Pain in Knees

[Brock456]

I’ve had pain in both knees for years now even with sleeves. I’ve tried every kind of knee sleeve there is and icy hot cream, warming it up, etc. I’ve always just worked around it.

Smith machine Squats, leg press, smith machine Bulgarian squat, etc

It’s a sharp pain in my knees as I squat down and bend. The lower I go, the sharper the pain. Maybe a year ago I had my regular dr ultrasound it and he said micro tears or patellar tendinitis. I tried one PRP session that didn’t help.

I think I might finally just get an mri and see what’s really going on as it has really limited my leg growth specifically my quads. Hamstrings I can do SLDL’s, curls, etc but not being able to squat low sucks. Hack squats are out of question.

Even leg presses I switched up my technique and went deeper the correct way and that hurt bad which has led me to where I am now with this.

Not looking for a diagnosis, just curious if any guys have had anything similar and what was your diagnosis or results.

 

[Runner1032]

I have had knee pain for many, many years. It limited my ability to do almost anything. It became so bad that just walking on the treadmill would cause my knees to hurt for days. I wasn't able to do much of anything.

What I did was get an MRI to see what was going on. What was happening is that my patella's were laterally tilted to the outside that caused tracking issues. Over the years it just became worse and worse until I had pain just walking.

Anyways what I did to help them is to really, really work on flexibility in my hips. I would hold stretches for 5 minutes to get everything to become less tight. I would stretch daily for an hour. I still do because I am not 100% yet.

Within about 3 months I was able to do bodyweight squats with zero pain or discomfort. Everything actually felt very normal. Currently I am back to being able to leg press with 100lbs and squat 135 with zero pain or discomfort. Keep in mind I haven't been able to do this in 7 years.

I would say get an MRI and then go from there. From there you can see if surgery is the route or rehab.

 

[Canuck54]

I feel your pain here. Aside from reducing the weight and focusing more on the eccentric part of the movement, PRP shots helped tremendously also with working my hips and feet to rebuild the proper movement patterns. I had micro tears and all of that. Almost unbearable. I hope you find some relief.

 

[Anabolic_Beast]

I’ve had pain in both knees for years now even with sleeves. I’ve tried every kind of knee sleeve there is and icy hot cream, warming it up, etc. I’ve always just worked around it.

Smith machine Squats, leg press, smith machine Bulgarian squat, etc

It’s a sharp pain in my knees as I squat down and bend. The lower I go, the sharper the pain. Maybe a year ago I had my regular dr ultrasound it and he said micro tears or patellar tendinitis. I tried one PRP session that didn’t help.

I think I might finally just get an mri and see what’s really going on as it has really limited my leg growth specifically my quads. Hamstrings I can do SLDL’s, curls, etc but not being able to squat low sucks. Hack squats are out of question.

Even leg presses I switched up my technique and went deeper the correct way and that hurt bad which has led me to where I am now with this.

Not looking for a diagnosis, just curious if any guys have had anything similar and what was your diagnosis or results.

I think that the knee pain comes with the territory (especially if you have been lifting hard and brutal for many years with heavy weights). What's going to solve this is very simple: If the exercise hurts (Hurts like...the bad sharp pain kind at any given time..whether immediate or after workout) then don't do it!!! (and the credit for who quoted that above statement was Jay Cutler and B-Boy passed on the word in his posts from a while ago) So for me what it took was to cut the weight in half for the squats (Or in your case all of the exercises that HURT you, which is all of em..right?) and jack up the rep count (You can break it down into more sets in say 5-7 rep increments to keep it easy) Aim for a higher payload. So for me..instead of 5 sets of 315 for 4-5 reps of front squats..break that into 8-10 sets of 225 for 5-7 reps with perfect ass to grass form) or even cut the weight into a 1/3rd and do like 10 sets of 135 for 12-15 reps each. Nothing is worth suffering knee pains and aches for days after a heavy leg day (and if you are having knee pains and aches for days after a leg day..then your doing it wrong).
I think legs don't like heavy weights...with those knees in the way..it's just not natural..more natural for body to go lighter and higher in rep count. I mean..by cutting the weight by 1/2 to 1/3rd..I have MUCH better quad sweep..more endurance..ZERO aches and pains..and not even knee sleeves or the muscle gel cream anymore.

