Working around injured knees

[Craig]

Hi,

When I injured my knees, a while ago, I just stopped going to the gym altogether because I didn't want (or knew the first thing about how...) to adapt SS to my condition. Having stopped going to the gym for 2 years, I regret my decision.

My rehab just never really worked and the process was horribly slow. I concluded now that I should go to the gym and somehow try to get a decent workout without engaging my knees too much, until they are okay.

Now, while I read quite a bit about SS and its lifts, I'm not particularly educated in terms of weight lifting. What are some of my options that would be in line with SS ?

[Mark Rippetoe]

What happened to your knees?

[Craig]

They started feeling shaky during some lifts (squats, deadlifts) and somewhat uncomfortable post-workout. Then, after a few weeks of this, I had to stop my training in the middle of a squat set because I felt sharp pain in my right knee. After that workout, I chose to take a few days off and got an appointment with a sports doctor.

Getting medical help ended up being pretty complicated and slow (I'm Canadian, I think you are familiar with our health care system), but I eventually got the following diagnostics : The general practitioner said I had chondromalacia patella, prescribed some mild analgesics and told me I should drop the offending activity.
The sports doctor said I had knee tendinopathy and prescribed physiotherapy. She also told me orthoses could help.
The physiotherapist couldn't name the problem but described it as some kind of misalignment. She told me not to squat until my bodyweigth squats are pain-free. I've been following her rehab program for a while.

At this point in time, my knees still hurt in everyday life (going up and down stairs, doing nothing standing up for a while) and rehab-wise I'm starting to look into orthoses.

[Mark Rippetoe]

I should have put this in Repetitive Inquiries, but since I didn't: these are all bullshit diagnoses. You squat form was wrong and you irritated your knees. Squat correctly and they will stop hurting. Post a video when you gather the courage.