I suffered a seemingly minor knee injury in training last night and could use some help in finding the middle ground between taking it easy to avoid further injuries/pain, yet very actively working to increase recovery time and return to training. My own conclusion for the time being is I suffered a grade I strain in my LCL and/or lateral meniscus.
It happened during a session of live wrestling. I was in the process of resisting a takedown attempt off a single leg grab. My partner had my left leg secured in his chest and bent 90-120 degrees at the knee. He was driving forward to finish the shot and, in the course of trying to get my weight back with my free leg, I ended up hitting the ground with my left leg cradled out in front of me so my lower leg ending up perpendicular to my body during the time of impact and absorbed most of the force. There wasn't any pop or dramatic pain right away. Just kind of a minor ache in the knee. I actually disregarded it and did some further training on the ground not long after without any real issue. Although the knee continued to feel somewhat off during the rest of the session.
I iced it when I got home for the night and didn't think much of it prior to going to bed. However the knee pain was a bit more pronounced when I woke up this morning. It is still very manageable pain and is not even in the same league of discomfort from when I tore my PCL or ACL in the past. The pain is most quickly produced when I push on a certain spot on the outside of my knee, or when I rotate my heel counterclockwise to rotate my lower leg inward. I've still got no discernable instability, swelling or decrease in range of movement. I feel like I could likely train at 40-50% intensity without it being too much of an issue, but I think the rotation or torque of high intesity standup wrestling or kicking a heavy bag would prove pretty uncomfortable.
Unless signs of a more serious injury develop, I don't plan on going to see a doctor. Knee ligament injuries don't fall under a general practitioner's range of competencies. Conversely, the only Ortho's in the area I trust have long waiting lists and my injury obviously isn't severe enough to warrent an emergency appointment.
So I'm going to be doing about it on my own. My overall plan right now is a few days of extensive stretching & light knee mobility exercises to keep my knee limber & reduce any deep down stiffness or swelling. I'm planning on utilizing heat prior to stretching sessions to losen the ligaments up, then ice at the end of the sessions to avoid any additional swelling or pain from the exercises.
I'm looking to return to training as soon as possible. I can't afford to loss too much time by being overconservative and babying an injury as I was hoping to enter a competition in early october.
So my question to those who have experience with low grade knee injuries is the general timeline for how long you should stay off it completely and how long one generally needs to "take it easy" afterwards?
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