Saw
Valerie Brill of
Excel Physical Therpay today. Val is still, by far, the most competent physical therapist I've ever met. Probably more competent than the majority of sports med. doc's too. A few questions, a rapidly changing variety of pulls and pushes & even staring at my 2.5 minutes on the treadmill clearly with intense study going on followed detailed observations, good discussion, and, like a prior injury, "does it hurt when I push _here_" nailing a spot that hurts as much or more than anything that I've found myself in dozens of pokes and prods over the past few months. If expert Physical Therapy can fix this, I'm on the right track.
My HHT (hamstring issue solved by pineapple and walking) was _not_ really cured by expert Physical Therapy, and my tendintises (?) tend to be more chronic than most people's, so my self-prognosis isn't optimstic, but we'll do what we can, including, mostly from Val's advice,
At least 8 days of the following, probably modified a bit after that, still with no running until ~3/13, to-be-modified based on progress.
3x/day of
- 5 min. Transverse Deep Tissue Massage right where it hurts, with leg extended
- L-Quad stretch, standing, pull back to involve hip flexor
- (2x/day) L-leg squats, 2x10 reps. (On declining platform, weight on heel, lower leg vertical.)
- L-Quad stretch again if exercised
- ice cube, 5 minutes
Assessment of progress will be hard, but if I can do this w/o my knee getting worse (e.g. worse than no pain during any normal daily activities), and I can run notably farther before pain on a treadmill test next Wednesday, I'll consider it progress.
Based on past experience, this kind of strength training may have a 24-hour-lag increase-of-inflammation effect, just possibly trashing the leg from what was looking like a maybe, possibly, slow recovery in progress (e.g. the ability to run 10 minutes, ice after, and not get worse the next day.) If this happens, my opinion of traditional physical therapy for my injuries will sour much further.