ACL Reconstruction & Hot Yoga

If you are reading this you are either researching the best ways to rehab, currently rehabbing or just plain curious.

An Anteriror Cruciate Ligament (ACL) reconstruction of the knee joint is one of the most common surgeries and the recovery time can be up to a year. That is a long time for anybody and even after the instructed rehab has finished for many the pain can still be a problem as surgery doesn’t always mean a pain free life.

This is where the Classic Hot Yoga (26&2 sequence) approach comes in as an aid for your ACL reconstruction rehab.

Before I go into more detail - I have had double ACL reconstruction, and one of my surgeries didn’t go to plan, and the Classic Hot Yoga (26&2 sequence) helped me walk again. And there have been many stories of this working for people.

Combining your physio and Classic Hot Yoga you will be back in action in no time, and you will be able to maintain the health of your knee.

This is a practice to aid your normal physio therapy rehab, or to practice after you have fully rehabbed but please be sure to check with your physiotherapist and doctor before starting.

The following factors explain why the yoga helps those going through rehab and even post rehab.

• The heat allows the joint to relax giving it the stretch it needs.

• The emphasis on straightening out the leg and activating the muscles around the knee joint helps to realign the knee and creates a strong muscular structure to support it.

• The calm and relaxing environment that your mind goes into during practice will allow you work with the tightness of the knee; giving it the safe stretch it needs.

• Yoga pumps fresh oxygenated blood around the body to the knees where they are needed the most and this really helps the healing process.

• The repetition in the sequence balances out the body and builds muscles correctly, giving strength equally throughout the body.

During the practice please do not miss out: Fixed Firm - Supta Vajrasana, this is the knee healer, and even though 99% of "rehabbers" will not be able to do the full expression at the beginning, you must start this – the teacher will guide you and this right here is the knee healer regardless you have had surgery or not! Before you know it you will be in the full expression and happier than ever.

Before you start tell the teacher about your injury, listen to them and also listen to your body – do not strain yourself in any posture.

Using this approach to rehab both of my knees has been an absolute gift - I couldn’t walk after an infection in my left knee reconstruction and, I can say I have been very lucky to have this practice.

If you have any further questions about ACL rehab please email me at – surajyoga1@gmail.com and I will be more than happy to guide you through and give you some tips to get you back to what you love doing most.

Below is a picture of me 10 years on post infection, and you can see the wonders yoga has done for my knees by allowing me to hold this posture and also straighten out the knee joint as much as possible.

Positive Intention

The lesson

When I started practising yoga and meditation Tuwith dedication and seriousness, I did start with the intention to fix my knee, my badly broken, previously septic, intensely painful knee joint that was far more stubborn than a mule. I wanted to heal quickly but the knees take longer to heal than any other joints in the body.

During this time I was very confused, upset, emotional, filled with rage and anger at my situation and in many ways lost. I was lost because not only was I injured and helpless to walk, not expecting the outcome that I encountered post ACL reconstruction, but I learnt something about life at an age the 24, that nothing in this world is promised except death.

I went into an ACL reconstruction of my left knee; thinking that I would come out the same way I did when my right knee was reconstructed, but how that hope went right down the crapper. But the lesson I learnt was priceless, it was in fact, something that I decided to make into a positive lesson, and I didn't know until later I was doing that straight away. I knew that I was going to prove the doctors wrong about them saying I would always have difficulty walking, and never be able to use the full range of my knee, but I really had no idea to the extent of what I was going to gain as a yogi but learn as a human being.

Positive intention pays off

My mentality at the point of being in serious physical pain and being falling in and out of depression was very complex, and the first year was the hardest, I had to adapt physically, mentally, in friendships, relationships, not being able to see people as much, having to fight and try and make people understand close to me why I was extremely difficult to be around but I still kept a smile on my face (most the time). Not only that, I had certain people that did nothing to help me, and I was naive to think others would stop their lives to fit mine; something that took me a while to understand and accept that not all people think the same way you do.

During my yoga practise, I kept pushing through the pain, kept going back to yoga and I kept working at a craft that I knew would help me, because the way I felt after class was much better than I did before, and the logic and science behind yoga just felt right to me, and my body did start to change for the better, and even though it has taken 6 years for me to be where I am today, I wonder where I would be without the yoga.

And all the above came from pure positive intention, something I believe can help anyone going through a difficult time, whether it is yoga you use, or it's tai chi, or meditation, or reading or mathematics; regardless of what you want to achieve in your life if you start it with positive intention you can achieve even more.

And with that mentality, in the crazy world we live in, it can take you much further and to a place where you can understand yourself and others around you better.

I would like to leave you with a quote that I strongly believe in and even though I just wrote it down now, this has been with me internally for years.

"Intention is a powerful thing, and when used with positive affirmation we can achieve more than brilliance, we can achieve anything."

- Suraj Ghumra

I wish you the best of health and happiness with everything you do, and with positive intention, anything can be accomplished.

Thank you for reading.

Written by Suraj Ghumra.