Day 47 - back from the doctor

Well, the visit to the sports medicine doctor was helpful, even if the prognosis wasn't entirely black and white. She doesn't like the range of motion (the lack thereof) I have in my hips. She feels that the most likely cause of my pain is a weakness in the muscles that help keep the knee cap tracking properly. Years of walking with my legs splayed wide made my glutes stronger than the balancing muscles, and that is the likely cause of the pain. She dismissed cartilege issues as being a possibility, becuase she noted that the pain is actually above the joint line.

So, what do sports medicine doctors prescribe most often? Therapy...and a specific knee brace. Yes, I'll need to get in to two therapy sessions a week. We'll start with a gait analysis, and then move into flexibility and strengthening exercises. If that doesn't help moderate the pain over the next few weeks, then we'll consider an MRI. This is a knee I injured 23+/- years ago, and I had orthroscopic surgery on it at that time. If it was actually clicking or locking while I was running, she'd push for the MRI now. We both agreed that we can cross that bridge if the therapy does not help.

My new knee brace will be a patellar stabilizer. She wants to keep the patella (knee cap) from sliding too far to the outside. I say "will be" because the largest one they had in the little clinic I visited today was too small. When they visit their main clinic on Monday, they'll drop one in the mail for me. I'm going to ice and rest my knee over the weekend, and I plan to run on Monday with my double wrap in place. I'm relieved that she didn't put any restrictions on my training.

So, that news was good, and I'm pleased to have lost a few more pounds this week. Now if I could only do something about our uber-screaming, furniture-climbing, fast-walking infant!