More on Guichet and team
I was impressed with the improvements he made to his protocol. Basically, I remember that 10 years ago with Guichet, the surgery would include more hospitalization, more complications and slower recovery. Right now, what he calls "hyper fast track" lowered the hospital time from 3 nights to 0-1 night. I stayed 1 night, although I was expecting to stay 0. Will touch on that later.
Also, I believed that his focus on training prior to surgery and after is key for recovery, and respected him for that because I am sure it made him lose a lot of patients (most of us are lazy, and that's ok).
Guichet is still available to you after surgery, as well as his team. However, don't expect him to be your 24h companion.
You will receive a program with everything you need to do after surgery, including all medicine, training, post-op check, gym training times and you need to document everything you do.
He will tell you exactly what to do and he emphasizes one thing - Don't ever do anything, even not changing 1mg of medication, adding an exercise or clicking an extra click without letting him know. He want's to know everything and will not accept any deviation from his protocol, which he will show you statistically using research evidence, that is beneficial (he will walk you through all his number and statistics).
He claims all of his statistics that are constantly improving is due to him constantly trying to improve in every parameter (he said "I am an inventor, I always try to make things better").
His anesthesia protocol impressed me as well, he basically uses General + Morphine to the spine. The reason for using specifically morphine is that it will maintain muscle, thus you can use it after surgery to achieve things like riding the bike or walking stairs. In addition, they are now using some compound that doesn't make patients vomit (I didn't feel sick at all).
My Experience
So before surgery I was nervous like hell, I thought it is better to dissappear from earth. But I was still curious if that is possible, that I can become taller and get through this, and live my life after I recover as a taller "me". Eventually I said to myself the NIKE approach of "Just do it" and boom, I decided that the best way for me to make sure I go to surgery is to do fun stuff the night before and not sleep a lot, so I would be quite tired when entering and my brain will be on "automatic" mode.
Checked in at the hospital, met Guichet and the Anestesiologist, The OR was full of people (around 8 people) one of the male nurses put an IV in my hand, after several attempts to find a vein, then I heard the Anestesiologist say something like "let's inject it", and the next thing I know I open my eyes and I see that I'm in the recovery room (I think).
I was looking at my legs, I could move my toes, but I could not move my legs. Imagine you are using your brain to move them but they don't move. So I thought to myself - That's probably due to spinal anesthesia. Then I see Guichet, and I just told him that I think anesthesia didn't finish yet on my legs. He said: no that's not possible. I said by I cannot move my legs. He said of course, we need to activate the muscle. Next thing I know he grabs my knee and pushes it to my chest. I couldn't believe how heavy my legs were, they felt like I had a truck on me. Then he tells me to grab my calf and push it towards the femur. It was almost impossible but I managed to connect them. He said very good, and then I was able to move my legs a little, but they were super heavy and stiff.
You cannot imagine the level of stifness until you do it. It is something I never experienced before. The only way to move your leg is if you make the initial movement with your hand and then your leg will "learn" that movement.
Then Guichet showed me how to click my legs, but I was super dizzy and didn't even understood what he was saying or which leg we clicked (he said I should click the next one by myself later). I later decided it was the left and clicked the right one more the next day but who knows...
The feeling of heaving two broken legs is something I will never forget. You are basically disabled. I had to call nurses to move my blanket 1cm, or handle me water that is 5cm away. In addition, I decided I would put my feet at the bed, and it felt like the part of the bed where I was laying my feet is like a boat, or something that moves. I thought that might be a special bed for recovery of the legs. But I was WRONG - the feeling I had is me moving my fracture site, which is possible I believe because this is a ratcheting nail with some degree of freedom for the LEFT and RIGHT. Once I understood that, I understood that I basically have new legs now, that I don't even know how to operate.
Guichet and a PT wanted me to stand a use a walker, I tried and then I just opened my eyes and understood that I fainted. So I was to stay at the hospital for 1 night (I didn't want to leave). But some patients leave in the same day of operation.
I hired a helper (you MUST have somebody 24/7 with you, at least for the first period (I am still day 4 post op so can't say anything for after). So told her to come back tomorrow.
The night was difficult, I had to rely on nurses and couldn't move from the bed. I was happy my legs were not shaven (this will hide the scars more). also, I was very happy that I don't have a cathether. I didn't have a lot of pain, just feeling disabled was hard. I got a slight fever and was given an IV.
The feeling of disability was the hardest for me, as you are perfectly normal a few hours before, and now becoming handicapped. This is something you must be prepared for mentally and this is not a joke. It would last more time, and will improve gradually in slow steps over many months. Make sure you can handle something like this (don't think - I am so strong, be sure you are)
Key insights after doing LL
1. Most people in this forum are height obsessive (this is an obsession). I understood I was obsessed as well. LL will give you more perspective. People in the world don't walk around thinking about height 10 times a day (at least) like most of you. Try to see the world from their eyes to get better proportions. You might be doing wrong decisions also for the number of CM you want.
2. LL is not a magic surgery that will make you "a taller you". It should be described as: a bone lengthening making a specific bone segment in you longer and your other parts of the body above it will increase from their previous position. Be carefull not to LL to much.
3. Being disabled is rough, especially if you lived a normal and active lifestyle before. The more you did - the more you should prepare mentally to sacrifice that. If you are a loner, this might be easier for you.
4. You must be 100% sure you want to do this (90% is not good enough)
5. You must be mature enough and responsible for every aspect (additional costs, organization) everything that will make you achieve this and go through this safe. Any parameter that you would skip could cause a major complication.
That's it for now.
Please wish me luck
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Topic: LL femurs with Guichet 2023 (Read 5732 times)