Does this sound like you?
- pain located around or underneath you knee cap
- Pain with sitting too long
- Pain with squatting
- Pain with going up and down stairs
- Pain with running
If so, it’s possible you have patellofemoral pain AKA runner’s knee (though you don’t have to be a runner to get it). Essentially, the knee cap joint is irritated. In this article, I’ll give you short overview on this problem and what you can do about it.
Why you have Runner’s Knee
The knee cap joint gets irritated when you put it through more stress than it could handle. So that could be from a sudden increase in activity or training volume/ intensity like going on a long hike up and down a mountain without training for it. High stress and lack of sufficient sleep and recovery could also contribute to the development of an injury in general.
What Not to Do About it
The answer is rarely ever complete rest until it stops hurting. While the irritation may settle down, it does nothing to build up the durability or capacity of that knee cap joint to tolerate the loads you want it to be able to handle. In fact, complete rest may decrease its capacity and important related muscles like the quads and glutes because of the lack of use.
What to Do About it
One quick way to get relief is a quad stretch. The quad attaches to the knee cap, so if the quad is tight, then it’ll add extra compression to the knee cap joint, which it won’t like. Stretching the quad will loosen the pressure and hopefully provide a little relief. But that’s not the end of it. If you want to fix it long term, you have to do some strengthening.
In the early phases when that knee is still bothersome, going straight into strengthening the quads with squats, lunges, knee extensions are not the best idea. Those will come later. It’s best to start with some glute strengthening exercises as it doesn’t typically involve the knee cap much. The glutes can provide more help to the quad during those aggravating activities like stairs and squatting. Here are some ideas using some mini resistance bands (affiliate link):
As the knee is less painful or even pain free, you need to gradually build up the capacity of the knee cap joint by optimally stressing it. This is where squats, deadlifts, stairs, lunges start to come in. It’s best to start with light difficulty, then gradually increase it over time. This is where there’s some minutia and a need for fine tuning. A physical therapist will be able to guide you through these types of exercises, make the necessary adjustments, and progress or regress them when appropriate.
Hope this was helpful for you! If it was, send it to friend who needs it or comment down below!