A Ray of Light

Wednesday again, which means it was time for my weekly visit to the Physical Therapist. I've been following my stretching and strengthening routines religiously the past week, and was thinking I was seeing some progress in terms of a reduction in the twinges of pain in my knee, but also wondering if I was just trying to convince myself of this rather than actually experiencing it. Regardless, I went for my appointment which started with a 10 minute warmup on the stationary bike, then we rolled through some new strength exercises to add to the regimen (a series of lunges), did some leg manipulation, and then the unexpected happened in the form of a simple question from my therapist ....

"Want to try some running?"

I think I may have flown from the table to the treadmill in a single bound, and next thing I knew I was running again. Nothing strenuous and nothing remarkable, but still, a wonderful little toe in the pool of running again. He checked out my gait to make sure nothing was out of alignment and see if I was favoring anything, and it at least looked good. He let me do a mile, after which we wrapped up the knee in some ice and talked about next steps. Overall it felt OK - no real 'pain', but I could definitely feel the running in my knee, versus before when nothing was ever localized or noticeable. Still doesn't feel quite right, but hopefully that will continue to come with time. Here's what's on tap for the next week:

Strength exercises every other day rather than every day
Stretching regimen once daily versus twice daily
Running (no more than 2 miles) every other day
Ice massage 2x daily, plus ice wrap after running

If nothing is causing pain, and improvement keeps going, today might be my last PT trip. Didn't schedule another one when I left this morning, but we'll see how it goes. Also planning to dive into the world of Yoga this weekend and see what that's all about.

Overall a pretty good start to the day.