Lifting around an injury

                                                    This is my knee.

Last fall while landscaping, I made a very stupid mistake.  I stepped up too high with my right leg to get up onto the slope at the side of our yard.  I didn't do it correctly.  My leg was too high to engage any muscles and the brunt of the lift went all to my knee (I know better).  I felt it and I heard it but disregarded it and continued to work (me in a nutshell).  But the weeks and months ahead were plagued with knee pain.  I've had my fair share of injuries; do a lot of stuff, your going to get hurt sometimes.  

But at 62, an injury takes a whole lot longer to heal, if it will heal.  So I'm probably about 6 months out from the high step up and it's still bugging me.  It is not a debilitating injury but it is most definitely bugging me bigtime.  So I decided to finally go the Orthopaedic specialist to see what was going on. I wanted to know if there was something seriously wrong or if this was something I just have to be patient with. 

Almost all of my injuries have happened when I was doing activities other than lifting.  Skiing, playing on a floating inflatable water park, landscaping, kicking things etc.  Over the years I've had to deal with many different injuries; some very serious and long term.  

Not working out is not an option for me; not even when I have a serious injury.  So, this mean a lot of focus on engaging the right muscles around the injury without further damaging it.  This one is a weird injury for me; I've had two serious knee injuries before this one and this one is tough.  Basically I have damaged my patellar and quadricep tendons.  I over stretched and paid the price.  So bending my knee is what bothers me.  

I am going to go to physical therapy, hopefully they can do something.  But I'm doing a lot of stretching, careful stretching and lifting around it.  Not easy but I will not stop lifting because I don't want my knee to be weak.  I am also wearing a knee brace when I knee to be sure that my knee doesn't give out on me.  Being commited to remaining strong is very important as we get older.  Muscle atrophy is a very real thing; and injuries can really put a wrench into your workouts if you let them.  

Nope, not stopping.