Knee Pain

My right knee is a mess. I have no cartilage in it and apparently I've developed arthritis. For months now it has been bothering me. Months. It gets slightly swollen, just enough so I have a hard time straightening it out. It feels unstable and hyperextends. And it's super stiff whenever I get up from a chair. I can't squat properly, so I'm relegated to doing box squats. I can't jump or run. I understand getting old, I really do. This body has been around for 55 years and has taken a lot of abuse over the years. I understand that it is wearing down some. I get it, I really, really do. But this knee is freaking annoying. I'm over it. I have seen an ortho a number of times and I've gotten cortisone shots, they don't really do anything anymore. Also, it's not really painful. I don't have much pain, sometimes I do, but it just doesn't work right. But I had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I'm going to need surgery to fix it. UGH!!!!

So the other night I was sitting thinking about my knee. And I got to thinking about how tight my quad was a couple of months ago. It was so tight, I could hardly bend it completely. Weird. Then I started thinking about the knee. Hmmmmm, could there be a connection???? So I got out my foam roller and started rolling my quad. Not bad,it didn't feel that tight. Then I rolled over the inner thigh. Holy Carp!!! I almost went through the roof. It was so incredibly painful. Hmmmm. The pain seems to be in the lower part of the sartorius muscle and the gracilis muscle. We are talking real, tear inducing pain. So naturally I continued to roll it, for as much as I could take - it was painful. So I got to thinking about this. If that area is really tight, it's going to pull on my knee on the inside. This would apply pressure to the opposite, or outside, of my knee. Guess where the majority of the pain is? On the outside, lower leg. Well....this puts a whole new spin on things. Could it be something as simple as a super tight muscle? I don't know for sure, but I do know that I am going to roll it out every single night until it stops hurting. It makes a whole lot of sense. It's pulling things out of whack from the inside causing pressure on the outside. This will cause the knee to swell because things aren't lined up properly. It all comes clear. I'm also considering a deep tissue massage to focus on the leg. We shall see. At this point I'm willing to work on it. As I said, the knee is not painful but it is very, very annoying. Also, being without health insurance until next month, there is not much I can do about it :)

In other news, today is a rest day. I have to get the costumes finished for the box jump tomorrow and I want to be rested for tomorrow. So I'll be sewing most of the day. I also have some assignments due on Sunday, I need to work on those at some point. Tomorrow I will be out all day so tomorrow is out completely. Okay, off to get the day started.