Pain

It has been my plan to offer encouraging news about my knee and the physical therapy but I am still short and still in pain. The fact is that I am in so much pain that all I want to do is hide my head in the sand. I question the physical therapy's effectiveness but I also question my enthusiam to make it work.

Quite honestly, I feel trapped. My plan has always been to live to be 100, but I can't imagine living another 35 years with this kind of pain nagging at my soul. I feel like my body is at war with itself. My heart wants to run and play, but my body says NO! Surely this will pass.

The Physical Therapy has begun

As per doctor's orders, I have started spending an hour twice a week in the pool and hot tub with a physical therapist. Cute young thing, almost 20, telling ME what to do! She is very patient and sympathetic about the pain so I try to not take advantage of her gentle nature.
I am told that all of the exercises are for lengthing the muscles in my back and legs. In my mind, I visualize lengthening my leg muscles and back muscles and becoming 2 inches taller. After all, I am almost 2 inches shorter now than I was when I graduated from HS. Standing up straight also seems to make me taller, but it hurts to do that. However, I think the therapist thinks that lengthening my leg muscles with take some of the stress off of the joint, wherein lies the pain.

After getting into the pool, my exercises consist of walking forward across the pool 3 times, walking backward across the pool 3 time, then walking sideways 3 times. That is easy enough. Next I hold onto the side rail of the pool and do various types of squats, holding them for 20 seconds each. I think I do 10 each of those.

After that, comes the hard part...getting my wet body out of the pool. My legs have become used to the weightlessness of my body in the water, then slowly but surely they have to take on all of that weight again. My legs are weak for lack of exercise, even though I walk a lot, I do not WALK seriously because me knees have been hurting so much.

The last part of the therapy consists of getting into the hot tub, putting floating devices under by head so I don't go to sleep and drown. The therapist at this time proceeds to take control of my body, stretching the muscles along my spine by messaging as she helps me stretch. Then while I am so relaxed, she works on my hip joints with her thumbs, trying to release some of the tenseness.
That only takes about 20 minutes. Then I am done and headed for shower.

My insurance pays 90% for physical therapy. The therapist charges $120 per hour. Guess that is only half what the doctor charges. It is all good, though. Afterwards I feel great because I am doing something good for myself.