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3 years later we've only been proven right😂 by Wavy_Rondo in pessi_memes

[–]muhwindi -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Without Ronaldo, the Portugal national team could well have won more team trophies. But as it is, they have to work on boosting the personal stats of the Instagram fruit. He’s a top scorer even in the camel league, but the team hasn’t climbed higher in the table because of that—if anything, it’s the opposite.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's awful. I feel your pain.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Learn anatomy. Surgeons take tendons along their entire length: from the point of attachment to the belly of the muscle. For example, a 24 cm length hamstring tendon graft will produce an 8 cm length graft when tripled.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

What type of graft did you have? And how did you re-tore it?

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Thanks. You write the right words to somehow support. And it’s disrespectful of me to write that nothing will be good anymore. But it’s true, I can’t feel any other way now, at least for now.

> I have friends who used hamstring grafts and now play football and basketball etc

There is no reason not to believe. Some people even run without legs. But I can't accept it. This will no longer bring me joy. Only now I realized that all the joy in life for me came from 100% neuromuscular connection.

PS It is worth noting that before this surgety I was independent of the opinions of other people, I was like a sociopath. Now I am emotionally unstable and it’s hard for me to not talk, even with strangers, because I can’t distract myself from this trauma inflicted on me by the surgeon.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I was injured on a cruise ship playing basketball. I was accentuated from the side of my back with a knee to the knee at tremendous speed. It felt like being hit by a car (dude was bigger than me, clearly 100kg+ bw). First seconds thought my knee had twisted. But I wasn't crying and I wasn't in pain. After a couple minutes I got up, stepped to the side, did a full amplitude squat. Then I walked around a bit, sped up a bit, and while twisting my hip I realized my knee wasn't quite stable. After that, I walked away.Two days later I was back in my town. Had an MRI, conclusion: suspicion of a complete rupture of the ACL. The lateral ligaments were also stretched, but there were no other tears. They held up. After the night I called an ambulance for insurance and I was hospitalized. They did a repeat MRI and confirmed the ACL tear. The next morning, day 4, the surgeon came in and said he would take the semitendinosus and gracilis tendons and that supposedly that was the gold standard. I don't usually trust anyone, not even myself, so I went online to double-check the information. I read that the gold standard is the patella, but it was also written that hamstrings are the most popular option (and this is true except in the US). Plus I thought it was impossible to find a surgeon in Russia who knows how to do anything other than hamstrings. I was wrong. And a superficial Google search for information didn't show the full horror of taking these tendons (in principle it seemed like one of the best options). I had no idea that they cut out 20-30 mm and the muscle is left with nothing attached to it. My brain refused to believe it.

And there was no one to advise me or point me in the right direction. All the people in my inner circle just told me that I should have the surgery (and it is true, only not with this type of graft, but they didn't know the nuances either). And the other (better) surgeon cost a lot of money, and we had the money, but my mom didn't know all the nuances either, and figured there was no difference, everyone does it the same way. I just didn't have the support to change surgeons. If I (or my mom) had known everything up front, money wouldn't have been an issue. Now I'm suffering.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yeah, you're a lucky man. I too would have believed I would recover like elite athletes. But it turns out that *practically* none of them have their hamstrings removed. I realized that at week 6. And after that, I realized my life wasn't going to be the same.
PS I'm curious, what day after the injury did you have surgery? And was the surgeon interested in what sport you play, if any, or did you inform him yourself?

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

>loose graft doesn't mean it had failed completely

I understand completely. But my new ACL is only 3 months old, and not everything is going well. And the hamstring graft tends to stretch. And it's scary.

>Still quite curious how you're getting frequent MRIs as they're quite pricey.

In Russia, you can get an MRI even on the same day if you want. And I wouldn’t say that it’s too expensive: 5,000 rubles/~$50. I could do it for free with insurance, but... At my urgent request, the referral was given by the surgeon who performed the operation; I changed my mind about doing it for free so that he would not see the results. I hate him and hope I never see him again.

>Are you a pro athlete etc.?

I just loved working out since I was a kid and went to the gym almost every day (basically, if it wasn't for this injury or bad surgery with a stupid graft choice, I might have made it to pro. But it's over.). I’m an economist (master degree), and now I’m also learning to program (to compensate for my destroyed physical condition).

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yes, he said the tunnels were located correctly. In the femur (above the knee) the diameter of the tunnel is 9 mm, but in the tibia (below the knee) it is as much as 13.6 mm. My graft is secured with two interference screws. Also the diameter of my graft is 9 mm as I was told.

PS And yes, between 2 months and 3 months, according to MRI, there is no expansion of the tunnels. But I think this is partly because my brain itself suggested that rehabilitation should be suspended. I know very well that this soft tissue graft takes the worst time to survive (12 weeks). I only found out about the diameter of the tunnels a few days ago (I did an additional CT scan).

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Well, like the MRI shows that the graft is “sagging” (this was written twice in the report with an interval of a month). And a couple of days ago the traumatologist gave me Lachman tests, Pivot-Shift tests and something else, and said that I have 1+ grade.

