Leg Training with Messed Up Knee

N_Robinson · November 5, 2009, 1:07am

Hey all, so about 6 months ago my knee started to hurt. im not sure what caused it but yeah it just started to hurt. i thought it would go away so i gave it about a month or two and decided to get it checked out. i got an x-ray and an mri and they said they couldnt find anything wrong with it. they told me itd be a good idea not to do any leg training. so i didnt. however my knee isnt getting better. not only is not gettig better but because of lack of trianing my legs have shrunk in size and strength.

I am wondering if anyone has had knee problems like this and what they did to help it out. the pain is above the knee cap toward the midline of the body. so the upper right part of my left knee. i have started to do high reps with leg press to jsut get some blood flowing in there. i am very tempted to just say fuck it and start training legs with the pain. Any advice would be appreciated!

Nate

HK24719 · November 5, 2009, 2:44am

See a different doctor, preferably one who specializes in sports medicine.

Iron_Dwarf · November 5, 2009, 3:53am

I’m no doctor of course, but it sounds like tendinitis of the patellar tendon. Do not train through pain!

Up your intake of fish oil caps, and magnesium supps. Stretch it and foam roll it daily. Work on exercises that do not hurt it (now would be a good time to really focus on hams). Tendinitis sometimes takes a long time to heal. It took me 8 months last year to clear up.

And as HK said above, see a good sports med Doc.
Chiropractors are often helpful here.

N_Robinson · November 5, 2009, 4:45am

yeah i was thinking of seeing a different doctor. only thing that sucked was last time it cost like 900 bucks for the xray and mri… pretty ridiculous haha especially for them telling me nothing. and yeah i was actually thinking about focusing on some hamstring training! focus on the deadlift or something. oh and would doing high reps on the leg press just aggravate the injury further or help it out

sam_sneed1 · November 5, 2009, 2:11pm

Do you have insurance? If so , see another doctor and he could prescribe physical therapy. Then find a physical therapist office that doesn’t charge co-pay and get that shit worked on.

on_edge · November 5, 2009, 7:36pm

[quote]Iron Dwarf wrote:
I’m no doctor of course, but it sounds like tendinitis of the patellar tendon. Do not train through pain!

[/quote]

What he described isn’t Patellar Tendonitis. It might be tendonitis of the Vastus Medialis (sorry if i butchered the spelling).

What I’ve found about my knee health is it gets worse with less activity. So an injury is a catch 22 for me, I can’t work out so the knee health gets worse. The more I can do as far as weights, sprinting & plyos, the healthier my knees get.

So, my best suggestion is to figure out the things you can do and make sure you do them. Also, get your knee thoroughly warmed up with heat before working out or maybe just use a knee sleeve (my knee caps hate those things and do much better with a Cho-Pat). Ice after working out and/or at the end of the day may be helpful as well. Good luck.

on_edge · November 5, 2009, 7:40pm

[quote]N. Robinson wrote:
oh and would doing high reps on the leg press just aggravate the injury further or help it out[/quote]

Try it out and see. Start with your feet as high as possible on the plate so you are using more glutes and less quad and feel it out from there.

N_Robinson · November 5, 2009, 9:30pm

[quote]on edge wrote:
Iron Dwarf wrote:
I’m no doctor of course, but it sounds like tendinitis of the patellar tendon. Do not train through pain!

What he described isn’t Patellar Tendonitis. It might be tendonitis of the Vastus Medialis (sorry if i butchered the spelling).

What I’ve found about my knee health is it gets worse with less activity. So an injury is a catch 22 for me, I can’t work out so the knee health gets worse. The more I can do as far as weights, sprinting & plyos, the healthier my knees get.

So, my best suggestion is to figure out the things you can do and make sure you do them. Also, get your knee thoroughly warmed up with heat before working out or maybe just use a knee sleeve (my knee caps hate those things and do much better with a Cho-Pat). Ice after working out and/or at the end of the day may be helpful as well. Good luck.[/quote]

thanks alot man that was very helpful.

dankid · November 5, 2009, 9:56pm

Do some research on here an dother sites. There are plenty of articles on knee health.

Its always a good idea to listen to your dr., but sometimes their advice isn’t very good. I mean if they couldn’t find anything wrong with it and told to stop training legs, thats kinda silly to me.

You can try to find another dr. if you have the money and patience, but I know how you feel. Almost any time Ive had somthing similar to this, it cost me a lot of money and the dr.s didn’t really offer any help.

It usually comes down to figuring out what you can and cant do and working around it while trying to make yourself more injury resistant (stability, mobility, strength etc.)

If you are going to try to train around it, be reasonable with what you are doing. Start out slow, dont go overboard with teh frequency, volume or intensity. Dont do stupid things, like plyometrics, or 1rm squats. Take note of what makes it worse, and figure out why and avoid these things.

Do lots of research so you have some knowledge going into this.

Main thing is be smart about it. If you are trying to keep your leg muscle, and strength, then dont go running. Im not sure about leg press, i’d probably rather go with some single leg squatting type movements and deadlifts.

Good luck man. If all else fails, get a pair of sweat pants, and throw out all your shorts.

N_Robinson · November 6, 2009, 1:39am

[quote]dankid wrote:
Do some research on here an dother sites. There are plenty of articles on knee health.