I longed to be an air hostess - so I had my legs stretched

by NATASHA COURTNAY-SMITH, Daily Mail

At just 4ft 7in, Emma Richards knew she was too short to fulfil her dream of working for an airline. Emma, 17, a student, who lives in Wadebridge, Cornwall, with her parents Irene and John, brother Steven, 19, and sisters Katie, 14, and Shannon, five, tells us why she underwent a gruelling operation in which both her legs were broken.

When my parents asked me what presents I'd like for my 15th birthday, I gave them the same answer that I've given every birthday and every Christmas for as long as I can remember.

I didn't want clothes, make-up or tickets to a pop concert: I just wanted to be taller. At 4ft 7in - almost a foot shorter than most of my friends - I was miserable. I became more and more desperate to do something about my height with each passing year, and pleaded with my family to help me.

My parents had seen me go through years of misery, but felt helpless. Apart from buying me 6in platform shoes, which I never left the house without wearing, there was nothing they could do.

Shortness runs in my family, but everyone else has made it past 5ft. (Mum is 5ft 1in and my dad 5ft 4in.) Some people think it's 'cute' to be tiny, but I don't see it that way. I've endured endless taunting, teasing and inconvenience.

At home, I couldn't get things from the kitchen cupboards without clambering on a chair, and it was dangerous for me to use the kettle or stove because I couldn't reach properly.

But the final blow came when, at nearly 15, I realised I was too short to do the one career I'd dreamed of since I was a little girl - being an air hostess. The minumum height requirement is 5ft 3in, so I didn't stand a chance.

I became so depressed that I rarely left the house. My friends went out shopping and to parties, but I stayed at home. Their height meant they could pass for being older, so they could get into pubs and 18-rated films at the cinema, which I couldn't do.

EVEN when I was invited by my closest friends to a local funfair, I turned them down, because I knew that I'd be too short to go on any of the good rides. At school, I avoided standing in a group because it just highlighted how short I was.

I also gave up PE, because it meant wearing trainers, which don't have a platform heel. And boys didn't give me a second look - I looked more like their baby sister than their girlfriend if they took me out on a date.

Mum and dad told me constantly that I was lovely and beautiful as I was, and to ignore everyone else, but it didn't help. I just couldn't see what hope my life held.

Mum thought I was becoming suicidal. I don't know now if I would have killed myself, but I did think about my height all the time, and didn't want to live unless I was taller.

In desperation, mum took me to my GP, in the hope he could give me some new miracle drug that would make me grow. I was referred to Dr Darren Fern, an orthopaedic surgeon at the NHS Royal Cornwall Hospital in Truro.

When I first saw him in September 1999, he told me I fell into a category of people who do not have dwarfism, but who are considered 'grossly short'. I was 5cm shorter than the average 'short height' bracket for my age group, and he believed my height would have a severe impact on my future, especially my job options.

From an X-ray of my growth plates (areas on bones which disappear once growing is complete), Dr Fern concluded that I'd stopped growing. He said I was too old to have growth hormone injections, but he mentioned an operation called bilateral femoral lengthening.

Up to 1,000 people a year - most of whom have one leg longer than the other - have this operation. It would involve breaking each thigh bone in two places and screwing a pin into the bone either side of each break, so I'd have four pins in each leg.

The pins would come out from the bone, through the skin, where they would attach to an external fixator device - a metal rod which ran from my hip to just below my knee - that would prevent my broken bone from moving.

Turning a screw on the fixator would lengthen the bone by pulling the broken sections further

apart. It would naturally form a putty-like substance around the break, which would turn into new bone. Each time I moved the section of bone further apart, more putty would form to fill the gap. The body would also grow new nerves and muscles.

Dr Fern said it was possible to grow as much as 3cm in a month. It sounded like the answer to all my problems.

The whole process, including recovery time, would take more than a year, and I was told I'd have scarring where the pins had entered my legs and have a higher risk of fractures and knee stiffness for the following year. I was also warned I might get infections around the pins.

I didn't care how much pain I'd be in, the scars I'd have, or for how many months I'd be in bed. It would make me taller - and that was all I wanted. My operation was booked for January 12, 2000, and I couldn't wait.

But when it came to it, I felt really anxious because I'd never had an operation before. When I woke from the anaesthetic, I was so drowsy I could barely open my eyes, but I managed to look at my legs. The pins looked like giant body piercings and I felt a bit queasy.

I spent 12 days in hospital but, for someone with two broken legs, I was in very little pain.Four times a day, using a special key, I had to turn the screw on each rod a quarter turn, which pulled my thigh bones about a millimetre further apart.

It sounds disgusting, but it did not hurt. My legs throbbed and ached between turning the screws, but it wasn't unbearable.

The only time I felt real pain was when the pins caught on the duvet, or someone accidentally knocked them. It was similar to the pain you'd feel if someone yanked your earring the day after you had had it pierced, but much worse.

I looked at my legs constantly to see if they were any longer, but because it was a gradual process, I couldn't really see any difference.

Mum looked after me and my friends came round after school, but after about two months I'd had enough. I became very bored, grumpy and tearful.

At one point I even screamed at Dr Fern to take the frames off my legs. But he told me a lot of people who've had the procedure get depressed after a few months, and that I should focus on the end result.

In April, one of the pin sites became infected and started weeping. Then, the area above my knee swelled, which was agony. I was admitted to hospital for two days, but after a course of antibiotics, it cleared up.

In the middle of May, I stood for the first time, still wearing the fixators and using a Zimmer frame for support. I felt like an old woman and could manage to stand for only about two seconds.

BUT I knew straight away that I was taller. I was level with Dr Fern's chin, instead of his chest, and I was nearly the same height as my mum. I screamed with joy.

The fixator and pins were removed on June 15, and I was given a pair of crutches. I couldn't wait to get home to show my friends, but about an hour later, I put too much weight on my left leg and it fractured. The pins and frame had to be put back in for another eight weeks.

Two weeks later, I got out of bed without my crutches, bent down to pick something up from the floor and my left leg broke in the same place again. It was agony.

I didn't want the fixator device back in again as the pin entry sites were healing, so Dr Fern put me in traction for two months instead. I came out of hospital in November with my leg in a hinged brace and on crutches.

Then, in January 2001, my crutches slipped on some leaves in the playground and I fell, breaking my leg in the same place again.

It isn't uncommon to keep breaking bones after this operation, but I'd had enough by this point - and so had Dr Fern.

Through a small incision in my buttocks, he inserted a metal rod down the centre of the bone. The rod is still in place and I haven't broken the bone again since.

I probably missed about five months of school, but I was set work to do at home and had a private tutor so I didn't fall behind.

It's more than two years since my operation, and aside from slight throbbing in my bones when the weather is cold and small round scars on my thighs, you'd never know I'd been through such an extraordinary process.

The world does seem a different place now I'm five inches taller. Although, at just over 5ft, I'm not exactly tall, my life has improved beyond measure.

I've just enrolled on a two-year course in travel and tourism, which includes a certificate in air cabin skills. Technically, I'm still too short to get a job on a big airline such as Virgin, but after all I've been through, I hope they might at least consider me.

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