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[Stubborn Knucklehead]

Hi guys I’m a 22 year old male from America who’s in the middle of the LL procedure right now with the company WannaBeTaller aka WBT. I am going to be documenting my progress in this thread.

Starting Height: 167.5cm
Goal Height: 176.5cm

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

Update:
Week: 4

It’s been almost a full month since my surgery at Beykent University Hospital with doctor Yunus. I have gained 2.6cm so far from turning my device (not including the .5cm that you start with from the surgery). For about 10 days I lengthened 1.5mm a day instead of the normal 1mm a day because I have a limited time here and I was looking to take some time off of this trip. While it did shave some time off of my process, it was so painful that I could no longer continue doing it. I have since switched back to 1mm a day and I am still in significant pain, but I am hoping this will get better over the next week. My advice to anyone considering this procedure is to plan to give yourself a lot of time so you can take your time with this process. If you want 8cm, plan to stay here at least 4 months. Other general advice, allow your leg muscles to atrophy as much as possible pre surgery and become very flexible (especially in your hamstrings and IT bands). I know it’s sad, but avoid doing any weightlifting exercises that involve your legs for a year before your surgery and just focus on stretching. While I did stretch far in advance, I did not quit working out my legs and as a consequence, my pain is much worse than most of the other patients. I highly recommend you give up working out if you don’t want to be in hell.

[Mocrovich]

Nice progress, could you have done 10cm, or did you or the doctor oppose it?

[our time]

Nice progress, could you have done 10cm, or did you or the doctor oppose it?

Any surgeon that cares about their patient would strongly advise to stay within 8cm. It doesn't matter if you have gymnast flexibility and the pain tolerance of Kratos, your body will have to deal with exponential physiological stress.

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

It’s a good question and there’s definitely a lot of clinics that do 10cm, but we don’t really know the long term effects of going that far past 8cm. I know anecdotally from a few people here who went past 8cm that they already started to have some complications and the recovery process was a lot harder. So as much as I’d want the extra centimeter, I think settling on 9cm (8.5 + the starting 0.5) will be enough for me to be pretty happy and will be overall much better for my long term health.

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

1 month update:

On June 18th, it’ll be exactly one month since my operation. The pain has been pretty unbearable every night even after I quit 1.5mm a day, although I am hoping this will improve since it has only been 5 days since I quit. To be honest, the pain is so bad every night that I want to quit, but seeing how much taller I’ve gotten in just one month really helps me psychologically have the strength to keep going.

I’m 171cm today in the afternoon wearing thin sandals. I took a picture, but can’t for the life of me figure out how to upload it here. At the time of the picture, I have lengthened 2.875cm on the device, so I still have a little more than 5.6cm to go from here. Should be around 177cm barefoot in the morning.

[BestOfLuck]

Glad to see your progress is going good and that your staying dedicated to your journey. Sending prayers your way for a smooth extraction/recovery. Do you think that part of the reason your pain levels are so high beside the amount you lengthened per day is because you continued to weight lift and not stop a year before surgery?

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

Thank you for your kind words! It’s all speculation at this point but I think the weightlifting significantly affected my experience here. I used to lift a lot of heavy weight on squat, bench, and deadlift, but I thought it would be okay because I was pretty flexible coming into this procedure. But, heavy weighting causes both the muscles and the bones to be very dense, which is why I think it hurts so much seeing as they’re being pulled apart. All I can do is hope things improve and hold out until I am allowed to start taking a stronger painkiller.

[BestOfLuck]

Thank you for your kind words! It’s all speculation at this point but I think the weightlifting significantly affected my experience here. I used to lift a lot of heavy weight on squat, bench, and deadlift, but I thought it would be okay because I was pretty flexible coming into this procedure. But, heavy weighting causes both the muscles and the bones to be very dense, which is why I think it hurts so much seeing as they’re being pulled apart. All I can do is hope things improve and hold out until I am allowed to start taking a stronger painkiller.

