I have torn the ligaments in my right knee on a number of separate occassions over the last four years or so, most recently while playing basketball. Does anybody know of any good knee strengthening exercises as I am getting sick to death of having it collapse under me.
use weights on your ankle, starting at around 2 pounds. Keep your leg straight and do 5-10 lifts like that while sitting, then do 3 or 4 with just your lower leg. The Orthopedic surgeon I saw when I broke mine had me do that for about 15 minutes every day and it helped a good bit, although the knee will never really be right again. Rob
Wee bit late for that as I have already buggered them both up!!! Sounds like the sort of thing that I need to do. I've been told that the way to do it is to build up my quads as they lie over the ligaments and will hold everything in tight. The other thing that I have to do is lose my belly (and there is rather a lot of it!), unfortunately I'm finding that hard to so as I find myself unable to do all the sports I use as a way of keeping fit (rugby, squash, football and basketball)! Why couldn't I have damaged another part of my body?
When I did my knee's in, the physio told me to do lots of low slow squats and straight leg lifts. Do the squats over a chair, and make sure your bum touches the chair on the way down. Try sticking a handbag or carrier bag with some weights in on your ankle and lifting up that slowly. Another thing thats good for the quads is to get a soft or deflated ball, put it behind your knee and press down on it, then relax the muscles. Do it 10 times on each leg to start with, and build up from there. Doing these really helped me get back from a bad injury Hope this helps
Thank you Kyokushin_girl, I will try that this evening! How long did it take for you to recover from your knee injury and is your knee back up to full strength?
MCL is where the main tear is but I have been told that I also have a little damage to the Cruciate ligament. The ACL is fine.
I'd say its as near full strength as I'm going to get it, its still a bit weak and gives out at times, especially If i'm doing a lot of high kicks. Other than that its Ok, it took about 18 months to get it where it is now though, at least 6 months of that was intensive physiotherapy. You could try asking about ultrasound physiotherapy too, i had that done and it really helped it, but I don't know if its suitable for ligament damage or not.
I asked some acupuncturists about this once and had regular zheng gu shui application recommended to me. Couldn't tell you the recipe for it, though.
One of my friends has also suggested acupuncture but I've got a bit of a problem with needles! Someone also suggested rolfing which I have been informed is actually a form of deep massage rather than another term for throwing up! Apparently immediately after an injury the muscles will try and protect the injured area by taking the strain off the joint as much as possible. This leads to your muscles not sitting in their natural position after your injury has healed. Rolfing is a deep muscle massage designed to return your muscles to the correct position. I've been told that it is extremely painful but very effective. Has anybody else heard of it or even had it done?
I've heard of it before, I also heard it hurts but works. No pain no gain... have a look at http://www.rolf.org
Yes, I've heard rolfing hurts but works also--but zheng gu shui is an herbal mixture. No needles involved. BTW, if you want to try acupuncture, but don't like needles, you could try a consultation anyway. There's treatments that don't involve poking holes in you, like moxibustion.
Hi, there are lots of Teraphys that can help you. To keep up your C.V. and strenghten your leg's it would be a good idea to go jogging in water. Make sure that the water is chest height,this will help with controlled movement of the knee,if at any pain then stop and go to your doctors. If there is no pain try to go at lest 3 tines a week this will help with eney excess fluild if there is eney. The water will help with a masseging effect helping ligament's and eney soft tissue damage . The water offer's a thousand times more resistance than air. It is a grat medium for Rehabilitation.
My left knee was messed up in a car accident and both knees already have the beginning of osteo arthritis from excessive wear and tear. I wear elastic support braces on my knees when I train and that seems to help. Wearing training shoes also helps.
