Man Bullied For Underbite Waits 6 Years For Surgery

post, where he explained that, “since I was a teenager, I’ve had quite a pronouncedunderbite.”

“This resulted in pretty bad insecurity,” he explained of the gap, which was approximately the size of a marble. “Smiling was off-limits for me.” He struggled to share photos from his graduation, or when he cycled across Europe, he explained, because he was so self-conscious of his jaw — which often attracted unkind comments from strangers.

One night out with friends, “this drunk guy standing next to me was like ‘What is wrong with your jaw?’ “ he said, perDaily Mail.“He was ripping into me and being really nasty about my underbite. That has stuck with me for so long.”

But after waiting on a six-year-long list, McLuckie, who hails from the English city of Manchester, was finally able to undergo surgery to repair his jaw this past July. During the grueling, six-hour longdouble jaw surgeryhis top jaw was moved forward 11 millimeters, and his lower jaw was moved back 4 millimeters.

“It’s so unbelievable strange to see your face change overnight, especially in such a drastic way,” he wrote in his TikTok. “All the doctors were saying I looked like a different person and this is what I wanted to hear.” But the surgery was just the beginning — Luckie underwent an “arduous” three-month-long recovery process, which included severe nerve pain, and where “liquid diet and rest was the prescription.” As he toldDaily Mailhe had to drink milkshakes out of a baby bottle.

Four months after the surgery, he decided to see friends socially. “I was in the pub and I went to the toilet and there was a mirror where I could see my side profile. When I saw this, I looked like a completely different person. I smiled and my bite line was perfect,” he said. “I loved who I saw even though I was still swollen and not fully recovered,’ he added.

McLuckie isn’t the only one who’s had to get used to his new look: “Every friend I’ve met since surgery, there is a period of adjustment about five to 10 minutes where they look at me. They know it’s ‘Luke’ because of my mannerisms but I don’t look like ‘Luke’ and they look at me like a stranger and it takes them a few minutes to warm up.”

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As he toldDaily Mailhis physical challenges were just “10 percent” of his problems.

“The rest is mental and how you view yourself and how confident it makes you. We need to raise awareness of this condition and how bad it is to have an overbite, underbite or misaligned jaw. If you see someone on the street or someone you know and you’re judging them because they don’t look quite right, the looks are just the tip of the iceberg,” he told the outlet. “That person is suffering from not being able to eat or breathe properly, not sleeping well and not liking what they look like in the mirror either.”

PEOPLE has reached out to McLuckie for info.