Double Hip Replacement and Recovery

Right after my surgery, I'm laying in bed and I'm watching a Netflix TV show about surgeries. Maybe somebody knows. And the doctor that was talking about it has his hip replaced. And one of the things he had gotten the metal on metal, and what happened was the metal actually disintegrated in his hip, and it caused some cobalt poisoning in his hip and made him go crazy. Actually. He had some mental issues and stuff like that. And he was a orthopedic surgeon himself. And so he luckily was able to diagnose himself and find out that the hip replacement actually is what had caused him to go kind of crazy. And then they went with the ceramic one that I have.

You just came off double hip replacements. Is that. Is that something that was more of an injury, or did you have some type of, like, genetic hip issue that caused that?

You know, it's a little un. A little weirdly unknown. I guess what it is, you know, I have a twin brother. He doesn't have any hip problems. I have an older brother and younger brother. They don't have any hip dysplasia and stuff. But what they do know is I've trained martial arts since I was five years old, six, seven days a week. It's not something I do as a hobby. It's my lifestyle. I train every single day, almost eight hours a day. And when I trained a lot of karate growing up, there's a lot of hip twist movements and kicks and stuff like that. And I mean, we do thousands of repetitions, you know, a week, Thousands and thousands. And just the wear and tear off of my hips from a lot of that martial arts actually created, like, an impact compounding syndrome that soccer players get in my hips. And so it created the end of my femur to grow because my cartilage actually delaminated. There's some bone spurs in my hips. It delaminated my cartilage. I'm only 33 years old, but just the excessive wear and tear and those bone spurs actually peeled out, as you would imagine, the cartilage within my hips. So I had first hip surgery where they did a biocartilage in there. They tried to replace the missing pieces in there with a cadaver and then my own bone marrow. And you know what? I went actually, for people listening, I actually went to you for a lot of this stuff on the rehabilitation and to see what I could do to try to get back to sports. And, I mean, a lot of that, which I can talk about later, is actually what helped me get back to Today. But the first thing that I went to after that surgery was stem cell therapy. So I did stem cell therapy directly into my hip joint from a good place in Seattle. Unfortunately, the stem cell actually regrew my bone spurs back, more of like a.

Rep of that happening before. It's crazy.

And it was actually terrible because I went in for surgery thinking, hey, I'm going to come back out of it better and it's going to be good for me. And sure enough, I'm trying to push the pace, go through the six weeks not walking, all that stuff. And then I kind of get back to things. A couple months in, I knew that things weren't right. I go back into the. I go back to the doctor. And they had a pretty good. I mean, it was, I think, you know, a pretty good spike that they had ended up pulling out. And it was only within like an eight months time that it had grown back from the last surgery. So it was a pretty, pretty awakening thing, I guess. And then so they tried to do the surgery again and they, you know, shaved off the end of my bone. Things grew back right again. And they just said, you know what, the last choice is just a total hip replacement.

Do they talk about how common that is for stem cells that are injected into a cartilaginous area that has a spur to just regrow the spur?

I didn't know anything about that, actually. And then so I went to a friend that has a good clinic in Seattle and he did it. We did some PRP injections as well. You know, I used hyperbaric chamber, things like that. And I was trying to really throw the book at it for the healing process, but it kind of healed it, like I said, in that wrong way, which then I was trying to go back to do some movements and stuff, and that bone spur grew in there and just created a lot more damage.

Wow. And then you had to get your other hip done as well.

Once they realized what happened with that first hip and the kind of the problems they went through it, they just said, you know, what quality of life and stuff. We could try to do the other surgery, but no doctor in Spokane would actually do that one, knowing the other one had already had two failed surgeries. That, you know, it's kind of their quota and stuff, is, you know, making sure they have successful surgery. So they just said hip replacement was the only, only option at 33 years old. Double hip replacement.

Wow. And is that a certain composite that they use? I mean, are they. I. Long time ago. I don't talk about this much on the podcast. When I first got out of college, I did about six months of hip and knee surgical sales for a company called Biometric. And so I got to watch a lot of this acetabular resurfacing and replacement of ephemeral head and everything. But do you know what kind of hip you actually wound up getting?

I ended up getting the ceramic on plastic, so I didn't do the full steel. And I guess there's really contraindications in both of them. People say, go this way, go that way. But I guess I had felt my doctor had said it was a little bit better for sports. Me personally, I do a little bit more impactful type sports. I felt like I wanted to have a little bit of cushion in there instead of just like a metal on metal, just in case. Now I'd watched actually right after my surgery, I'm laying in bed and I'm watching a Netflix TV show about surgeries. Maybe somebody knows. And the doctor that was talking about it has his hip replaced. And one of the things he had gotten the metal on metal, and what happened was the metal actually disintegrated in his hip, and it caused some cobalt poisoning in his hip. It made him go crazy, actually. He had some mental issues and stuff like that. And he was a orthopedic surgeon himself. And so he luckily was able to diagnose himself and find out that the hip replacement actually is what had caused him to go kind of crazy. And then they went with the plastic, the ceramic one that I have.

