Feeling Kneedy

Trying To Get My Act Together

Most likely, as you’re reading this, I’m being tortured by a jovial but tough physical therapist by the name of Dylan. He’s a good guy, Dylan, a new dad, so at least I know that he’s not getting any sleep as he sets fire to my knee.

Just about 20 years ago, I took a tumble on a steep section of the East Peak of Mt. Osceola. It was winter. I was alone. (I know, I know.) My right boot spike snapped and I started sliding. I whipped my ice ax back and over my shoulder and it caught, but as I turned my body over to my stomach, the spike on my other boot, my left foot, also caught. So my body turned, but my left leg didn’t.

The result felt like a thick rubber band had snapped against the inside of my left knee. I was certain I had blown, at best, a ligament. A bunch of Tylenol and a whole lot of adrenaline later, I made it down. My knee swelled like a basketball that evening.

Later, much to my relief, the doctor told me that I hadn’t outright tore an ACL or snapped anything, but I had messed things up pretty good.

“Keep an eye on it,” he told me back then. “You’re going to have trouble later on.”

Well, it’s later on, and Dylan is trying to help me salvage whatever is left.

Me sitting with a PT trainer in a downtown office gym didn’t happen overnight. Over the years, every so often I’d restrain the knee, or hike so far it would flare up again. But it always seemed to heal up.

That pretty much stopped happening over the past year. The healing up part. My current doctor, after a battery of x-rays, diagnosed it as arthritis, you know the arthritis of the getting old and being out of shape type. But both the doc and Dylan pointed out that old injuries can make it worse, which is likely why the left knee and not the right is the culprit.

Little Bean is ten. She’s fast. We have lots of hikes and climbs and mosh pits ahead of us. If I can strengthen my knee, just a little bit, just enough to extend its life by a few more years, I figure it’s worth it.

Meanwhile, right now, I’m probably doing squats, or Dylan is forcing me to do 30 more side stretches or whatever other unpleasant thing he can think of.

Whatever. I’m not going down easy. But I am curious, has anyone else had knee issues, either serious or minor? Recommend any at home exercises. What worked for you?