 

[Anabolic_Beast]

And you spend all of this money and time in trying to have these doctors look into your knees and they are just going to tell you that you got damaged knees or whatever. Much of what we did with the heavy weights and the damage we done to em is already done and done. But we can still keep our head sharp and STAY in the game by modifying it a bit and being smart and working with the damaged knees that we have and make the most of it. No problem. Aging and arthritis is just a part of life. No peptide or medicine gonna undo that.
Oh and also..start by eating tons of Salmon and taking at least 5-10 grams of omega 3 fish oil..that'll help!

 

[w8tlifterty]

I have had knee pain for many, many years. It limited my ability to do almost anything. It became so bad that just walking on the treadmill would cause my knees to hurt for days. I wasn't able to do much of anything.

What I did was get an MRI to see what was going on. What was happening is that my patella's were laterally tilted to the outside that caused tracking issues. Over the years it just became worse and worse until I had pain just walking.

Anyways what I did to help them is to really, really work on flexibility in my hips. I would hold stretches for 5 minutes to get everything to become less tight. I would stretch daily for an hour. I still do because I am not 100% yet.

Within about 3 months I was able to do bodyweight squats with zero pain or discomfort. Everything actually felt very normal. Currently I am back to being able to leg press with 100lbs and squat 135 with zero pain or discomfort. Keep in mind I haven't been able to do this in 7 years.

I would say get an MRI and then go from there. From there you can see if surgery is the route or rehab.

I’d like to hear more about specific stretches.. anything you can provide, that’s helped you, would be great.

I was a two to three times a week squatter throughout my early days and competed in both pl and bb. My knees are now shot, despite what I believed to be very good form. The heavy wgt took its toll. I can still squat once a week but the pain afterwards last for days and my work sets are only 315 these days. You mentioned tightness in your hips being a culprit.

Did you ever get to the point that your hips literally felt out of line squatting. I don’t know if it’s a knee tracking issue but I feel as if I have to bring my left foot an inch or so in front of my left (relatively shoulder width distance apart) for things to be smooth and kind of locked in. I can still squat well below parallel but my hips feel out of line? It’s progressively gotten worse as I approach 40.

Anyone in the same boat?? Or has had success correcting it.

To be fair, I hate mobility work and stretching but I’m at the point I need to dedicate myself to getting right.

 

[Blacktail]

I have stopped working legs because of this. I’m on my feet all day for work so I can’t afford to be out for a surgery.

 

[Brock456]

I think that the knee pain comes with the territory (especially if you have been lifting hard and brutal for many years with heavy weights). What's going to solve this is very simple: If the exercise hurts (Hurts like...the bad sharp pain kind at any given time..whether immediate or after workout) then don't do it!!! (and the credit for who quoted that above statement was Jay Cutler and B-Boy passed on the word in his posts from a while ago) So for me what it took was to cut the weight in half for the squats (Or in your case all of the exercises that HURT you, which is all of em..right?) and jack up the rep count (You can break it down into more sets in say 5-7 rep increments to keep it easy) Aim for a higher payload. So for me..instead of 5 sets of 315 for 4-5 reps of front squats..break that into 8-10 sets of 225 for 5-7 reps with perfect ass to grass form) or even cut the weight into a 1/3rd and do like 10 sets of 135 for 12-15 reps each. Nothing is worth suffering knee pains and aches for days after a heavy leg day (and if you are having knee pains and aches for days after a leg day..then your doing it wrong).
I think legs don't like heavy weights...with those knees in the way..it's just not natural..more natural for body to go lighter and higher in rep count. I mean..by cutting the weight by 1/2 to 1/3rd..I have MUCH better quad sweep..more endurance..ZERO aches and pains..and not even knee sleeves or the muscle gel cream anymore.