Wow, interesting. Now, I know with the metal, I guess they use like a polyethylene with the plastic. From what I understand, that can actually kind of like wear down over time, just because all the implants are going to shed debris over time. And I think some of the polyethylene can actually lead in some cases to a little bit of. What's it called? Osteolysis, like when the bone breaks down a little bit. Have you looked into whether or not, you know, like, 10 years down the road from now, you're going to have to kind of go in and re upgrade the hip replacement?

Definitely. Yep. And, you know, it's one of those things, I guess, you know, and anybody that's gone through a major surgery, I'm sure, goes through this, especially an athlete goes through a depression, you know, and then some of these major decisions that you have to make that are like, what if, what if, what if? I mean, I can't tell you how many nights I didn't sleep Thinking if I'm making the right choice the night before, the day before, you know, I mean, this is stuff that affects your everyday quality of life because you're constantly thinking about it. I knew going into it I was going to have to have the replacement. I'm an active competitor, martial artist, I'm a high level sport sports person. And so I knew that it probably isn't even going to last the amount of time that they're going to give it a normal 70 year old guy that's just walking down the street. So I had to make the choice. Hey, am I willing to go out there and push this thing to its limits? And that's kind of where I am. I made that choice.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, you never know where science is going to go over the next 10, 20 years anyways. Prior to that point, there's a lot of talk about being able to grow, gosh, everything from organs on scaffolding to certain elements of joints. So they might just be able to grow you a new hip at some point.

That's right.

Or get some kind of injection that just regrows the whole thing internally. I don't know. You can barely keep up with the, with the, the pace of regenerative medicine these days. Now the, the one other question about the, the stem cells that you got, was this stem cell from an autologous source? Like did they take some out of your own bone marrow or, or your own fat or was it harvested from something else?

It was harvested from the fetus. Okay, so. Okay, got it.

Cool. Okay, so I'm curious. You mentioned that you're training sometimes up to eight hours a day. What's that actually look like? Like what's, what's the day in the life of a coach slash professional athlete actually look like?

Well, I mean, just kind of go back a little bit to that hip replacement thing. You know. First of all, I'm doing so good now with my hip replacements, both of them, that I'm, I'm actually able to give, give it kind of my all. So my day typically looks like getting up and being here at the gym. At 6am we do a 6am class and got a lot of professional guys in that, doctors, dentists, police officers and stuff like that at that 6am class. So I love to just get on the mat and train with them. You know, I'm not. Eight hours a day of training isn't necessarily hard grinding, lifting weights and stuff like that, but there's a lot of therapeutic motion that happens in the martial arts. A lot of mental stuff that also needs to happen with training and stuff. So I start my day right, six o' clock in the morning, train with guys that also, also push my mentality a little bit. You know, bring that camaraderie and stuff. And you are who you hang with a little bit. So at 6am, when I've got in some of the leading, you know, plastic surgeons and doctors and stuff around and we're doing jiu jitsu, we're also kind of doing a little bit of, you know, talking and stuff. And then I go from 6am by.

The way, former former podcast guest. I know I was training with you at that time, Dr. Cameron Chestnut. I did, I did a two part podcast series with him on hair regrowth and, and a little bit on regenerative medicine and, you know, skin health and gray hair and all sorts of stuff. And then I think a few months later he started training with you.

He did, actually, yeah, it was, you actually were the one that gave, gave us that connection. Now he's a year into it, solid, solid jiu jitsu guy and he's brought in a few other doctors and stuff with it. So thanks for that connection because he's super cool.

Yeah.

But anyway, so I go from, I go from training to cleaning the mats and then I have a noon class. So I teach at noon another group of people and then I teach little kids class. I start them all the way at 3 years old. So at 3:15 we start our 3 and 4 year old class which is just a half an hour. So I do that class. Then at 4 o' clock I have another class from 6 years old to 9 years old. 5 o' clock I have a class from 10 to 14. Then the adults step in from 6 and 7 o'. Clock. And then sometimes we get some MMA done at like 8 o'. Clock.

So are you training in between all these classes or are the classes part of your training?

