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| PT attire |
Then it was off to the machine similar to a leg press. I think following that (but I forget my exact order), I did this other leg press thing but it was a game. It was 3 different 1 minute games using the press and then repeat the three games. 1 game was harder than the other two. You had to dodge things or follow a path by moving the leg press.
Then wall squats. The wall squats are too easy. Then it was standing IT band stretch.
Then it was adduction and abduction exercises. Abduction is harder for me with the same weight. But I also start with adduction so that could be why that one is easier.
Then they added another new exercise. It was a bridge but with a theraband around my knees. I was to hold each bridge for 5 seconds. I love bridges.
Then I had to wait for the doctor to come over to do whatever with me. But after some waiting (annoying) the guy came back over and had to go hold a bar and do some squats so he could see my form. Then he told me I was fine after doing a few things. Then it was back over to the bench to wait for the doctor.
But after some waiting (which was annoying) she sent someone over to do laser treatment (instead of ultrasound).
Later she told me that ultrasound isn't effective on IT bands (but that is what they did the past 2 PT appointments which is annoying)
Then the doctor finally came over and did this cocoa butter massage thingy. Then she stretched me out a little bit.
She told me running on a track is stupid. But she also said I need to run on the level. I don't understand how there is level around here w/o a track. It was annoying. She said I am not to do any lower extremity weight lifting on my own (opposite of what I was told before) (annoying). She said swimming would aggravate my knee too and not to do that. She said not to use an exercise bike either.
These doctors can't get anything straight. I have no idea what is right or wrong.
She told me that I can run the marathon and just quit early. She said it will aggravate my knee and it will be harder to heal it the 2nd time but that I should have no problem running at least 10k of it. Except the fact that I haven't run or done cardio in 3 weeks. My endurance is gone. So I'm not supposed to do anything basically at home. How can I get my cardiovascular strength back? Well Tuesday, I'll see a different PT guy and get different instructions that I may like better and maybe I'll do that. She said the only work on my knee should be running from here until the marathon. I'm allowed to stretch and do yoga. Well by allowed I mean that is her recommendation. Mike's (guy from Wednesday) had a different recommendation. Diane (lady from last Friday) had a third recommendation. I think this lady's name was Licia or something. The guy who shows me the exercises is Brit or something but I don't know how you spell it but it sounds like that (but I think Brit is a nickname for Brittney not some guy's name.)Overall the appointment was 1:55. So much for my appointments being an hour to an hour and 15 minutes. I'm going to miss so much work. This is going to suck so bad. They make me wait too long between things and I also do a lot of different exercises/stretches/etc.
I have learned that they take me more seriously when I wear race shirts. Time to wear them from now on.
Have you ever had an IT band injury? How did you fix it?
(Did anyone count how many different things were annoying? I did not but it sure was a lot.)
Update: I forgot to mention that the doctor said my strength doesn't need to improve at all. My leg strength is good. I already knew that but was glad to hear it... except she contradicted other doctors in other things so who knows if she is right.
Oh, man, that is - in a word - ANNOYING!! And incredibly frustrating, too. I always hate when you get different recommendations from different professionals. UGH!!
ReplyDeleteI don't have any experience with IT band injuries. But I hope you heal quickly and are able to get back out there.
That really sucks!
ReplyDeleteI can't believe they said no swimming - swimming is like, the ultimate therapeutic exercise!
- "I have learned that they take me more seriously when I wear race shirts. Time to wear them from now on." Hahaha - it's true.
ReplyDelete- Ultrasound is so stupid. So is electric stim. In all these years of getting injuries and sports medicine treatments, I have never once felt results from either of those two things. To me, they're like expensive placebos (this girl said some similar things about a few other treatments, too - skip to the part about injuries: http://runningtimes.com/Article.aspx?ArticleID=20603&PageNum=2 ).
Alright: down to business.
If I were you and I wanted to run in and complete that marathon, and my doctors couldn't give me a straight answer, these are the things I would do:
- Find a pool, stat. The only way you're going to get your cardio ability back is by doing cardio. This doctor has probably never been a competitive swimmer, so she probably doesn't know about pull buoys and not having to use your legs to swim. (The tough thing about most doctors is that they have never been a competitive anything, aside from in academics, as medicine doesn't seem to be a field a lot of retired hardcore jocks go into, and unfortunately, retired hardcore jocks would be the ones who'd recognize how much more the human body is capable of than what the average person thinks.) She probably does know about aqua jogging, which is less hard on your knees than running, so if she said you can run, then aqua jogging shouldn't be a problem.
- I wouldn't do weight-weights for lower body, just to be safe, but I would duplicate any of the PT exercises at home that you can. The time my ankle was very bad (sprained all three ligaments on the outside, there), they were amazed at how fast I recovered because I did everything they showed me at PT, threefold. Like, they recommended three sets of fifteen of all the Theraband exercises, and I'd do three sets of 45. Or just 150 of them all in a row (as many as I could without feeling like I was re-injuring something). And stretched very seriously after. I'd stick my feet under the couch and back up slowly over 5-10 minutes until I could get the bad foot to stretch as far as the good foot. It took almost a month for it to stretch back to normal, completely. They told me it would probably never do that again. But I did those exercises and stretching 5 days a week, religiously.
It's a time commitment, for sure. But well worth it. If it were me, I'd do the PT exercises at home, as well as any of the foot/shin exercises we've already talked about. If you don't cheat or skip them, you will see results. But you can't cheat or skip stretching very thoroughly, either.
- Ice after you exercise. Every time. No exceptions. 20 minutes (and if you have time, take it off for 20 minutes and put it back on for 20 more). Ice everything that hurts (knee, shins, feet, whatever).
