Injury

Today I am one week away from completing my Bikram Yoga 60-Day Challenge. The one benefit about this yoga is that, with regular practice and time and patience, you can work out and fix injuries or imbalances that have been around for years. That's what is happening to me now.

I first experienced knee pain during my first season of college soccer. As I recall, the pain wasn't prevalent during soccer practice but I remember pain climbing into and out of my lofted bed, along with pain that would wake me up during the middle of the night. Now that kind of pain is back.

I've tried ice which seems to make it way worse. Heat seems to be more helpful so I'll sleep with my knee resting on a low-heat heating pad. The pain still wakes me up but I can turn the heating pad back on and fall back to sleep. The pain has also been progressing in yoga. At first it only hurt when my leg was bent at about at 10-20 degree angle with weight on it, but now it hurts even when I lock my knee and tighten up my quad muscles (which makes Bikram really difficult). For several days I decided to lay off of it any time I felt any pain. But that seemed to make it worse! So I'm experimenting with pushing through some of the pain while still being protective of my knee.

The good news is I have scheduled an appointment to see an orthopedist who specializes in sports medicine (and treats the Cleveland Indians during Spring Training!) who will hopefully be able to diagnose my pain and give me treatment options that will allow me to continue to be active. I can deal with the pain, I just want to know what is making my injury worse or better.

The not knowing is making my yoga practice difficult, annoying, and unsatisfying. I hate not being able to do the postures or do them to their fullest extent. This is funny because some days all I wanted was a break! It also leaves my body somewhat out-of-whack and uneven. But the show must go on!