Weak in the Knees

     Have you ever had a nagging pain that just wouldn't go away?  Well, I have been experiencing pain in my right knee for several months now.  I went to see my doctor, and he said I needed to go see a physical therapist.  So, off to therapy I went.

     During my first session, I had to talk to the physical therapist about my pain level, where the pain was located, and how often I was feeling the pain.  I explained to him that this was not happening everyday but only when I exercised.  I told him that I wanted to exercise more so that I could stay in shape, but after one workout session, I was in pain for days.  He formulated a plan especially for my condition and started me on it immediately.

     At first, I only had to do some leg raises to begin to strengthen my thigh muscles.  Then, I was doing scissor-leg raises to warm up my outer thigh muscles.  Next, he put me on a squat machine (this thing about killed my thighs). He set the timer for four minutes—seemed a lot longer to me.  After my squats, I was asked to balance on a soft beam, one foot in front of the other, until the timer sounded.  Afterwards, I was asked to balance on the same beam, but this time, using only one foot—talk about hard.  Then I was told to sit on a table.  The therapist was going to help the pain and discomfort in my knee by hooking up electrodes to the muscles surrounding my knee.  I thought this was going to be painful, but I found out that it wasn’t so bad.  I watched the muscles popping on my leg.  It was a really strange sensation.  These electrodes were also attached to an area of my leg that made my calf muscles and my toes twitch.  It had a tingling sensation.  After fifteen minutes of this, the therapist removed the electrodes, and I was free to go.  I had to go back the next day and do it all over again…boy was I sore!  The one good thing from this is that I am no longer in pain. YAY!