At Home PT

Last night was a rough night.  I decided to sleep with my IceMan on for the first time in a few weeks because my knee was extremely swollen and was bothering me all day.  I thought that it would provide me some relief but for some reason, it provided just the opposite.  I could not get comfortable. It was so bad that I was actually relieved when it was time to get up in the morning.

After I got home from work I decided to look up some additional at home PT exercises to try and work out this stiffness and increase my crappy ROM.  I do not recommend doing this, however, it seems that no therapist at the hospital I go to is familiar with the rehab protocol for Microfracture patients (nor do they seem to even know what a Microfracture is; awesome, right?).

I found a couple of great exercises and saw immediate results.  My physical therapist has had me do all of my previously mentioned exercises while sitting up with my arms behind me; however, I decided to give those same exercises (with a couple of changes) a try while laying on my back.  It is insane how much of a difference this made.  First, being able to place my hands on my stomach helped me to control my breathing which helped me to relax which made a WORLD of difference!  After doing my "floor routine" I climbed onto the ottoman to do my heel slides.  Right away I was able to successfully bend my leg a little more than 90 degrees with no pain and very little discomfort.  That is over a 20 degree difference in less than two days!
Also, I was able to do 25 leg lifts all on my own! Before now it would take me a few tries to even get my leg off of the floor and even then I could only do a couple unassisted before I felt intense pain and pressure on the inside of my knee (is that normal?).  I still felt that pressure and some popping/grinding today, but nowhere near as bad as before. 

I really needed today, I have begun to get really frustrated with how little progress I have made lately.

There were two exercises that gave me a little trouble.  One was when I was bending my leg/sliding my heel while on my back.  Somewhere between 20 and 30 degrees I kept feeling this really painful popping/shifting on the inside of my knee.  After I realized that it would not subside, I stopped immediately.  The other one that gave me an issue was putting a rolled up towel underneath my knee and trying to lift my lower leg while keeping contact with the towel.  I did this at PT the other day and it was unbearable, however, I thought it was perhaps because their foam roller is freaking gigantic.  I got the same popping, however it was a lot less painful and eventually it became more uncomfortable than anything.  I made a note of both of these concerns and will be sure to bring them up to my PT on Monday.

Now I'm off to spoil myself with a couple hours of uninterrupted icing.  It's the little things...