Wham! - Injury...

I'm not 21 any more. I have experienced an overuse injury in my left knee, possibly related to a severe car wreck i had in 2003 where my shin and knee slammed into the dash, and a follow-up ankle / MCL sprain last year that actually got me back on the bike. The injury occured when last week in the gym, as i was pushing up the end of my 3rd set of 8 plates on the leg press, i noticed tenderness in my outer and inner knee, as well as my ham and calf. I have now been referred to a sports medicine osteopath. It sounds like i have a possible range of problems, from just a pulled ham, to IT band tendanitus, to MCL and PCL problems from my past car wreck that had been previously hidden due to my relatively low state of activity, to possibly all of the above. The worst is that i have to wait for 2 more weeks until i see the osteopath and can really know what to expect. The good is that I am 31 and through this have found a personal trainer at KU med for a very affordable monthly fee that is going to help me through this problem no matter what the diagnosis. Basically, if I ain't dead, I can overcome.

There is no doubt that my left leg has built differently in the past 3 months than my right leg - as my right quad is noticibly larger and more powerful than my left. I have even began compensating for this on the bike, as I think back to recent hard rides, by developing a right quad and left ham unbalanced pedal stroke. As one can imagine, I'm pretty bummed out right now. But, when there is crisis, there is always opportunity as well, so I'm looking forward to getting this matter straightened out, getting my legs balanced, and being stronger than I have ever been.

Annika is giving me lots of perspective an support, as one would expect, but I could use some encouragement if its out there - any kind of "you can do it's" or "I came back from a similar injury" type statements would be worth their charactars in gold right about now. I have included a diagram of the knee just to illustrate the complexity of the joint - which is porportional to my whirling internal conflicts related to this injury.