There’s a difference between pain and discomfort from lifting heavy.

I cannot do 135 squat without a sharp pain in my knees that I described. Its not a “push through it pussy” thing. Or I would. And I have.

Something is off. Need to get MRI.

And you say just don’t do it if it hurts. Its tough to build big legs without staple exercises like squats, leg press, lunges, etc.

I don’t know many guys who built huge legs doing extensions and curls.

 

[Alzadosghost]

I have stopped working legs because of this. I’m on my feet all day for work so I can’t afford to be out for a surgery.

You don’t train your legs at all??? Do you have stick legs and bird calves? Not working your legs your back will eventually cripple you just like all the inmates in the joint with huge upper bodies and the ass and legs of 12 yr old boys. Your core cannot really be that strong if there is no connection with the lower body. Your bad back is going to put you out of work eventually bro.

 

[Anabolic_Beast]

There’s a difference between pain and discomfort from lifting heavy.

I cannot do 135 squat without a sharp pain in my knees that I described. Its not a “push through it pussy” thing. Or I would. And I have.

Something is off. Need to get MRI.

And you say just don’t do it if it hurts. Its tough to build big legs without staple exercises like squats, leg press, lunges, etc.

I don’t know many guys who built huge legs doing extensions and curls.

That makes sense. Yeah you should get that checked out if it's that severe. In the mean time..just focus on the hamstrings. Can you do stiff leg dead lifts without pain (The kind you stand on a wooden box and go really low)? If you can just focus on ham strings, you can get around the other exercises that hurt (The bad kind of hurt) like squats and the mass builders..and just go all out on the hamstrings so you could protect the foundation and integrity of your core strength that the squats are so well known for..whilst still being able to keep your legs strong via hamstring focus AND being able to protect your knees until you can get to the bottom of whats going on inside those knee caps. I know if I had a personal choice to either choose extremely strong quads or hamstrings..I would take hamstrings all day over because they are the underrated core foundation that helps contract in explosive movements with the other stuff you love like benchpresses, deadlifts, etc..

 

[TheRealAphextwin]

Cissus worked for me back in the day. Also, The Labs J-flex is excellent.

 

[Runner1032]

I’d like to hear more about specific stretches.. anything you can provide, that’s helped you, would be great.

I was a two to three times a week squatter throughout my early days and competed in both pl and bb. My knees are now shot, despite what I believed to be very good form. The heavy wgt took its toll. I can still squat once a week but the pain afterwards last for days and my work sets are only 315 these days. You mentioned tightness in your hips being a culprit.

Did you ever get to the point that your hips literally felt out of line squatting. I don’t know if it’s a knee tracking issue but I feel as if I have to bring my left foot an inch or so in front of my left (relatively shoulder width distance apart) for things to be smooth and kind of locked in. I can still squat well below parallel but my hips feel out of line? It’s progressively gotten worse as I approach 40.

Anyone in the same boat?? Or has had success correcting it.

To be fair, I hate mobility work and stretching but I’m at the point I need to dedicate myself to getting right.

This is what I did and what worked for me.

My MRI's showed that all the tendons, ligaments, menisci, cartilage were in great shape. You could tell I have laterally tilted patellas because on the lateral side of the patella you could see bone spurs. Bone spurs occur from bone on bone interaction. This proved that cause of my pain was because of laterally tilted patellas.

The initial thought was to have a lateral release on both knees. I swayed against it because I have had this done previous on my left knee 10 years ago and here I am again with the same problem. The question that I asked is how did the tissue tighten up again?

My answer I determined was my hips, which is pretty much where every upper leg muscle originate. I figured that the outside of my knees was too tight causing the muscle to contract, so I started doing stretched for the left side. Super basic stuff.

I would do:

1) The foot to the butt stretch to stretch your quad. Only only I would use a bigger band around my foot and push the band over head locking out my arm. I would hold this for 5 minutes. Do each leg.