Your diary will be invaluable to others, i cant even imagine the amount of guest lurkers that are in this forum debating CLL that just quit weight lifting and saved themselves a huge hassle after reading this thread. Your experience will help many. Keep us posted


Keep your head high and your dedication locked in, pain is temporary but the height gain is forever. It will get easier to cope with over time and before you know it youll be a new man. Listen to your body, do what your surgeon and PT say and reap the benefits. Best of luck🤙🏽

[dboy123]

Tell me how it goes I know a lot of ppl here don't like going past 8cm, but I feel if your body can tolerate the lengthening past 8cm, I feel like should be good, I'm planning to do 9, to 9.5cm femur if my first surgery I still feel short, but currently pllaning to do tibia with LON to lengthen at 6.5cm to be 5'11

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

Your diary will be invaluable to others, i cant even imagine the amount of guest lurkers that are in this forum debating CLL that just quit weight lifting and saved themselves a huge hassle after reading this thread. Your experience will help many. Keep us posted


Keep your head high and your dedication locked in, pain is temporary but the height gain is forever. It will get easier to cope with over time and before you know it youll be a new man. Listen to your body, do what your surgeon and PT say and reap the benefits. Best of luck🤙🏽

Thanks again man I really appreciate it. I hope others can find even just a few pieces of information from my experience that helps them in their journey. I’ll keep posting here throughout this summer and if you ever have any questions feel free to ask.

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

Tell me how it goes I know a lot of ppl here don't like going past 8cm, but I feel if your body can tolerate the lengthening past 8cm, I feel like should be good, I'm planning to do 9, to 9.5cm femur if my first surgery I still feel short, but currently pllaning to do tibia with LON to lengthen at 6.5cm to be 5'11

If you’re starting at 174cm why not just do your femurs instead of your tibias and gain 8cm in your first surgery and be 182cm?

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

6/19/23

This is the beginning of week 5 and I am really grateful to say that it seems much of my pain from having done 1.5mm a day has subsided. Obviously I am not totally pain free now, but I am feeling much better compared to just a few days ago. I have not needed to take any stronger painkillers yet, which is good because I plan to save those for when the pain starts to get much worse, most likely around 5-6cm. I have been walking on a treadmill for about 5 min a time, a few times a day and I am hoping that as long as my pain levels do not skyrocket again, I will be able to maintain a decent level of mobility and flexibility which will aid me in the recovery process.

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

Here is a short video of me walking at the beginning of week 5 after the surgery. I walk at a slow pace for about five minutes at most each time, and I try to do this a couple times a day if I feel good enough to.

https://imgur.com/a/b7bPqSE

[BestOfLuck]

Glad to hear everything is going smoothly (as much as it can during a surgery like this😂) your walk definitely looks pre good for 5 weeks post surgery. Glad to hear that the pain you were experiencing has subsided. Your doing great man, keep it up👍🏽

[MOMOV]

progress! keep it up you got this

[Among us]

Looking good king 👑 one step at a time.

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

Week 6 Update:

As of right now I’m at 4.2cm and so I’ve got about 4.3cm left to go to finish off at 9cm. The pain has been pretty bad but I’m still managing to get by without using the opioids. I’m planning on saving those for when things get worse around 6cm. I want to thank everyone for all of their kind words. I posted a progress picture that shows my before and after at the halfway point. If all goes well, I should be able to double that height increase, bringing me to about 176.5cm  which was something I could’ve only ever dream of. My advice to people considering doing this, is to definitely make sure you want it really badly. If you’re committed you’ll be able to do it, but you’ve got to have a lot of guts and determination.




 

[lucindaris]

How much did you pay for LON + Accommodation in Turkey, is it a package?

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

How much did you pay for LON + Accommodation in Turkey, is it a package?

The prices are different now but at the time I paid it was around $24k USD for the package.

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

Week 7 of 12

Tomorrow will be the beginning of my 7th week since my surgery. The weekends are definitely hardest because there is no physical therapy. I had a lot of pain two nights ago and had no choice but to use one pill of the opioid. I didn’t use it last night though, and I plan to not use it as much as possible as to not ruin my tolerance for it when I need it to work. By the end of today I’ll have lengthened exactly 4.5cm so only 4 more cm to go to bring me to 9cm total. It’s getting harder and harder to walk without doing the wide stance “penguin walk” and at night my legs feel very weak. As long as I stay in bed most of the day, I don’t feel too much pain which is good. Just taking it one millimeter at a time right now and holding on until the real pain comes.

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

7/6/23

I’m almost at the end of week 7 and as of today I have reached 5.5cm (counting my internal bonus). Over the past few days I have been lengthening 1.25mm a day in my left leg only because it was 1.5mm shorter than my right leg. If I continue this for just a few more days, both of my legs will be symmetrical and the doctor won’t need to do a shortening at the removal in order to match my legs. As to be expected the pain in my left leg has been much greater these past few days but I only need to continue this for a little longer in order to equalize them. I’ll include some photos. Overall, the pain has been bad but not completely agonizing which is good. I have refrained from using any opioids and my mobility is not atrocious. I can still walk with the walker, but it is a lot harder for me these days. I’m definitely counting the days until this is over.


