Inner Knee Pain - Lotus Pose Not Blooming

By David Keil • November 4th, 2010 • 17054 Views

As much as I've already written about the knee, it never seems to be enough. I often take a poll in workshops when heading into the knee section and on most occasions one quarter to half the students will raise their hands when asked how many people are experiencing knee pain? This isn't necessarily a yoga problem, but it's showing up there.

This is a requested article, someone asked me to write specifically about lotus and the medial meniscus. When I do my unscientific polling in workshops, approximately 80% of those people complaining about pain in their knee, say that they experience pain on the medial side of their knee. Approximately 10 - 15% complain about
pain on the outside of their knee. The remainder usually complains about pain running through the centerline of their knee or around the kneecap. All three areas express stress in the knee in different ways.

Pain on the inside of the knee seems to be the most popular and is almost always associated with the leg being in a half or full lotus position. My statistics are only my own personal and simple observations turned into a working hypothesis. It seems to me that the most common cause of pain on the inside of the knee is compression of the medial meniscus. I say this cautiously because I know that not all pain on the inside of the knee is going to be the medial meniscus. Nor am I saying that because you have pain on the inside of your knee does this mean that you have already torn your meniscus. You may simply be irritating it repeatedly in the same area.

There are of course other structures in this area that can get inflamed or irritated and cause pain on the inside of the knee. Some of these structures are the medial collateral ligament (MCL), various muscles crossing the inside of the knee and even the joint's capsule can get compressed and bothered.

The reason I lean toward the medial meniscus compression is that I have heard so many stories of knees popping with it in the lotus position. Swelling in the back of the knee and sometimes a regular clicking sound often follows the pop. It's also possible that the knee will lock intermittently after the original pop happens. All of these are classic signs and symptoms of a meniscus tear. The best way to confirm if the meniscus has torn is to go to the doctor and have an MRI taken.

What Is The Meniscus Anyway?

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Location:  Miami, US

David Keil was introduced to yoga in 1989 by his Tai Chi Chuan  teacher. Both the Tai Chi and Yoga practice at the ripe age of 17 began his research into his own mind-body connections. As...