2) Lay down in a door way. Put your leg on the wall and move your butt as close to the wall as you can. This will stretch the hamstrings. Hold this for 5 minutes. Do each leg.

3) Last stretch was lay on your back, legs up and bent 90 degrees. Cross one leg into the other and keep one foot against the wall. Hold for 5 minutes. Do each leg.

I found that these with using a band to strengthen my glutes helped immensely.

The big thing Is that I had nothing else wrong with my knees. If you have structural failures you will have to use alternative methods.

 

[goback2013]

i lazily went through a BPC/TB course a week or so ago. meaning i just pinned .25ml of each vial during the week until each vial ran out. no dosing schedule.
a vial of each. 5mg per.
a couple days ago while playing basketball on concrete i was able to cut without too much pain
yesterday, i went out to the same court, and felt very bouncy.. little pain if any...
no swelling today or even joint stiffness..
i started thinking of what my have changed that my knees feel better.. i forgot about the BPC/TB course
i still squat, leg press as usual. still run my miles.. so my activity level hasnt changed.. so it could be the BPC/TB or
co-incidence.. there is definetly more bounce in my step.. and no longer have the random bone on bone feeling.

 

[goback2013]

I’ve had pain in both knees for years now even with sleeves. I’ve tried every kind of knee sleeve there is and icy hot cream, warming it up, etc. I’ve always just worked around it.

Smith machine Squats, leg press, smith machine Bulgarian squat, etc

It’s a sharp pain in my knees as I squat down and bend. The lower I go, the sharper the pain. Maybe a year ago I had my regular dr ultrasound it and he said micro tears or patellar tendinitis. I tried one PRP session that didn’t help.

I think I might finally just get an mri and see what’s really going on as it has really limited my leg growth specifically my quads. Hamstrings I can do SLDL’s, curls, etc but not being able to squat low sucks. Hack squats are out of question.

Even leg presses I switched up my technique and went deeper the correct way and that hurt bad which has led me to where I am now with this.

Not looking for a diagnosis, just curious if any guys have had anything similar and what was your diagnosis or results.

have you tried body weight squats for reps.. like 100 reps or even 100 partial reps on the bottom half of the movement?
those seemed to have built up strength and stabilization in my knees when i first started running a couple years ago.

 

[btails]

I stopped injecting my glutes. Magically my knees stopped hurting. Such a simple thing I couldn't believe it.

Id suggest giving it a try and see if it works for you

 

[junker]

i been doin teardop squats a la the kneesovertoesguy on youtube. i get tendonitis between the kneecap and thigh muscle up there. but i started doin those and my knees are doing great now.
they look like they'd hurt but no. check em out

 

[Steel_moose]

 

[Pericles]

There needs to be a sticky with what u need to do when you have an ailment so you guys will stop pissing your money away and or make the issue worse
1) find a doc who does ART and dry needling
2) listen to the rehab exercises they tell you to do and cut out the shit that makes the pain worse. If your knees hurt you should probably cutout movements that load you heavy in knee flexion nd maybe think about loading the posterior chain? Glutes and hams maybe?
I could go on but the mindset on here needs to change.

 

[goback2013]

Played basketball on the concrete yesterday. 4on4 half court.
No knee pain.
Played today on an indoor court.
Was able to cut, jump, sprint with
no problems.
Not sure if it was my haphazard course of
BPC/TB, but my knees almost feel brand new. Mind I am not dunking like even into my mid 40s. But I'm still very quick and light off my feet.
20somethinfs and coaches in their 40s all think I'm in my 30s.
Excuse the typos. Not using my
Reading glasses and using normal font size

 

[FartJohnson]

I stopped injecting my glutes. Magically my knees stopped hurting. Such a simple thing I couldn't believe it.

Id suggest giving it a try and see if it works for you

yeah I do subq shots w a slin pin now but years of shooting my ventroglutes must have caused a lot of scar tissue bc my back and knees hurt unless I regularly work the trigger points out. This one is so painful but it makes me feel 20 years younger:

Beyond wear & tear, I feel like joint issues are mainly caused by inflexibility