from work later this year, so I’m planning ahead to get them taken out around then. I will try to put together an update after I recover from nail removal.

Scars: Unfortunately my scars still haven’t faded. The scars near my knees are very dark and obvious and the rest are light, but still noticeable. Once I get the nails removed, I plan to get all the scars removed by laser as soon as I can. For now, the scars are a PITA because I can’t easily wear shorts around people that I don’t want to know about my scars, which is pretty much everyone I knew before surgery. I guess I shouldn't have just trusted everyone who said the scars would fade on their own.

Final Thoughts: Now that nail removal is in my sights, a big part of me is very excited to finally be done with this whole thing. It was an interesting experience for sure, and I don't regret it one bit. It gave me some serious introspection into my own brain, and in a way it feels like I took an epic adventure into what's possible with the human body. I can still happily report that I have absolutely no intention of doing my tibias. I think my current height is great, and even though many would not consider me "tall" I no longer feel that my height is limiting me in any way. I don't care about the numbers anymore and I don't care what others say about my height. Although I still have some physical limitations in my recovery, I've been able to do most of the activities that I love and go to the places that I enjoy. Overall, I have a pretty positive outlook on life right now, and it feels like LL both helped me unlock my potential and better helped me appreciate all the things that I already had.

Amazing post !
Thank you .

[randomperson]

Great post! Your recovery sounds very impressive. Thanks for sharing!

Question BelowTheMean...I am also an early 30s guy, same exact starting height as you.

If you were in the situation now with STRYDE off the market for the time being, do you think you would have waited another year or two for STRYDE's successor to release, or would you have gone with Precise to just get it over with? I am trying to decide this myself. Being early 30s, the longer we wait the longer we are without the additional height....But the recovery with Stryde seems better...

[BelowTheMean]

Thank you for sharing it. Doing LL is a big challenge in life, probably the most challenging task right?

The distraction phase of LL was the most physically challenging thing I've done in my life, but not the most intellectually challenging.

Cheers for the update. Glad to hear things are going well generally. What do you think of your proportions now? Also, how hard has it been to squat with your new biomechanics? This is one of my biggest concerns.

As I mentioned in the past, I think doing the full 8cm made my femurs a little long compared to my tibias, but it's not an issue imo. No one aside from you yourself will notice these things. I've never had anyone comment about my tibia:femur ratio. Regarding leg length, one girl even said I had short legs.. can you imagine what she would have thought of my proportions before surgery? As for squatting, the new biomechanics are much worse for squatting. If I squat like I used to, then I would fall over backwards. Nowadays I lean forward a bit to squat and I can go all the way down, but like I said I still have a bit of femur pain when using weights and my knees were never very good, so not sure how well I can recover there. Only time will tell.

Great post! Your recovery sounds very impressive. Thanks for sharing!

Question BelowTheMean...I am also an early 30s guy, same exact starting height as you.

If you were in the situation now with STRYDE off the market for the time being, do you think you would have waited another year or two for STRYDE's successor to release, or would you have gone with Precise to just get it over with? I am trying to decide this myself. Being early 30s, the longer we wait the longer we are without the additional height....But the recovery with Stryde seems better...

I've known about LL since at least 2014, but didn't get it done until many years later. I spent a lot of time thinking about it over the years and at one point even decided not to do it. The main issues for me were the medical costs, finding help for the period that I would be crippled, and figuring out how to take an extended break from my career. The lost opportunity cost of not working for an extended period of time was even higher for me than the cost of surgery itself so I never seriously considered it. Then in 2020 the pandemic forced everyone to work from home and I returned to the forum to discover that the rumored weight-bearing nail from a few years ago had actually been released. Now all my problems had been resolved. With Stryde, I wouldn't need someone to take care of me the whole time I was lengthening, I could just work from home while lengthening due to COVID, and I had some extra cash on hand with a crazy market in 2020. It was pretty much the perfect storm so I quickly decided to pull the trigger and scheduled my surgery.

