Hippy Gatherings

The official 8th SF Bay Area Hippy gathering date has been set! It will be on Saturday, April 17th, 2010 and this time there will be no "surprise guest" but a REAL guest of honor,  Dr. Edwin Su will actually be flying out from NYC to attend this gathering.

So anyone looking into surgery, bring your x-rays, those that had surgeries, CA is NOT a bad place to visit. We as surface hippies are indeed a unique group. We did not take just what any surgeon said, we did our research and found what was the best solution for us. I have made many friends for life through this group and will be forever grateful to it. Here is your opportunity to meet with well over 50 fellow surface hippies that have been to all different surgeons from around the world, compare stories and match faces with the names.

Here are the details. If you are not already on my evite list, or for that matter if you have been on it and choose no longer to be on it, you can also go to the evite and delete your name from it but if you would like to be added, please email me at vickymm@ comcast.net, just delete the space. The list is getting longer and longer. I expect at least 70 or so people at this one, maybe even close to 100.

Our good friend and fellow surface hippy Chris Walton will again offer the special $50 room rate at the Comfort Inn in Fremont for our out of town guests. Thank you SO much Chris for that kind offer. The info will be on the evite. There are three airports you can fly into, I prefer San Jose, it is the closest, then there is Oakland and San Francisco.

Hippy Gathering Description.

These gatherings are very informative and great for those that are pre-surgery to get a ton of questions answered and be able to meet with many hippies face to face that are in all different stages of recovery as well as patients from many different doctors.

Here is an idea of the way these gatherings go.

First everyone begins to arrive around noon. Everyone mingles and I provide color coded name tags to each person so you will know who has had surgery, when, their doctor and device they have and the newbies will have Red tags that say NEW on them. Guests of those attending will have guest name tags. There will be food there and I ask for a $15 donation to help me with the costs of renting the place the food and just want to break even on the event. Otherwise I would not be able to hold these in the future.

About an hour or so into the gathering, I will call everyone's attention and introduce myself and give a brief background about my experience. Then I will go around the room to some of the long term hippies first, like Des Tuck who had his surgeries in 2001 and 2003 by Mr. Treacy in the U.K. He recently (2008) got his 6th degree black belt with bilateral BHR's! See him in action at the last hippy gathering in this video.

Desmond Tuck, Goju Ryu style karate from Paul Hamilton on Vimeo.

Hopefully he will be able to attend this gathering as well. Alan Ray who had incredible knowledge on learning to walk and regaining a natural gait, you can see his articles here.

Learning to Walk

Proper Use of a Cane

He taught me how to use my cane pre-op and helped me learn how to walk again the right way post-op. Also this time I hope my infamous PT Greg Booth will be attending, he has helped over 7 surface hippies now and every one of them raves about him.

Then I will go around and ask several other post op hippies to tell their stories and make sure we have patients that have gone to different doctors to get a variety of experiences.

Then around 3pm or so, Dr. Su will show up and be there to answer anyone's questions and review x-rays etc. The gathering usually last until 5pm but this time it will probably last until around 6pm with Dr. Su there.

I have a hip model which you can see in this video

as well as a BHR, ASR and C+ device, so you will actually be able to hold them and see what they look like.

What an incredible opportunity for a newbie that is still looking into surgery.  If you are one of the many that need to wait due to too much cartilage left in your hip, CA is NOT a bad place to visit for a weekend. :-)

If anyone out there has family or friends that are skeptical and hard to convince, invite them to this gathering, it will definitely turn them into true believers of resurfacing. Also of course if you know anyone scheduled for a THR, bring them!

Finally, here is a short video clip done by Paul Hamilton that shows a large group of us at one of the gatherings held last year walking with crutches, then without.



Vicky