Yoga is being considered as a low- impact exercise. Yoga can bring inner peace and a flexible body. Yoga is one of the oldest practice forms or art that is bring practiced by the people over many years of times since from olden days. Yoga can be divided into a wide range. Yoga is being taken up as a regular practice by people. It is added to the workout plans. Yoga is said to strengthen the body. Few types of research also proved that yoga increases immunity, inner peace, and strength. Well, there are many reasons yoga can be a better solution for the depressed mind too. Back to the topic that Yoga for bad Knees. What could be the reason for a bad knee? Well, it may be injury or other several reasons needed to be looked up. But yoga for bad knees could a little risky business for the knee and the body. Well, let’s take up a look at this topic and discuss the views over here below.
Is that ok to be with bad knees for yoga?
There is a question that most of us have, safe to practice yoga? Yes, yoga is a safer practice for the body proposed by Olivia Zurcher a 200 RYT yoga instructor in Des Moines. That is when we have an injury or other physical complications then you are advised to take tips from the experts or the instructors. It doesn’t matter practicing at home, studio with an instructor, gym, or other practices. The thing is you must tell your instructor or trainer about the bad knees or injury. So if you can get a modified workout that avoids discomfort in the body while practicing. This modified practice can also protect the knees from further damages. Over-exercising can also lead must pressure to the knees or bones that could end up with an injury, ligament tears, etc. This information can help your instructor to provide you the key to protect yourself.
It all depends on the type of injury:
A physiotherapist who teaches clinical yoga admits that one potential of doing certain yoga depends on the type of problem they have physically. For example, it is very discomforting to bend down fully to the person who has the problem called meniscal tear (cartilage problem included specific pain in joints of the bones). They cannot sit up on child pose also will be a difficult task for them. You know yoga can be used as a healer tool. They can suit even for bad knees people, which adds up the title “yoga for bad knees“. Yoga is used to stretch joints for the people who suffer from tear or arthritis. It can be an effective way for them to reshape themselves. At first, it will be a difficult chore to do. But regular practice can give effective results. One of the biggest advantages of yoga is that it can suit all types of people. It can be customized according to their needs. There are floor sequences that can help the process yoga for bad knees. These floor stretches will safeguard the knees without many risks. There is less harm in them and of course, it makes the knees intense.
What modifications can be done?
First, we should allow our body to try different stretches or transitions. This transition phase has to be done step by step process. It can’t be done overnight. If there is any pain in the process, then skip those steps. So that leads to harm so be careful at what you do? This is the simple modification to be done at basic. It is advised not to over bend on knees and also not to hyperextend on the straight position. Here are the few modifications for knee positions.
Warrior II poses a triangular pose: Activate the leg muscles mainly your quadriceps. That can avoid the hyper extending of knees.
Half pigeon pose: When doing this pose the total weight of the body drops to legs due to gravity. Do don’t practice this pose regularly. Better to skip them.
Child’s pose: In this phase knees are under extreme flexion to place a block or bolster under to get a comfortable seat.
These are few general and basic modifications can be done. But there are few more poses to be modified for the regular practice people. They are listed below.
Half frog pose: When doing this pose proper alignment of the body should be taken care of when jumping use the props that can save you.
Deep side lung pose: This pose aligns the hips over the ankle. So go a more comfortable state, without placing the seat on the floor. It needs much strength so hold careful. Stay stable.
Toe stand pose: This toe stand pose is difficult. So we should maintain stability and do not stress much on the knees.
Lotus pose: Lotus pose looks simple but it needs external hip rotations. So there should be a flexible body and alignment must be good at the body. Don’t stress much on knee points. That leads to joint hyper extending.
How does the body indicate yoga is ok for the knee?
The body tells us a few indications where it can accept it or not. Body cause pain when it cannot accept. That is when a part of the body is stretched too much or pressured the nervous system to send chemical messengers to the brain and that indicates pain on the body. When certain pose causes pain it’s ok to get out of it. Don’t do anything with pain, which leads to harm to the body. Don’t adjust poses when there is a sharp pain indication, which means it will cause delicate harm on nerves or ligaments. No pose is worth risking the body. When yoga is ok for knee it makes ease on the body. Just keep observing the body when you do yoga. How it tunes and works on the body. This is a good observation that can help you from damages.
Yoga could help with a bad knee:
Well, we have discussed that over-exercising can make injury. But a coin always has two sides right? So yoga can be effective on the bad knee. Certain yoga is effective on a bad knee and people have experienced it too. Well, we can get on that reliever exercise.
Foam Rolling:
Foam rolling can hurt a bit but it can positively make wonder. Yes, it is a good hurt. The rollout can be done on a few parts like
a. Gluts
b. Hamstrings.
c. IT bands (sides of the thigh)
d. Quadriceps.
e. Calves.
Reclined hand-to-big-toe pose (Supta Padangusthasana):
This pose helps in relieving the body cramps and body stress. This doesn’t need rotations, abduction, and adduction of hip. But this stretches the knees evenly on both sides.
Bridge pose (Setu Bandhasana):
This poses a focus on inner thighs and soothes pain in knees. It attracts stress on inner thighs and helps to relieve pain. Here, pelvis, knees, and muscles around are balanced.
Banana pose (bananasana):
This may not look that suits knees pain. But this helps in pelvis stress relief. So it soothes pelvis and comfort knee zone too. So it can make release mental stress about knee pain.
Mountain pose and chair pose (Tadasana +Utkatasana):
This two pose activates the muscles on the legs and engages them. Mountain pose works on alignments of the body. Then chair sitting makes gluts, knee, and heels stronger.
There are a lot more poses that can be effective on the knees and encaging the knee muscles. The above mentioned are few important relievers for the pain. So this could work on bad knees.
Reasons for bad knees:
The knee pain can be caused due to the few regular mistakes that we make on our routine. Overweight on the body can stress the weight on the legs. Wearing heels for the long periods and making regular stress on leg muscles. Over stretching muscles when we do workouts. Old age people often deal with this knee pains and joint pain problems. These are caused due to less calcium intake in the diet. Regular practice of only one pose for a long time can scratch knee bones and make calcium dissolve on blood. Ligament tear, tendonitis, arthritis, torn cartilage, and sprained knee ligaments. These complications can be the main causes of knee pains. The knee pain should be consulted with the doctor and medications to be taken. There are many ways to identify knee pain causes like x-ray, CT scans, MRI scans, and arthroscopy. This technology tells the exact problems inside the knees. Some medical complications are to be done accordingly by surgery. This could comfort the knees from the pain. People follow home remedies to get relief from pain like applications of oil, ointments, and pain killer sprays. Apart from this all insufficient diet can also lead to this pain. There should be a proper diet maintained. Vitamin D and calcium intake is a must for bones and joints. Fiber-rich foods also needed to be included in the diet. These are the few relief techniques discussed above.
Yoga for bad knees – Conclusions:
Yoga for bad knees is a bit a large topic that needed to be discussed. Yoga is like a coin that has both advantages and disadvantages. So we should be very careful about the matter of yoga. Wrong practice can cause a few complications. Yoga can give the best relief too. Yoga is for inner wellbeing and then physical wellbeing. So yoga for bad knees can work wonders but under proper guidance.