An Alien Signal in Your Knee

You manage to injure yourself: hurt your shoulder throwing a ball, tweak your knee walking down the stairs, sprain your ankle tripping over a curb. The injury heals, but the pain persists. What’s up with that?

First, there’s the injury. And the anxiety around the injury, which makes the pain ramp up. There is the impatience (stress) of waiting for the injury to heal. Why is it taking so long? Stress is a driver for pain. You want to protect the injury so it doesn’t get worse, so you stop using it. Let’s say you injured your knee. It still hurts from 4 months ago. The injury has healed, but you have been protecting that knee ever since the injury. How do you protect it? You use the other knee. You step up using the other knee, verbalizing that you have a bum knee and have to “baby” it. When you do use it, sure enough, it hurts. You have just created your own never-ending pain loop.

With piddling to no use, the tissues around the knee become stiff. You move even less, because now, any movement hurts. The tissues become stiffer, you become more immobile. Stairs are out of the question, take the elevator one floor. You expect the pain when you move your knee, and your brain complies. Ow! You created this new pain pathway. It stays in your brain forever, and anytime stress kicks up, your pain returns in that knee.

Myelin surrounds the nerve, reinforcing and strengthening the pain signal. It’s an erroneous signal. You created it by reinforcing, verbally, your pain, and babying that knee. Non-movement makes it worse. The pain will increase with less stimulation. Sometimes, if you think about the pain in your knee, your knee will begin to hurt. Mind over matter has a huge impact.

Try this: Do not move your knee (because it hurts), instead; move some other part of your body. Move hands, eyes, hips, head. Movement sends endorphin (feel good) signals to your brain. It clarifies the virtual map in your brain about how your body is functioning, helping you to function better. It distracts you from thinking about your knee pain. Movement is the answer whatever the question.

Gentle stretching helps. The tissues are stiff from non-use; they could use a little massage and stretching to come back online. Passive, gentle stretching increases tissue flexibility, which in turn, allows more pain-free mobility in the knee. When the knee can move, it needs active stimulation and this creates a new neural pathway so the knee can function again. And then keep that knee strengthened through some kind of exercise that works it. Walking is perfect.

That’s Aging Intelligently