 

[TheDream]

Stubborn stupid question perhaps but if a lengthening discrepency occured in your left leg when you lengthened at a normal rate, will this not happen again, when you go back to the regular lengthening rate again?

Also, have you gotten an IT Band release? I’m thinking maybe it could be your left IT band being more firm causing the slower lengthening, but I’m no doctor, so take this at face value.

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

Stubborn stupid question perhaps but if a lengthening discrepency occured in your left leg when you lengthened at a normal rate, will this not happen again, when you go back to the regular lengthening rate again?

Also, have you gotten an IT Band release? I’m thinking maybe it could be your left IT band being more firm causing the slower lengthening, but I’m no doctor, so take this at face value.

I had an ITB release in my first surgery and I plan to have another at the removal surgery. I waited for a while before trying to correct this and my previous x-rays from the beginning all showed the same discrepancy so I decided it was okay to fix it. Also, if by the next x-Ray somehow my left is too long, I could always skip a rotation or two. But that’s an interesting point you make, but everyone at the clinic here has some discrepancy and 1-2mm isn’t much at all considering he broke my legs with tools by hand. So the doctor has pretty great precision.

[MOMOV]

Looks amazing! keep it up youre half way there!

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

7/14/23

I’ve just finished week 8 of 12, will be starting week 9 now. Everything has gotten so much harder now. As of today I’ll be 5.7cm (+0.6) so depending on when I stop, this will all be over in either 17 or 27 days. I really want to go for 9cm but my body is definitely starting to fall apart. The tendons behind my knees are starting to get very inflamed and so sensitive that it makes stretching impossible. I may have to start taking the opioids before physical therapy otherwise I fear I won’t be able to have an effective session and I’ll need to stop lengthening. The pain is getting worse each day and my ability to walk is definitely going out the door too. I can’t think too far ahead right now, I need to focus on reaching 8cm and if I’m able to I’ll try for 9cm. Otherwise, the journey may be coming to an end sooner than I wanted.

[Robert Adam]

If you lengthened your bones by 90mm, are you 90mm taller or little less?

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

If you lengthened your bones by 90mm, are you 90mm taller or little less?

Should see the exact 9cm reflected in your height because unlike shoes that give you more height in the heel and less at the front (the slope leads to less effective height gain), lengthening the femurs is similar to standing on a box. But I will double check at the end of the procedure when I measure myself if I am actually the exact amount taller.

[Philosopher]

How flexible were you before the surgery? Did you do any exercises before?

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

How flexible were you before the surgery? Did you do any exercises before?

I was decently flexible. Sitting on the floor I could grab both of my feet relatively easily, and both my quad and hip flexor flexibility was good coming into this. Unfortunately, I’ve always had relatively tight IT bands but the doctor did an initial IT band release and will do one more at removal, so he said he is not concerned after my checkup today. I used to lift weights quite frequently which I strongly advise people considering this surgery to abstain from for at least half a year to a year out. The more muscle you have the worse pain you’ll be in.

[Stubborn Knucklehead]

7/30/23

As of today I have reached 8.0cm on my femurs, leaving me with only 10 days left of lengthening before I reach my goal. I can’t believe I’ve made it this far, but the process has truly been hell. The night time is still significantly more painful than the daytime, but with wise management of painkillers I’m still surviving. I’m grateful I chose not to use the painkillers until the end of this process so at least in my last ten days they should continue to work for me. I’ve seen a lot of patients here abuse these painkillers and eat them like candy even as early on as 3cm in. Right now, I’m not really able to walk at all anymore, so I can only move around using my wheelchair. I stay in bed for 22 hours of the day and only get up to do physical therapy or to go to the bathroom.

For those considering aiming for the full 8cm or further, you really have to be committed to this process and also have good flexibility. As of right now, I’ve only met one other patient at the clinic who managed to get the full 8cm. It’s not impossible to do, but I think almost everyone else couldn’t handle the intensity of the pain past a certain point. For me, the pain became significantly worse after 6.5cm. Furthermore, many patients’ ligaments and/or muscles get too short and they are forced to stop for their health.

I’ll upload my x-rays next week to see where my consolidation is at and any final measurements before my removal surgery on the tenth of August. I really can’t wait for this all to be over.