- Wear a knee brace (it can just be one from the drugstore) all the time while you're awake EXCEPT while you're exercising. During exercise, it's just too clunky and sweaty and pinchy on the skin. This worked the time I was recovering from patellar tendinitis. Originally, I was wearing the brace to work out, and it sucked and didn't work. Then a coach suggested using it for stability while not exercising, and taking it off to work out, and it worked like a charm. I had to do two smaller workouts a day to get my mileage back up, but eventually the tendinitis was gone (coupled with doing the aforementioned exercises, stretching, and icing - in that order).
- Eat good stuff. You can eat junk on top of it if you want (don't tell anyone I said that), but make sure you're getting good amounts of protein and veggies/fruits along with your carbs. We all know processed food is bad news, but we all eat it, anyway. However, you'll have room for less of it if you're eating enough of the good stuff to fill you up. You'll recover from workouts (and injuries) faster, and hopefully, over time, have fewer injuries, because you're getting the right fuel.
ReplyDelete- Get a Glucosamine/Chondroitin/MSM supplement, already! And take it every day. Set an alarm; do whatever you have to do to remember to take it, but take it. Most of these supplements start you off with a higher daily dose for thirty days or so, then you can taper off to less. But take it.
The key to recovering from injuries is maintaining strength while keeping them stable and tracking correctly, so you don't cause any new inflammation. If what you're doing is causing more inflammation than you think your post-workout ice session can take care of, stop doing that thing, and work on something else.
I don't know how many workout days a week is your goal, but for now, I'd suggest maybe five. In some kind of cycle like pool/exercise bike/run/pool/exercise bike for, say, the next two weeks to see how you feel. Then after two weeks, turn one of the exercise bike days into a running day and see what that does. Oh man - I just looked and the marathon is in two weeks. So bump that up to pool/exercise bike/run/pool/exercise bike for this coming week, then run/pool/run/pool/exercise bike for the one after it. Plus the PT. Don't do any weights after May 11th.
I bet a lot of these things sound the same as what I always say, because I'm bull-headed and only know what has worked and not worked for me, specifically, so I always tell people the same things. The only way to know if they will work for you or not is to try them and stick to them long enough to analyze the results.
Anyhow, sorry for the long post, and for sounding like I'm yelling at you/telling you what to do, but it's getting down to the wire for this marathon business, and I've been holding out hope that you'll still be able to do it (without getting more hurt)! Good luck!
Revision:
ReplyDeleteHeck. Now that you've said you might be able to switch to the half-marathon, I'd vote for that over rushing back into things.
Pittsburgh is nice for giving you that option (most places won't). There are plenty of other marathons if you're not locked into this one, and it'd definitely be safer to wait and rebuild.
Callie,
ReplyDeleteI specifically asked about doing PT exercises at home and she said no. Only to do the stretching at home. I understand that I should do them every other day if I was lifting on my own so I wouldn't do them daily anyway because I am doing weights at the place heavy enough that my muscles need the recovery.
I didn't feel like you were yelling at me at all.
Also I want to be injury free to pace you for the Laurel Highlands Ultra.
I need some new running shoes. I hear I'm supposed to look at stitching. Do you have any advice with that?
I still want to find a pool. Did I tell you how I called two local places that I found on their websites that they had pools and the one was closed and the other didn't even have a pool.
Someone else told me to ice after every exercise. They said I should do that forever.
The med express lady told me to get a knee brace but nobody else that I have seen has mentioned one.
my knee (IT band) is extremely tender to the touch after PT today or maybe it just is. Does that impact any of this working out?
I think i'd rather not run the race May 15 because I want to do 5-10 other races this year and don't want to be bad off for them
So let me get this straight. She said running is okay (hardest thing on your body out of all the options, and the thing that actually caused the injury in the first place), but swimming is not, exercises that would build strength around it are not, and exercise bike - which you were allowed to do at PT and allows you to keep your knee aligned with no impact - is not. This doctor sounds nuts (and that's coming from someone who is also nuts).
ReplyDeleteI think once you heal, eventually you won't have to be so religious with ice, but it'd probably be good to still do it often. Not after every exercise in a string of exercises, though - only after you're completely done with your workout. You can do more damage continuing to still move cold muscles/joints.
I have no idea about stitching. I think I asked you about that in the post where you mentioned it, but you thought I meant "stretching." I wondered what your doctor said about it. Never thought about it before.
Don't not do a race because of my stupid ultra! I was thinking of not asking anyone to pace this year, since you're injured and I feel bad making Alex come from New Jersey again. It just seems so rude to force people to go run with you when it's going to be that hot and slow.
Well she said it is OK if i wanted to run the race I had to get miles in and then should rest it between and not do other stuff or I will be more injured but basically you are right and she is nuts.
ReplyDeleteThe first lady was also nuts. I liked the middle guy the best.
I meant after every string not just after each individual thing (for the ice)
Oh apparently I can't read the difference between stretching and stitching. I'm trying to find online info on the stitching. I'll update it later.
Also I don't want to run the marathon or the half and then not be able to run my 5ks to get my goal times this summer.
Scroll down to part 2. I can't even find better details and this isn't even exactly what the guy said. I need pictures of the insides of the soles. http://www.aapsm.org/runshoe-running-anatomy.html
ReplyDeleteHeck - this article puts real vocabulary where I normally speak in generalities (trying to describe lasts and midsole stability).
ReplyDeleteWhat kind of stitching did he recommend?
Well he said curved, straight, and in the middle were the choices and that curved is best. not straight. and my shoes he said were in the middle. and they were the one with stitching around the edges of the sole. he told me to go to runners world and get shoes from there that they are better or something.
ReplyDelete