It hurts, and you've started working around it
It is the knee on the stairs, the shoulder after tennis, the back you now plan your day around. You move less, the muscle that protects the joint gets weaker, and it hurts more. There is a way out, and it is almost never the operating room.
Mary was thinking about back surgery
Mary wanted a scan of her lower back, and surgery if it showed a herniated disc. I stopped her. I asked what she would do if the scan found one, and she said she would get it fixed. I told her the truth: study after study shows that back surgery usually causes more problems than it solves, and a scan you would act on wrongly is worse than no scan at all. I saved her the scan and the surgery. Her back is already better.
Knees
I have had chronic knee pain since I was a competitive skier, starting at age ten. I have seen doctors and had an operation, and I still had knee pain until I was sixty-three. Then I found the solution, and I have been pain free ever since. Set up a time to talk with me about your knees or other joint pain.
I started getting shoulder pain from serving in tennis. It got so bad that I finally had a "debridement" done, where they clean up torn cartilage in the shoulder capsule. I learned that shoulder surgery takes a year to recover from, whether it works or not. In my case, I wasn't much better off. The thing that has given me bulletproof shoulders is weightlifting. My shoulders are bigger, stronger, and more pain-free than they have been my entire life, and I teach tennis several times a week.
Tennis elbow
For elbow pain, see my page on tennis elbow.
Let's get to the bottom of it
Set up a time to talk with me. Tell me what's going on with you, and we'll get to the bottom of it together. I only work with five people at a time.
Back pain and plantar fasciitis are both things I handle. If that is what is going on, set up a time and tell me about it.