Part 1 of 4 · How to Relieve Knee Pain
Chronic knee pain is the second most common form of chronic pain in the United States. Plenty of people live with it for months or years without ever being given a real way out.
I have spent the last eight years helping people reduce chronic pain, and over that time I have put together the exercises and stretches that have helped more than a hundred people get their knees back. This is the first of four posts working through all of it.
It happened to me on my own stairs
There was a stretch of weeks where every night, after a long day of work, climbing the stairs to my apartment sent shooting pain through my knees.
What I eventually noticed was that I was leaning forward as I climbed. That lean was putting my knees way out in front of me and making them work far harder than they needed to. I changed how I climbed and the pain stopped almost immediately.
It was not damage. It was position.
Start with what you do every day
Your daily activities are usually a bigger part of your knee pain than anything you do in a gym. Whether that is sport or simply climbing steps, it is the repetition that adds up. So before we get into calming the overworked muscles down, which is next week, it is worth fixing the everyday thing first.
The stairs fix
The pressure going through your knee depends on how gravity is acting on it. So when you climb steps, look at where your knee is.
- If your knee is travelling out ahead of your toes, that is very likely a cause of your pain.
- Instead, climb with your knee stacked directly over your shin and your weight through the whole foot.
- That one change will reduce or remove the pain for a lot of people straight away.
The takeaway is simple: the position of your knee over your shin is the thing to watch. Spend a day noticing when your knee drifts forward of your toes and whether that is when it hurts. Then work on keeping it in a better position throughout the day.
The other cause, and the honest answer about it
The last common cause is weight. When there is too much load going through the joint, it gets overwhelmed by the pressure. I cannot solve that in one post, and we will come back to the habits that address it, but if weight is the driver of your pain then adjusting your diet and starting a food log is a real place to begin.
What is coming
Over the next three posts I will take you through the rest of it: calming the overactive muscles down, lengthening what has gone tight, and then building the strength that keeps the pain away for good.
Knee pain can be genuinely debilitating. It does not have to be permanent. If you would rather have someone work through this with you in your own home, book a free discovery call.
This is part 1 of four. Part two covers self-myofascial release, and how to calm an inflamed knee down.
Written by
Kristoff "Kris" Warsaw
Kris is the owner and head trainer at Versed Fitness, training clients in their own homes across Baltimore, Towson and Pikesville. He specializes in working with people whose joint pain has made ordinary exercise feel impossible.
