Is my body simply not suited for squatting?

[Viktor]

People that are gluten sensitive can end with painful knees.
You might be, without knowing it

Do a little search of "gluten knee pain"

[Mark Rippetoe]

This is really getting weird. Gluten Knee Pain. Well, alrighty then.

[tertius]

This is really getting weird. Gluten Knee Pain. Well, alrighty then.

Inflammation, doncha know!

Back in the day, it would've been because he was constipated (I find Charlie Atlas's writings on this particularly funny).
Or because of blood parasites. Or because his chi has blockages.
I'm sure you can think of others.

Hell, maybe he's constipated from eating too much wheat, and that's enabling the nightshade poisons from peppers, tomatoes and potatoes to cause blockages in his chi that are allowing blood parasites to proliferate, causing his joints to degrade, and thus he should cut out gluten and nightshades, see an acupuncturist and do a cleansing herbal fast.

I can't tell without seeing how his aura reacts to a plate of spaghetti, though.

[Gunnhild Bruno]

Aside from the cutting issue, you’ve mentioned in this and other posts that you do or have done track and field and that you at one point earlier in your SS were doing “hundreds” of bodyweight exercises and stretches.

So I have a hard time understanding why you are so sure that it is the squatting that is causing the problem instead of revealing that the problem exists. It’s entirely possible for squatting to be uniquely painful when your knees are messed up. Doesn’t mean that squatting is the cause of the problem.

Something like chondrolamacia patellae is generally caused by highly repetitive, low-intensity movements. Like running. Or “hundreds of bodyweight exercises”. Your symptoms seem to line up with something like chondromalacia.

Of course, they could line up with any number of other things as well. Have you had an MRI? If not, how are you so sure that the diagnoses you are receiving are correct?

Also, you’re not making it clear whether the improper tracking issue is something you have decided is happening, or whether a professional who knows his/her stuff has determined this. You do realize that, in normal knees, the patella often has the appearance of drifting to the side in the deeper angles of flexion? If you are self-diagnosing bad tracking and trying to tape yourself as a result (I imagine corrective taping also requires a certain degree of experience/expertise), consider that it may take someone with more experience and knowledge to make that determination accurately.

In addition, have you fixed the form issue you were having a few months ago with sitting back excessively?

As for the cutting, it is stupid to be cutting if you’re still on SS. The point of SS is to take full advantage of the time when your body is capable of simple linear progression. The intensity of the program is calculated for someone who is consuming enough calories to be gaining. The book makes this very clear, and I don’t care to think about how many times Rip has had to reiterate this point over and over again to people who don’t want to believe it. If you short yourself on calories in an effort to cut during this phase, you are putting more stress on your body than you should, period. Injuries, chronic inflammation, etc. can result.

I would take honest stock of what kind of stress anything else you are doing--exercise-wise and nutrition-wise--is placing on your body. And I would wait to worry about a little extra bodyfat until after you manage to satisfactorily troubleshoot what is going on.

Or you could just stop squatting. It sounds to me, honestly, that you’ve already pretty much decided squatting is the problem and that you shouldn’t do it anymore. If that’s the case, then stop worrying about getting anyone’s permission to stop. You should know already that this is not the place to ask for such permission. Whether you’re wrong or right, it’s your life. Do what you think is best.

But if I were you, I wouldn’t decide I understood what was happening without at least an MRI.

[Bronan the Barbarian]

Maybe OP should massage fish oil directly onto the knee. To offset the nightshade and the gluten, you see.

[Carnivroar]

This is really getting weird. Gluten Knee Pain. Well, alrighty then.

Rip, I thought you were into Paleo and all that. They recommend no gluten and nightshades, among other things. It's not superstition.

[Need2Lift]

This is really getting weird. Gluten Knee Pain. Well, alrighty then.

It's tall that damn food. Perhaps a detoxifying cleansing regimen or "juice fast" would help. 175 calories per day is compatible with Starting Strength, no?

(Obviously, if someone has celiac disease, the gluten thing is no joke.)

[mek42]

Do you have the issues when you only squat light?

[Bleve]

Is that anything like Cauliflower ears? We taped 'em up for no reason?

[Tom Campitelli]

There's almost no ache or pain that people don't like to blame on gluten.