Nov 17, Noon: Adductors!

Yesterday's yoga class was a good one. I didn't skip any postures, worked hard, had fun. I think the teacher was off a bit, losing his voice at one point, and correcting himself in the dialogue often, but it wasn't until the end of class that I realized he was off - as those things were happening, they just went in and straight out of my mind. I also felt like we held some of the standing series postures for not long enough, but we did a 1 minute Fixed Firm and a 1 minute Camel to make up for it. I stayed in both the whole time.

The best part of class yesterday was the chat I had with another teacher, Claire, after class. As I was putting on my shoes to leave, we started chatted, and I think it was about 20 minutes before I left. I really miss that from my old studio - yoga talk. In that studio, there was a waiting room area with benches right outside of the hot room, so after class, many of us would plop down for a few minutes to catch our breath before heading into the change room, and people would always end up chatting. In this studio, the hot room is upstairs, and the lobby is downstairs, so everyone just files out of the hot room into the changerooms, and there isn't as much interaction between students and with the teachers.

What Claire and I were talking about is various types of knee pain and the leg muscles. She has been having knee pain since she started practicing Advanced. I have had some pain in the tendon/ligament (I don't actually know which - need to look at an anatomy book) on the outside of my right knee. I know what it is from - I am often rolling my weight out on the outside of my foot on the one-legged postures. However, I have a hard time rolling it back to centre. I need to use the muscles on the inside of my thigh more (adductors? I get adductors and abductors mixed up). But, those muscles are weaker than my quads and the outside ones (abductors?), and I have a hard time just finding them when I need to use them. Claire suggested that I take some classes off, but I don't really think that will help. I might get some relief for that tendon, but I also won't be doing anything to build that muscle, either. When I am in the standing series and the couple other postures where this hurts, I really concentrate on the inside of my thighs, and try to work on strengthening them. The knee pain will only go away once I build that strength.

Claire also suggested that I do some exercises at home to build that muscle, then. I said, "Oh, like that evil machine at the gym where you squeeze that thing together with your thighs?" (I don't actually go to the gym, but I have been in one before. ;) ) She said yes - and that I could do the same thing at home with a yoga block or something similar. Brilliant! I don't have a yoga block, but I tried this last night with a rolled up yoga mat, and it totally works. I am excited to have this extra bit of knowledge and to use it, and to hopefully see improvement more quickly.

No yoga class for me today - I have an appointment this morning and one this evening, and they are both right in between when I would be able to get to class. Could've done the 6 am, but I figure after 13 days in a row, I can take one day off. I am thinking about doing another double on Monday, too.