The reason I mention all of this is because if any of the issues above were still a problem for me, I might have not have done LL. Only you can decide whether to wait or not, because you know your own situation best. For me, I didn't seriously consider doing it until Stryde was available, but plenty of people did it before Stryde and I'm sure they are happy with their new height. I suppose many of them did it before weight-bearing nails were even a thing, so they didn't have anything to compare to, but also consider that one of the biggest regrets about LL that I see here on the forums from 30+ year olds is that many wish they had gotten it done earlier. Best of luck with your decision.

[Issun-Boshi]

Hi BTM, I'm been lurking on here for awhile and had to login just to saw thank you for your diary.

It's on of the best on here in my opinion, even our age/starting height/ goals, reasons, etc.

I understand that eventually you want to fade away from this and move on with your life, but it's been such a source of knowledge and comfort that I'd kinda wish you stayed around. I'd really appreciate a monthly video update on your walk, or even a video update every 6 months just so we can see how the results play out over the long run. Does it get better, does it get worse, etc.?

I also saw that you mentioned thinking about scar revision surgery and am wondering if you can show us what the scars look like, both close up and zoom out (so that we can see the locations they are on the leg), so that I can understand how discreet (or not) after getting the surgery with Stryde.

Once again, thank you for all your updates and responses. Really appreciate it.

[BelowTheMean]

Hi BTM, I'm been lurking on here for awhile and had to login just to saw thank you for your diary.

It's on of the best on here in my opinion, even our age/starting height/ goals, reasons, etc.

I understand that eventually you want to fade away from this and move on with your life, but it's been such a source of knowledge and comfort that I'd kinda wish you stayed around. I'd really appreciate a monthly video update on your walk, or even a video update every 6 months just so we can see how the results play out over the long run. Does it get better, does it get worse, etc.?

I also saw that you mentioned thinking about scar revision surgery and am wondering if you can show us what the scars look like, both close up and zoom out (so that we can see the locations they are on the leg), so that I can understand how discreet (or not) after getting the surgery with Stryde.

Once again, thank you for all your updates and responses. Really appreciate it.

Hi Issun-Boshi,

The media functions on this site don't work for me anymore for some reason so I can't upload any links or images. However, even if it worked I no longer plan to record any new videos not only for my own overall privacy, but also because I don't have the energy to edit my face out of them. I will answer your questions by text though.

1) Regarding walking, I mentioned in my last entry that sometimes it felt like my walk was off, so I spent some time in front of the mirrors in the gym when no one else was around and did a bunch of walking in different ways. With this I can say that no matter how my walk feels internally, it looks completely normal in the mirror. I have full confidence that anyone who sees me will not notice anything wrong with my legs at all (as it should be since I'm over 15 months out from surgery).

I think the weird feeling is probably just a bit of tightness or stiffness due to the nails still being in, but we'll know for sure once they are out. I do plan to update this journal when my nails are out, but I don't know when that will be yet.

2) As for scars, I will definitely not share pictures of them due to privacy reasons. Each person is going to have different levels of scar recovery based on their genes and lifestyle. Personally, I think I exposed some of my scars to too much sunlight which caused them to unnecessarily darken. The ones that have always been covered have faded much better, though they are still a bit red. As for the location of the scars, there are 5-6 in total, from right above your knee all the way to near the intersection of your hip/butt. I'm sure you can find a photo or video of internal nail scars on a social media page or website of one of the big doctors. Imo the 1-2 scars near your knee (depending if you did IT band release or not) are the most concerning for men since they will show up when you wear shorts or swimwear.

[Issun-Boshi]

Hi BTM,

No worries, I understand. Thanks for replying anyways.

Now that your walk is normal, at least to external appearances, how does it function?

You previously mentioned you can run normally (even sprint?) but how long are you able to keep going? Would you be able to run, say, continuously for an hour (assuming that this was possible pre-surgery)?

What about long-distance walking, like hiking? I'm a big hiker and really into long-distance walking. I like to travel and my preferred method of exploring my destination is on foot. I've been trying to do that with insoles and realized my capacity for walking normally with insoles is only about half an hour before my feet starts to kill me. Is walking/hiking for hours a possibility for you at the moment?

In any case, thanks again for your response. Really appreciate it.