You know, the cool part about teaching and anybody that does a sport and stuff is the more that you're active with your athletes and stuff like that, you train, get better. You know, I actually got my black belt pretty fast as compared to a lot of black belts. Right. So I, my instructor is world renowned and he's one of the best instructors out of Rio. And I got my black belt in about four and a half years from him, which is an incredible pace, usually in Brazilian jiu jitsu. But the reason is, is when you regurgitate a lot of information and you teach it, you have to dissect it and find the details and explain them to people with different learning styles and age variabilities and stuff you're training the entire time. If you were to take yourself out of that training mode, then you're probably missing a whole bunch. So I'm sure any coach out there that's maybe even a pickleball coach that you're doing and stuff is probably maybe analyzing games and stuff like that, also coming up with stuff that's a bit of training. If anybody's taking the mental part away from training, then they're probably only training half time. So, yeah, I'm training good eight hours a day with my students. I learn all the time. I learn from the kids as they. They teach me what I can teach, what I can't teach, what levels I can do. But pretty much I'm an engaged martial artist from the time I wake up at six in the morning until I go to sleep.

Yeah, I wish I had a pickleball coach. I'm not that serious yet.

It is, I would imagine, good for overall muscular endurance if you're just on your feet the whole time teaching classes. But as far as your own specialization, I would imagine you're still having to roll with other people besides your students in some of the. In between hours.

Yeah, yeah, I still get like at noon I like to train. One of my. A few of my students here are pretty tough. I got some MMA fighters and stuff. And then like in the mornings we get some training. About 10 o' clock we do MMA. Just more of a private MMA with me and a couple of guys that I know that can be at my level. I'm a little bit more of a rough and tough guy to train with. People aren't wanting to train with me because, like, my name is Smash for a reason. I teach 3 and 4 year olds, but at the same time, when you get me on the mat, my style is not to play around and play jiu jitsu. I'm going out there to win. So I'm a little bit more rough to train with. I don't have a ton of training partners, but the ones I do, they're.

Legit at that level of physical activity. I mean, you mentioned that you pulled out a lot of the stuff or a lot of stops when it came to your hip replacement. And you recovered from that amazingly fast. I mean, I noticed you were already back training and I think already fighting. And so I'm curious, I actually would love to hear a little bit more about the recovery. And then after that, maybe we could talk about the, the. The diet or the nutrition a bit, but as far as the type of modalities that you're using. You mentioned hyperbaric, but what else do you kind of implement for your own recovery?

Yeah, you know, so, I mean, I. To go to the recovery is. I got my hip replacement. It was like March 31st, and then two and a half months later, I competed at the biggest jiu jitsu tournament in the Northwest. And I competed at the black belt level. And I won a gold medal, Beat some solid competitors. My first match, actually, I won by flying triangle, which is where you jump up as high as somebody's neck and wrap your legs around them, pull them back down and submit.

I actually saw you do that once because I watched one of your matches on pay per view at the house. I think you were in Seattle, and it's pretty impressive. The flying triangle.

Yeah, Kind of a signature move I do and stuff like that. But for me to be able to get back after a total hip replacement 2 1/2 months and pull off that move was something I didn't even think I'd be able to do. But I had confidence just kind of through the recovery. So, like I said, I use the hyperbaric chamber quite a bit. I have my own, you know, thanks to you. I. I use it at your house. And it was like three days after using that thing for the first time at your house, I just was like, this is next level. I mean, the difference in the sleep, the, you know, recovery, I just. The quality of life was just, I mean, bar none, it's the best thing I could recommend to anybody. So I'm going to use the hyperparameter.

It's fantastic for the immune system, too. I mean, as far as not missing training days, you eat a lot of. It'll basically disable a lot of the toxins that bacteria churn out while increasing the oxygen concentration in the tissue, making them more resistant to infection. So there's some pretty cool things that go on with immunity, too. I mean, I get in mind. Gosh, I'm in there like five days a week. Like right after lunch, I just slide in for like 30, 40 minutes and do my meditation or catch up on some reading or what have you. And, I mean, I didn't used to get sick much anyways, but I mean, like, I might get ill once every, like, maybe year. It's. It's pretty nuts. And I think a big part of that is just frequent hbot. And it's nice to know that it could have an effect on just your overall longevity as well.

Yeah, you know, and that's what I was hoping for that. But really I was looking, you know, for that immediate recovery. Like I said, I want to get back active to sports and stuff. And even though I wasn't able to get back right away, I'd go in there and then be able to come out and had so much energy that I would lack from not being able to work out and stuff being stagnant in my body. So I used the hyperbaric quite a bit, but I also did some peptides. So I did TB 500 BPC 157. And that was pretty much it. And then I just. I think probably some of the biggest thing was I was really active going into the surgery. One of my first hip surgeries. I actually ran two miles to the surgery. I got there, I was all winded. The baby's like, oh, you ran to surgery? I said, yeah, I wanted to be in shape by the time I got in there. And I think a lot of that, as you talk about it, helps so much. By the time I got, you know, into that recovery process as well.