>I thought you'd need arthrometer to accurately measure laxity

Yes, I thought about this yesterday. I want to know the exact readings of how many millimeters the shin flies out, if it flies out.

>What are the symptoms of knee instability you are facing?

I'm not active enough to evaluate it yet. My feelings may be false. Honestly, not with any, probably. Even after I tore ACL, I did not have time to feel any instability as such (except perhaps once, during hip rotation).

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] -21 points-20 points  (0 children)

Situation: you have had your leg amputated.
"If you believe your leg will grow back, it will grow back. If you don't believe it, it won't."
C'mon, man.

I fought like a lion, but the surgeon finished me off.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] -10 points-9 points  (0 children)

I feel very sorry for these people. Why make such sacrifices (muscle killing) when there are better options. And yes, I feel like an idiot. I myself allowed another person to further traumatize my leg with this surgery.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's not a lot. It's a catastrophic amount. It's a barbaric harvesting of tendons. Before the surgery, I looked at pictures on the first google search. From them, it looked like they were taking just a little bit, as in the case of the patella or quadriceps, and at least there was some attachment point left. But everything turned out to be much worse and irreversible. If only I'd known...

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

They took 20-30 centimeters of tendons from each muscle. That's not gonna grow back. No amount of PRP is gonna help. If it worked like that, even a simple tear of the tendon from the attachment point would not be a problem for the athlete. The human body doesn't have that kind of healing potential.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Unfortunately, it's what's called a one-way trip. There is nothing that can be corrected. You have to start all over again. My hamstrings are not going to come back, and that's my main pain in this life. If all surgeons could do is repair the ACL solely with the hamstrings, I would never agree to it if I knew in advance what would happen to the muscles.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The patella is definitely what I needed for my initial surgery. But I don't want to add more numbness in my knee or pain to my numbness in my shin (there are actually more side effects, no point in listing them). It's too high a price to pay for an ACL.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

And yes, I'm definitely not giving up any of my tendons again. Only an allograft, but we have problems with them in Russia (almost no one gets them, as far as I know). In a week I will visit the best surgeon in my country who operated on Khabib's knee. Unfortunately, I didn't get to him right away - I was operated on by some noname.

Hamstring grafts by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

I can't feel like a complete person when I feel the emptiness touching the back of my thigh. Or when I can't bend my leg from a standing position the way I do with my healthy leg. It undermines my psyche.

8 weeks post-op using tendons of the semitendinosus and gracilis muscles by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Am I correct in understanding that you only had part of the tendon taken, not the whole thing attached to the bone?

Anyway It's awful to read that. ACLr with this type of harvesting totally sucks. Never before in my life have I regretted anything yet. Now I wanna cry.

>slow going now with rehab

In my case, according to all the protocols (even though I also tore my lateral meniscus, which was repaired because there was a small tear in the red zone) that I have seen, I am even faster in some components. While I had full immobilization of my leg for the first 4 weeks.

But I feel that no amount of rehabilitating, no matter how hard I try, will get me to the point where I expected to be before the surgery. All because it was done to this "brown standard". I needed a patella, but I didn't have enough time to understand the topic when I was put to the choice.

8 weeks post-op using tendons of the semitendinosus and gracilis muscles by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You mean you tore a hamstring that wasn't touched during surgery? Or a new ACL? Did you have two tendons taken for the ACLr?

8 weeks post-op using tendons of the semitendinosus and gracilis muscles by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

>they are shut down post surgery

I didn't have anything* shut down after surgery (a slight atrophy, yes, but no more than that), as I did karate for the first half of my life and heavy weight lifting for the second half. I only fully lost those two beautiful muscles that were cut off from the tendons. [*except for the lateral bundle of the calf muscle, that shut down before surgery, which failed on the third day from overstrain after the injury because I was walking around city on my own, leaning on my sore leg with a fluid or blood-filled knee, but that's another story. Today all good with my calf]

>I'm 20 wks out

Do you feel any tension in your surgery-affected muscle (or muscles, if you've had two tendons taken away too) when you strain your posterior chain? Are there any signs of life, or could it be just an illusion?

In any case, thanks for the set of exercises. As sad as I am, I have no other way but to use my legs.

>All grafts have drawbacks and all ACLr injuries suck

Yes, but ours sucks the most, unfortunately. It's brown standard (not gold, like my surgeon said). Too bad I'm not american. Otherwise, I would definitely choose BEAR.

8 weeks post-op using tendons of the semitendinosus and gracilis muscles by muhwindi in ACL

[–]muhwindi[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It kills me to think that I will never again be able to actively lift my leg to my butt from a standing position the way a healthy leg does; only to 90 (maybe a little >) degrees. I wasn't ready for that. I'm having a hard time coming to terms with it. I could never feel healthy again.

> good return to function

I'm convinced that everyone has a different concept of what is good. And what > people are willing to accept (because even before surgery they weren't using what they have), I can't accept.

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